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Huh? / Re: Letter: For DX With SDRs, It’s Not the Same As It Was? OK, my take.
« on: July 11, 2025, 2140 UTC »
Hey All,
I will chime in with my 2 cents and
“ sad” story .
I am DEFINITELY OLD SCHOOL when it comes to radio reception.
I want it to come and hit MY antenna, and play on MY receiver .
BUT… My BIG ham farm on the apt roof had to come down. ALL of it ( N1NQC / General, QRT/ expired).
And NOW I get hit with around 5 DIFFERENT types of building generated QRM.
Some of it is BIG.And at least one type ( “ Warble “ QRM on AM bcast ) can often not loop directionally null or tilt out .
If you are in a hot spot, it can be everywhere 3 dimensionally.
Again, you can sometimes move to other rooms and maybe lose it. But of course, it’s strong in the bedroom.
The UP side ( if there IS one) is that SOME types of noise can be reduced or eliminated by moving around in the apt.
Ex.it’s very strong near the walls ( which of course is my bed side op position). But 5 or 10 ft out some of it sometimes can be tamed or even eliminated.
I could write more blah, blah / boo hoo details about noise, but I think you get it.
My only FIXED antenna is a 33 ft square bedroom loop that doubles back and has both ends available at bedside.So it can be used end fed or as an actual loop.FWIW, the loop is stood up on ceramic insulators above the door /window moldings. So it has a little bit of free air.
But being horizontal, it’s at least 22 db down from AM bcast polarization.Marginal to crappy .Around 9 or 11 AM broadcast locals on a single tuned crystal set . Hoping to pump those numbers when ant tank , big litz , etc are done.
But just even NYC Dx (from here at Boston ) may be a crap shoot, even on a high end crystal.Again,22 db or more down .
The indoor “ 40 M square “ is decent to good,at times , on 60 M and up.
IF I can dodge the bldg QRM , which is spaced across most of HF .
Ex. 10 WWV , 40 M CW QRP frqs and a number of others get crushed.In between can be fair to good. But if you are hit with it, you’re all done.
AM broadcast loops and tilt
work “ variably” per propagation and dumb luck.Occasionally fairly well.
And yet after ALL of this sob story, I still only use SDR’s “ occasionally “.
I recently had a HUGE amount of domestic Chinese broadcasts along with other
“ rare” broadcasts ( SE Asia, South Pacific, etc) on SDR.
AWESOME, HUGE FUN , but still not MY QTH or rig.
So I DO like SDR’s and will use them in the future.
At times.
And often just for quick checks rather than long sessions.
But I still like to squeeze out what I can on the pathetic remnant of what was once a very good station.
I love a challenge😜.
NQC
I will chime in with my 2 cents and
“ sad” story .
I am DEFINITELY OLD SCHOOL when it comes to radio reception.
I want it to come and hit MY antenna, and play on MY receiver .
BUT… My BIG ham farm on the apt roof had to come down. ALL of it ( N1NQC / General, QRT/ expired).
And NOW I get hit with around 5 DIFFERENT types of building generated QRM.
Some of it is BIG.And at least one type ( “ Warble “ QRM on AM bcast ) can often not loop directionally null or tilt out .
If you are in a hot spot, it can be everywhere 3 dimensionally.
Again, you can sometimes move to other rooms and maybe lose it. But of course, it’s strong in the bedroom.
The UP side ( if there IS one) is that SOME types of noise can be reduced or eliminated by moving around in the apt.
Ex.it’s very strong near the walls ( which of course is my bed side op position). But 5 or 10 ft out some of it sometimes can be tamed or even eliminated.
I could write more blah, blah / boo hoo details about noise, but I think you get it.
My only FIXED antenna is a 33 ft square bedroom loop that doubles back and has both ends available at bedside.So it can be used end fed or as an actual loop.FWIW, the loop is stood up on ceramic insulators above the door /window moldings. So it has a little bit of free air.
But being horizontal, it’s at least 22 db down from AM bcast polarization.Marginal to crappy .Around 9 or 11 AM broadcast locals on a single tuned crystal set . Hoping to pump those numbers when ant tank , big litz , etc are done.
But just even NYC Dx (from here at Boston ) may be a crap shoot, even on a high end crystal.Again,22 db or more down .
The indoor “ 40 M square “ is decent to good,at times , on 60 M and up.
IF I can dodge the bldg QRM , which is spaced across most of HF .
Ex. 10 WWV , 40 M CW QRP frqs and a number of others get crushed.In between can be fair to good. But if you are hit with it, you’re all done.
AM broadcast loops and tilt
work “ variably” per propagation and dumb luck.Occasionally fairly well.
And yet after ALL of this sob story, I still only use SDR’s “ occasionally “.
I recently had a HUGE amount of domestic Chinese broadcasts along with other
“ rare” broadcasts ( SE Asia, South Pacific, etc) on SDR.
AWESOME, HUGE FUN , but still not MY QTH or rig.
So I DO like SDR’s and will use them in the future.
At times.
And often just for quick checks rather than long sessions.
But I still like to squeeze out what I can on the pathetic remnant of what was once a very good station.
I love a challenge😜.
NQC
.