In article . com,
"John S." wrote:

mike maghakian wrote:
one of the disadvantages of the internet is that any asshole can
post an opinion on the E1 even though he has no qualifications for
making such assertions. In addition to people who are intelligent
like Guy Atkins, there is another source who people should not
argue with in this case. Dave Z and Larry Magne both assert the E1
is outstanding !

read this: http://passband.com/pages/receivernews.htm

Interesting update on that radio, although a quality issue like a
wobbly optical encoder is worrisome on a radio in that price range.
But more to the point just exactly what is a "Pro Opinion" and why
should it be given any more credibility than than the collective
opinions of users on on eham, radiointel, Yahoo or this forum. Also,
because Eton appears to be the single largest advertiser in PBWR
occupying several pages in the version I read, should reviews of
their radios be taken as truly independent?

I would take the well written opinons in PBWR to be just that and
nothing more. They are another source of information about radios
but not THE source.

That said I am impressed by the E1 and am seriously considering
buying one. But my decision will be influenced more by the opinions
seen on fora than one review in PBWR.

The Pro opinion stems from the fact that they have test equipment and
the experience to make the measurements comparing the performance
against other radios.

You get the unvarnished good and bad from PBWR AND a relative feature
comparison to other radios in its class.

The opinions in PBWR are generated from a panel of people not just one
person so reading it gives you a broader perspective then you get from
a persons personal review. An example is that a noise blanker may not
work on the type of noise around one persons residence where the other
people on the panel had no problems. This will be reported in the
review.

I think PBWR is a great place to start for reviews of a radio comparing
it to others in it class and to then follow it up with reviews on the
Internet that you mentioned.

Obviously you need to weed out the nut case opinions. Some people just
do not make sense like using the incorrect bandwidth for a mode and
then reporting the sound is muddy as an example of a worthless opinion.
If you read an opinion that states you need to spend days with a radio
to learn how to use it to get the most out of it should be a good
warning sign that it is not a good review as there are a small set of
interacting controls and it only takes a minute to go through all the
permutations of adjustments.

--
Telamon
Ventura, California