I can help with some of these (though I'm clueless on the NB...) It helps if you visualize the "passband" of the receiver as a small part of the entire RF spectrum that the radio lets into your speaker (or headphone.) This would be similar to a movable and resizable window on your house - so you can move the window to different places on your house to see different things outside (or make it larger/smaller to see more at once or less at once.) This window analogy, being visual, makes things easier to visualize...
Notch: This is like blocking out just a tiny portion of your "window." For me, it's most useful for those times that a LID decides to spend an hour tuning up and their tuning carrier is right in the middle of my "window." In SSB, the K3 will (by default) use "auto-notch" - so it'll look for a carrier within your passband (window) and automatically block it out. The best analogy I can come up with would be that the sun is shining directly into your window, so you put your hand between your eyes and the sun. Thats a "notch filter." Width: Simply, this is the size of your window. Usually, you only want to "see" one thing at a time, and for SSB, that width is 2.7. However, when stations are too close together, you can make that window smaller so that adjacent stations aren't interfering with your view. (If that adjacent station is putting out splatter or a really wide signal, this might not help...) I usually end up shifting (see below) when messing with the width. Shift: This is just moving your window around on your house. If you look out your window and there is a naked guy that you don't want to see on the left side of the window, you can just move the window a bit to the right. Of course, now you might be seeing something undesirable on the right side... Ideally, a combination of shifting the window and making it narrower (width) will let you see only what you want to see. NB: No idea how this works on the K3. The documentation suggests the NAR/MED/WID "if" settings are useful for some types of noise and the DSP settings are useful for other types of noise - but I haven't seen anything that narrows it down more than that. NR (noise reduction) is a mechanism of pushing the audio through a "DSP" (computer program) to try and clean it up. My understanding is that the DSP works by analyzing the audio and only letting through audio that forms certain patterns (such as speech) as opposed to completely random audio. The different settings for NR use slightly different mechanisms to try and clean thing up, some more aggressive than others. The more aggressive mechanisms tend to be more "destructive" to the audio which gives it that "hollow" or "echoing" sound. Take care Gary / k3wow On Jul 8, 2010, at 1:34 PM, Jeff Hall (W6UX) wrote: > Hi, I've been searching for some operating tips on how to strategically > employ the following K3 controls: > > - NOTCH > - NR > - NB > - WIDTH > - SHIFT > > As good as the manual is, I still feel like I don't understand how these > really work and when I should use them to get the best possible results. To > date, I've been randomly turning them on and off, adjusting their various > settings to see what they do. But I'm hoping some of the experts here can > explain how and when they like to use each of these controls. > > I have been using my K3 for about 4 months. Lately, 40m has been a little > more noisy for me (about 4 bars of noise). I suspect its QRN, but there may > be some QRM as well. Activating the noise blanker (NB) will usually drop > the noise by 1 S unit. Recently, I've been fiddling with the NR settings to > improve the signal quality (this was very helpful on last night's 3905 40m > SSB net - the noise without NR on was just horrible). > > I don't understand what the different NR settings are doing, as you move > from 1-1 thru 3-7. Going from 1-1 to 1-4, it sounds like the person on the > other end is moving farther down a long hallway - the signal gets more > faint, disappearing into a surrounding quietness. 2-1 and 3-1 sound very > similar to 1-1. And, I don't understand what NAR1,NAR2,NAR3 through WIDE1, > WIDE2, WIDE3 settings on the NR feature are doing for me. I don't notice > much difference no matter what I select with those. > > What about NOTCH? I don't seem to notice any difference whether it is > engaged or not. > > Finally, I can sometimes use the WIDTH control to reduce interference from > nearby signals, but if someone is booming in 2 kHz away, I can't seem to > shut them out. Anything else I can do here? I am not sure what SHIFT is > used for, perhaps this can be utilized? I have the 2.7kHz, 1.8 kHz and 400 > Hz filters installed. > > Thanks for helping a newbie! > > 73 de Jeff, W6UX > ______________________________________________________________ > Elecraft mailing list > Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net > Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html > ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
