Well, from my point of view Steve has it dead right.
I have a pal who I DX with who has a Drake R7A and he beats us hollow with
the feint/rare DX he gets that we can hardly copy.
I have had experience of many famous boatanchors including the Racal R-17,
but never does their performance come anywhere near a modern Drake receiver
like the R8B.
I think the boatanchor lads still live in dreamland

--
John Plimmer, Montagu, Western Cape Province, South Africa
South 33 d 47 m 32 s, East 20 d 07 m 32 s
Icom IC-756 PRO III with MW mods
RX Drake R8B, SW8 & ERGO software
Sony 7600D GE SRIII
BW XCR 30, Braun T1000, Sangean 818 & 803A.
Hallicrafters SX-100, Eddystone 940
GE circa 50's radiogram
Antenna's RF Systems DX 1 Pro, Datong AD-270
Kiwa MW Loop
http://www.dxing.info/about/dxers/plimmer.dx


I hate to tell Chuck, the apparent author, that I reliably copied, logged
and
QSL'd RRI Dili prior to his reception using a Drake R7 here in 1990.

dxAce
Michigan
USA