[Elecraft] K3 Display is Dated...

[Luis V. Romero]

I completely agree with Ken K6MR! 

I rarely, if ever, touch the radio. I sometimes twirl the main VFO knobs,
but frankly, out of habit.

90% of my interface is via the computer keyboard (N1MMLogger +. Oh, yes, I'm
one of those "Durn Contesters!").  

But there are very interesting things on the horizon. 

I had a very long talk with Tom Wagner, N1MM at the Dayton Contest Suite
Friday night while Spurious Emissions played in the other room.  He showed
me his new Logger feature: I call it "Active Bandmap".  It's a bandmap
window that integrates live information from an Icom 7300 spectrum display
and the spotting network data and displays it, dynamically, right on the
logger screen.  It integrates spots, signal strength and labels the pips
with the callsign from spot data.  

I have a friend with a 7300 and will start playing with this feature next
week (I have a repeater to install this week <sigh>).

This, folks, is what I attempt to do on my P3 display (I do not have the VGA
option, it doesn't do much for me). Marker A. Twist the P3 knob. Drop Marker
A on a pip. Push the knob in. Call the station. Repeat.  But don't do it as
much as I want to as it takes my hands off the keyboard.

I have *ALWAYS* wanted to be able to do this right on the N1MMLogger screen,
under N1MMLogger *KEYBOARD* control (Shift Up Arrow/Shift Down Arrow. I'm
not much of a mouser.).  Tom has implemented the functionality EXACTLY as I
envisioned it. But it currently works only on an Icom 7300 and, in the
future, other similar Icom transceivers. (Yes, I know Flex rigs can do this:
No I don't think their receivers and Maestro's touch screen workflow are not
up to the challenge. yet.) 

I am aware that details towards the implementation of this functionality has
been made known to Elecraft. Tom basically has developed an "API" that
defines how to format serial data to create a similar display from any
modern Panadaptor display equipped transceiver with serial or "faux" serial
over USB communications capability.  

I would recommend that the contest ops among us (and others who like this
kind of stuff) investigate this functionality in N1MMLogger + and see how it
may improve your Search and Pounce workflow efficiency.  

I also *strongly* encourage Wayne and Eric and the Elecraft Product Managers
to start down the road of implementing this functionality before
Icom/Somebody else comes out with a radio that challenges K3's performance
capability.  

73

Lu Romero - W4LT
Tampa, FL