[Elecraft] Modularity

[Vic Rosenthal]

All this talk about onboard computers (or not) and operating systems in the K4 has me thinking.
My K3 is serial no. 0007. I have had it since the beginning, and with a few simple upgrades, it is almost as capable as a new K3S. But the computers I had back then are long gone.
What I would like to have in the K4 is a backplane architecture. The entire radio except for a control head would be located on plugin boards that could be swapped out easily for testing, customizing, or upgrading. The ENTIRE radio. The K3 goes in this direction, but not far enough.
One of the options would be an onboard computer. You could use the rig without it or with an external computer if you wish. Maybe it would come with some version of Linux, but you could put another version of Linux or Windows on it if you wanted. You could upgrade it easily when it became obsolete.
Yes, this would cost more. But with the savings available from modern automated surface mount construction, maybe it’s possible.

Victor 4X6GP