[Elecraft] K3: advice about options to buy?

[Craig D. Smith]

Good decision on buying the K3, John - you will love it!

For your intended usage, your option selections will be fairly
straight-forward.  Good choice on the internal tuner - it is great.

You will save lots of $$ by not needing to buy many roofing filters.  The
stock 2.7 KHz should meet 90% of your needs.  If your intent to do more CW
comes to pass, then the 400 Hz would be my recommendation.  With these two
filters, you should be all set.

The General Coverage BPF option is a good one to have.  In addition to
opening up the K3 for BCB and SW listening, it will allow its use as a piece
of high quality test equipment.  You will have ability for calibrated RF
voltage measurement over entire HF spectrum.  But I HIGHLY recommend also
purchasing the KXVA3 option.  This will give you higher sensitivity on MW
and also allow you to bring out the K3 IF for use with the P3, etc.  At
$110, this is perhaps the biggest bang for the buck of all the K4 options.

No need for the high stability reference option.

If you have the $$ now, or if you want to anticipate a future purchase, then
go for the P3 - it is AWESOME.

        Enjoy the K3 and 73    Craig    AC0DS