The over all layout is in 3 sections with a raised forward
speaker. On left a recessed center area
with the display, some knobs and buttons and big main knob,
then a riased right hand section with
lots of buttons. There is also a thin strip along the bottom
with some small buttons. The buttons are
all square or rectangle rubber, with a nice feel, though none
have any tactile markings to aid
visually impared.
Here is the front panel from left to right.
On the left is the speaker grille (horizontal bars) taking
about one quarter of the radio width.
Below the speaker is the quarter inch headphone jack, and
large rectangular power button. The power
button has small raised ribbing round it, to protect from
accidental pressing I guess.
Now we move to the bottom of the front panel where there
is a strip along the bottom with six small
rectangular buttons to the left of the main VFO and one button
on the right.
The six small buttons are from left to right. (listed below)
and the big tuning knob.
1- Pre-amp (off, +10db +20db).
2- Attenuator on-off.
3- Noise reduction on off adjust (hold in for a few seconds
and it changes to NR level select mode.
Use the main VFO to increase or decrease level.). Press again
to exit NR level select mode.
4- Auto Notch filter on off.
5- Noise blanker on off.
6- AGC fast slow off.
The large tuning knob is slightly offset to the right of
center of the rig. The knob has great rubber
grip edge and a good free spinning finger dimple on the front
of it. The knob has a nice feel and weight
and at the bottom of the knob there is a little lever which
slides to increase or decrease the
friction.
To the right of the tuning knob along the bottom is the lock
button. Note this button actually has the
word LOCK in raised lettering in the rubber.
Above this strip, between the speaker and the tuning knob
is the large display. Below the display exists
two sets of inner and outer knobs. The inner left knob is
for audio volume, the outer left knob is for
both RF gain and squelch. the inner right knob is the 455
kilo hertz passband tuning knob, the outer
right knob is the 9 mega hertz passband tuning knob. Note,
these knobs have large clearly felt raised
"pointers" to show the level. The operation of the
agc/squelch button is unusual. To start with,
know that at the "12 o'clock" position it is maximum
RF gain, no squelch (normal operation.
turning to the left (towards 7 o'clock) decreases rf-gain,
turning it to the right (5 o'clock) brings
in squelch. The twin PBT operate by moving away from both
vertical and thus offsetting the passband.
Moving them together will slide the passband up or down, but
moving them opposite to each other will narrow the passband.
this is
dependant on mode and filter selection etc. For normal use
leave both vertical to start with.
(Though my rig I tend to have both on about 1 o'clock for
usb and 11 o'clock for lsb listening.)
To the right of the 2 knobs are two square buttons. The top
one is the SET button. For various functions
(too many to list here) and also the antenna 1-2 selector.
Note: a quick punch of this button is for the
Set mode, a LONGER hold of the button is antenna switch).
The lower button is the clock/frequency selector.
Above the knob and to the right of the display there is a
recessed panel with six square buttons in 2 rows
of 3.
From top left to right they are:
1 - SSB mode, USB-LSB.
2 - CW-Rtty mode, (hold for two seconds selects (REVERSE freq
offset.).
3 - IF filter Wide- Medium- Narrow, hold for two seconds and
it goes into filter setup mode.
Press again to exit filter setup mode
The lower row from left to right:
4 - AM - Synch, Toggles between AM and sync mode.
5 - FM mode.
6 - Tuning step, Changes tuning step.
Now we move to the right hand side of the rig, where the
front pokes out again.
There are 3 distinct sets of buttons here. At the top there
are 12 smallish square buttons in 4 rows of 3
These are the number keypad for punching in frequencies, in
the format
1-2-3
4-5-6
7-8-9
.-0-ENT
note the bottom row is DECIMAL, 0 and "enter" you
must always type the freq as MHZ.KHZ then ENTER
Unfortunately all the buttons feel the same, none have ribs
or dots to feel. Also the keypad is used to
type words into memory locations. The word is stored in memory
with the freq and can be displayed instead
of the frequency when in memory mode. The letters work the
same as on a standard telephone keypad (2 is abc
3 is def, etc. Except for some reason Q and z are on the number
0 key.
Below the keypad there is a recessed style-line in the plastic.
Below this there are 3 small buttons
above two larger ones.
The 3 small ones are:
1 - VFO/memory, Toggles between vfo and memory.
2 - Memory write, (puts vfo into memory).
3 - Clear, for keypad error, or to clear a memory location.
The larger two are:
1 - Memory SELECT mode, (hold for a few seconds whenin memory
mode to change display from frequency
to stored word/name).
2 - SCAN button, to scan through the memories.
Lastly we have two larger raised rectangular buttons on the
lower right. These have a small notch cut
out of them for identification, and are the UP and down (left
to right) used for moving through the memory
locations and functions in SET mode.
Underneath the unit is a tilt bail. I will now describe the
rear of the unit from left to right. First there
are two eighth inch jacks one for a recorder remote and the
other for recorder output. Then there is an RS232
control followed by two more eighth inch jacks. One jack is
for a CIV remote control and the other is for
external mono speaker output. Next is an RCA type mute control
jack followed by a push type connector
terminal with inputs for both ground and antenna inputs. This
can be used for random wire antennas. To the
right of this is the DC power input connector. Above this
connector is an SO-239 antenna terminal. This is
for coaxial type antennas.
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