Frank, K4FMH, is one of my fellow “presenters” on the ICQPodcast. He is also Professor Emeritus at Mississippi State University, where he taught statistics, survey research methods, and GIS/Remote Sensing over four decades. In other words, he’s a pretty smart guy.
His latest effort is a study that compares a list of popular HF transceivers and receivers sold in the last 50 years by these three criteria:
- retail price
- measured receive performance by Rob Sherwood NC0B
- overall satisfaction as reported in the reviews on eHam.Net.
The full report will appear in the National Contest Journal in two parts, with Part I in the current issue. Frank has, however, agreed to let me publish the chart below that summarizes the results. (Click on the chart for the full-size version.)
These are pretty interesting results. I currently own a Flex 6400 and an Elecraft KX3, and my previous rig was an IC-7300, so I’m feeling pretty good about my selections.
I think the one criterium that could be a bone of contention is the eHam reviews. One could argue that they’re not a great indicator of customer satisfaction, and whenever I read reviews there, I take them with a BIG grain of salt. As Frank points out, however, they are “our only consistent source of such consumer satisfaction measures across a wide array of ham radio products, including HF rigs.” In other words, it’s really the best we have.
Anyway, what do you think about the study? How does your rig rank? What nit would you like to pick with this study?