AOR-AR8000 Any good?
Justin Devereaux
Firstly, is it any good? I was initially planning to get a Yupiteru MVT7100,
but is this better?
Anything to look out for?
Replies quickly please, as I'm due to collect it tomorrow (Sunday) night.
Cheers all!
Justin Devereaux
this mean you can't independently select which mode you want to use?
Cheers!
Justin Devereaux <jus...@hellraiser.demon.nospam.co.uk> wrote in message
news:933458116.16420.0...@news.demon.co.uk...
Steve Evans
<jus...@hellraiser.demon.nospam.co.uk> wrote:
>I've been offered an AR-8000 for a very good price.
>
>Firstly, is it any good? I was initially planning to get a Yupiteru MVT7100,
>but is this better?
All radios have their own quirks but I find the Yup operating system
so un intuitive compared to the AOR. You can override the auto mode
and tweak most settings to your liking, menus...ahh, so easy to use!
You won't be disappointed with the AOR.
--
Remove the dodgy character from my address to reply
"The good thing about standards is that there's so many to choose from"
Mark Turner
http://www.strongsignals.net
Here's a few comments from personal experience though, which I hope you'll
find useful. Bear in mind that most of my listening is civil airband, 2m
amateur FM and 70cm amateur FM so I rate scanners mostly according to how
they perform in those areas.
Justin Devereaux said....
> Another thing I've noticed is this Automode facility for the ar8000 - does
> this mean you can't independently select which mode you want to use?
The Automode facility allows the radio to automagically select the mode for
any frequency according to a built in lookup table. You can override it on
the radio with a few button presses or (I believe but haven't tried) change
the lookup table using PC software.
> > I've been offered an AR-8000 for a very good price.
> >
> > Firstly, is it any good? I was initially planning to get a Yupiteru
> MVT7100,
> > but is this better?
I spent a few hours yesterday comparing a friend's AR8000 with my MVT7100.
I played with them on their own aerials, on each others aerials and on my
roof mounted discone. I used to have an AR8000 myself so know how to drive
it and think I gave the two a fair comparison.
According to the specs, the 7100 is more sensitive than the AR8000 in most
places. That does seem to be the case at least on the smaller aerials, but
on the discone I found it very hard to tell the difference even with weak
signals most of the time; on VHF/civil airband, 2m, 70cm and a few other VHF
and UHF frequencies. Ok so the S-meter on the MVT7100 showed a stronger
signal most of the time, but that's irrelevant as at the end of the day it's
the readability of the signal that counts rather than how many bars on an
uncalibrated meter you get.
On selectivity I found the AR8000 to come out slightly ahead, particularly
on FM Band II where it had no problems with a weak WFM signal .1 MHz away
from a strong one. On that same signal the MVT7100 simply could not copy
the weak signal without lots of "bleed over" from the stronger one.
The MVT7100 is s'posed to be far better on HF. I only tried it on
80m/3.8MHz amateur LSB and Shannon Volmet on 5.505MHz USB. On 80m the
MVT7100 did seem to give clearer audio, but on Shannon Volmet there wasn't a
lot of difference. I think HF is a bonus and compromise on this kind of
radio though as much better performance can be had from a dedicated HF
receiver.
The AR8000 has more birdies, especially in the VHF range. That irritates me
sometimes when searching but when scanning I tend to forget there's a
problem unless one of the birdies happens to be on a frequency I'm trying to
listen to.
The AR8000 has *lots* more features than the MVT7100, such as names for
memories rather than just numbers, a bandscope (which can be handy but is
nowhere near as good as more modern ones), PC control option, and autostore.
The MVT7100 comes with a telescopic whip which is *miles* better than the
AR8000's short helical whip. Don't let that influence your choice too much
though as a new whip is cheap compared with the price of the scanner and
you're likely to end up with several whips over time anyway. I'm currently
on the lookout for a decent airband whip for example.
Bottom line I think is that the MVT7100 is slightly more sensitive, not
quite as good at handling strong nearby signals, isn't as featureful.
There's not a lot in it.
Hope this helps. Shout up if you have any questions, but I'm off down to
the RSGB rally at Hatfield in a few hours so might not see anything until
this evening. Incidentally, if you're anywhere near the rally you might
want to go along to see some scanners in action to give you a better idea.
You might even find some second-hand bargains to beat the ones you're
currently looking at.
I'm very pleased with my MVT7100 but want a scanner with alpha-tagging
(memory names) as when I'm in unfamiliar territory I spend more time trying
to figure out what I'm listening to than actually listening. I also miss
the autostore mode of the AR8000 which allows me to set it searching a
particular range automatically storing away any frequencies it finds in a
memory bank. This allows me to search airband with the squelch up high
which I have a drink/sandwich/whatever then come back to find the
strong/local stuff. A few dozen button presses later and I've named the
ones I'm interested in, got rid of the rest, and started listening to what
I'm after. My shortlist is the AR8200 (most features though not as
sensitive as the AR8000) or the MVT9000 (most sensitive but no working
autostore (stores duplicates so runs out of room quick!)) or the AR8000. As
I'll still have my MVT7100 for weak signal stuff I'll probably come home
tonight with an AR8200. :)
Cheers,
Mark.
Justin Devereaux
news:7o11oj$c2t$1...@lure.pipex.net...
> Full reviews on both pieces of kit can be found at
> http://www.strongsignals.net
>
> Here's a few comments from personal experience though, which I hope you'll
> find useful. Bear in mind that most of my listening is civil airband, 2m
> amateur FM and 70cm amateur FM so I rate scanners mostly according to how
> they perform in those areas.
>
Thanks to everyone for the info, going by what I've been told here, and what
I've managed to glean off the net, it sounds like quite an awesome piece of
kit; I think I'll be getting it later on tonight!
I shall let you know how I get on.
Once again, thanks for all your help.
Justin.
Bandit
years now, wouldnt get rid of it you wont either...
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Steve Evans <s-e...@clara.net.shifty> wrote in message
news:37a48c8a...@news.clara.net...
> On Sat, 31 Jul 1999 22:54:42 +0100, "Justin Devereaux"
> <jus...@hellraiser.demon.nospam.co.uk> wrote:
>
> >I've been offered an AR-8000 for a very good price.
> >
> >Firstly, is it any good? I was initially planning to get a Yupiteru
MVT7100,
> >but is this better?
Justin Devereaux
connecting lead & software, for the princely sum of 140 ukp.
Played with it a bit today, not had much chance really, and with the storm
we've got at the moment, don't think it'll be much use tonite!
Cheers
Justin Devereaux <jus...@hellraiser.demon.nospam.co.uk> wrote in message
news:933458116.16420.0...@news.demon.co.uk...
> I've been offered an AR-8000 for a very good price.
>
> Firstly, is it any good? I was initially planning to get a Yupiteru
MVT7100,
> but is this better?
>