[Elecraft] K3 Future Factory Hardware Updates; + New beta f/w release 3.27

[Brett Howard]

I've not had a chance to spend a lot of time with the new firmware but
here are my initial impressions.

The NR seems to be really great in CW (but I liked it a lot in 3.25 as
well).  It seems to fade into the new settings a bit quicker and not
need to be turned off and back on again.  Although I find myself being
impatient and still doing that at times.  I did however go up and try
it out on some SSB stuff and it seems to really round out and muffle
some of the SSB stuff.  I found the signals easier to copy with the NR
off than on.  However the NR in CW is quite impressive at pulling out
some of the weak ones.  Its not doing such a good job that I'd not be
able to make copy with out it but for me who is a bit green on copying
its nice to be able to take many signals and make them sound near
perfect.

One detriment is that when setting the radio to PB CTRL = 0.1 before
it seemed like there was a lot more low frequency response and that
the bottom two bands in the EQ finally did something for a change.  Is
there something that one can do to get that audio back?

Testing the auto notch in a labratory type environment I inject an S9
signal and then notch it I get 43dB of attenuation.  Inject a 1uV
signal and I get 10dB of attenuation.  Both make the signal generator
sound as if its been turned off.

~Brett

On Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 10:52 AM, Eric Swartz - WA6HHQ,
Elecraft<eric at elecraft.com> wrote:
> Hi Roy,
>
> As of today, we have made the following enhancements to all K3s leaving
> the factory:
>
> K3 VFO TUNING NOISE REDUCTION  (requires f/w 3.25 or later)
> K3 AUTOMATIC FRONT END PROTECTION  (1 wire mod)
> K3 IF OUTPUT BUFFER GAIN MOD (For the P3, LP-PAN etc) (1 resistor value
> change)
>
> Based on feedback form those that have tried the preliminary release of
> these changes, we are comfortable with adding them as standard K3 features.
>
> Please note that the last item, the IF Output Buffer Gain mMod, is
> slightly different than the similar N8LP mod some have been performing
> on their K3s independently. We determined that only one value needs to
> change to implement the gain increase for the IF output. We are changing
> R8 from 1K ohms to 13K ohms.   (Those that have made the N8LP mod may
> also leave it as is.)
>
> Also, we are releasing new beta f/w today, MCU 3.27/DSP 2.24. This is
> already available on the web page at:
>
> http://www.elecraft.com/K3/k3_software.htm
>
> This release includes:
>
>    *ADDITIONAL NOISE REDUCTION (NR) IMPROVEMENTS.
>    *AUTONOTCH depth improved.
>    *SHIFT=.01 FIXED WITH LOW SIDETONE PITCH (300 Hz).
>    *VFOs NOW TUNE DOWN TO 490 kHz.
>
> We never sleep in Aptos! :-)
>
> 73, Eric   WA6HHQ
>
> Roy Morris wrote:
>> I would like to know if is the intention of Elecraft to incorporate the K3 AUTOMATIC FRONT-END PROTECTION mod and the K3VFO TUNING NOISE REDUCTION mod in future PC boards.  If so, I plan to install these mods in my K3s.  Roy Morris  W4WFB
>>
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