The K3/100 kit I ordered last December arrived. It went together
fairly smoothly (in about ten hours), and there were no error
messages when I powered up. I also ordered Rose Kopp's cloth case
which is attractive, well made, and perfect for packing the K3 in my
roller board when I go to France for the summer.
My only gripe is with the owner's manual. I have never used a
software defined rig before, and I found the description of the
various menu and config choices fairly baffling. Somehow (with help
from Scott and Dale), I've got the K3 functioning well on both SSB
receive and transmit, but I have little idea of what, exactly, the
numerous parameters actually mean and how they interact with each
other. Also, the acronyms tend to pile up a bit mercilessly. It
would be great if there were an extended discussion of all these
choices, a description of possible starting values and an explanation
of what would change (and how much) if one chose different
parameters. In brief, I would love a 'K3 for Idiots' type
manual. Is there any chance that some kind soul would prepare such a
document. Of course, it would have to change with software updates,
but this would be less difficult in the absence of any need for a
hard copy. Although the reflector has discussions of such matters,
it would be nice to have a coherent (and authoritative) discussion in
a single place of such topics as 'how to use the K3 to pull weak
signals out of the noise' or 'what can be done - both good and bad -
with AGC.' Of course, I could join other K3 users in discovering all
this stuff by trial and error, but with all the available variables
to play with, this could be life's work.
Given that the K3 works well already, I suppose I could decide to
leave well enough alone, but the manual leaves me with the distinct
feeling that one could do much better. Alas, the reflector makes it
clear that I could also do much worse as well.
73,
Dick, KA1SA
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