(1) Perseus is an excellent receiver in the
traditional metrics: Sensitivity, Selectivity,
Stability, and Strong-Signal Handling. Bandpass
and notch filters are superior to traditional
crystal, mechanical, and L-C types. The
synchronous AM mode is superior to that in the
Drake R8A/R8B and even the vaunted Sony ICF-2010
portable. Besides the manufacturer-supplied
software there are other programs which will
operate the receiver. Of course spectrum
recording is indeed the "killer app" especially
for those of us who go to a prime seashore or
mountaintop location and scoop up top of hour
+/- 3 min. files containing way more DX than
could ever be managed with station-by-station
tuning. Typically this would be around sunset
here on the East Coast or sunrise out your
way. Or just about any time of night if a
full-boogie aurora is in progress, such as we had here late March.
(2) You can still use tunable antennas and, of
course, use the Perseus for live
one-frequency-at-a-time DX as you would use
something like one of the traditional war-horses
(AOR 7030, R8B, R-390A, HQ-180A, SX-28A,
etc.). You can even use a tunable antenna and
capture spectrum maybe up to 200 kHz width
(peaked freq. +/- 100 kHz) with tolerable
sensitivity depending on the Q (quality factor
or, in layman's terms, sharpness) of the tuned
loop, preselector, etc. It is true that the
majority of users are interested in broadband
capture. Also, with the high noise levels in
most residential buildings, indoor antennas of
any type are losing favor. There are quite a
few Kiwa, Quantum, and d-i-y box loops
collecting dust these days, even for users of
conventional receivers. Outdoor antennas are
what you need now in most settings unless you
have taken extraordinary measures to keep your
home RF-quiet. One cheapo Chinese wall-wart in
the wrong place can crap up reception for a
hundred feet or more in all directions. If you
have a half dozen or so of these things charging
cellphones, powering cable boxes, etc. - not at
all unusual - kiss using your indoor antenna
goodbye. So what do we want in outdoor
antennas? Figure-of-8, omnidirectional, and
cardioid pick-up patterns are all relatively
easy to produce. The Wellbrook ALA-1530 will
give you a traditional loop figure-of-8 pick-up
and broadband reception at the same time. It's
small enough to mount on a mast strapped to a
chimney or elsewhere on a roof. If you want to
rig a rotor for it, just be careful that leads
going to the rotor do not transfer house RFI to
the antenna. For omnidirectional pick-up, there
are numerous active whips out there. MFJ,
Clifton Labs, DX Engineering, and others have
offerings in their catalogues. If a cardioid
pattern is what you want, the terminated loop is
what you need. Here on Cape Cod, much of the
interference is from the New York City area at a
bearing of about 255 degrees. Meanwhile, the
opposite direction 75 degrees, is a good one for
Trans-Atlantics. Similarly 345 degrees points
towards the Boston area (also NH and Montreal),
so I get quite a bit of interference from there;
the opposite direction 165 degrees is great for
the Caribbean and South America. At least at
this site, cardioid-pattern antennas are "what
the doctor ordered". The Kaz Delta, Flag,
SuperLoop, Ewe, Pennant, DKAZ, Waller Loop,
Bowtie, and K9AY are all variations on the
terminated loop theme. You can get by with a
fairly small one at a hopped-up shore site but
increasing the size definitely improves signal
capture and reduces (or eliminates) the need for
a preamplifier. Bruce Conti's website (
http://www.bamlog.com/ ) has a wealth of
information about these antennas. Also see the
K3KY Flag and Pennant Antenna Compendium (
http://www.angelfire.com/md/k3ky/page37.html
). Google search around and you can find
write-ups by DXers such as Dallas Lankford, Bill
Whitacre, Mark Durenberger, Neil Kazaross, and
the late John Bryant. One can also go with the
Beverage or the random longwire antenna and take
whatever directional pattern they get. To
minimize electrical noise, use a transformer to
isolate station / mains ground from a separate
"field ground" (radials and/or ground rods).
(3) At present the SDR receiver other than
Perseus that has the greatest appeal to serious
DXers is the Winradio Excalibur. Bruce Conti
and others have put that model through its paces
in real-world settings both at home and on
coastal DXpeditions. There are also competent
models made by RFSpace, Quicksilver (QS1R),
Afedri, and Elad. Guy Atkins, Bjarne Mjelde,
and other "power user" DXers can chime in with
their recommendations since they've had their hands on numerous SDR's.
I will be interested in reading what others have to say.
Mark Connelly, WA1ION
South Yarmouth, Cape Cod, MA, USA
(GC= 41.6931 N / 70.1912 W) (= 41° 41.59' N / 70° 11.47' W) (grid FN41vq)
Receiver: Microtelecom Perseus
Antenna 1: Cardioid-pattern SuperLoop: 10m vert.
by 11m horiz. (peak 165 deg., null 345 deg.)
Antenna 2: Cardioid-pattern SuperLoop: 8m vert.
by 15m horiz. (peak 75 deg., null 255 deg.)
See http://www.bamlog.com/superloop.htm for similar antenna type.
-----Original Message-----
From: Pete Taylor <ptdx@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: IRCA <irca@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; NRC <am@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sat, Aug 8, 2015 7:05 pm
Subject: [NRC-AM] THREE NAIVE QUESTIONS
Not exactly hyper-skilled in the technical
arena, I am considering buying a Perseus and have three questions:
(1) Above and beyond its ability to record wide
expanses of the spectrum, is it an above-average receiver?
(2) I have a couple of indoor loops which
obviously you tune for max signal strength
frequency by frequency. What are the Perseus
antenna needs so the whole band is at max?
(3) Are there others besides Perseus which I
should be looking at for simplicity or other reasons?
Thanks.
Pete Taylor
Tacoma, WA
12225w 4719n
HQ180 & ICF2010
Kiwa aircore & Palomar loops
DX398, SRF-59 & M37V
Eton E100 + Tecsun PL-300/380
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