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Most hams are happy with the -H4.

Dave - W?LEV

On Sun, May 4, 2025 at 3:26?PM William French - AA1BF via groups.io
<bill.french.epsom@...> wrote:

If you are going to be doing outdoor work, I strongly recommend the H4 with
it's 4" screen. It is extremely difficult to distinguish between a slash
zero and an 8 in bright light.
Also, the H4 shows the stimulus range for each saved band, which is a big
help.

On Sun, May 4, 2025 at 10:00?AM Bob Manning N7AW via groups.io <rfmanning=
[email protected]> wrote:

Looking at the number of different versions available on Amazon, I'm
confused. Although not an abnormal state for me, I try to keep it to a
minimum.

Can the group make some recommendations for a nanoNVA version fo antenna
tuning and other uses not known to a new user on a nanoNVA?

thanks for any recommendtions,
Bob

--

*Dave - W?LEV*


--
Dave - W?LEV

If you are going to be doing outdoor work, I strongly recommend the H4 with
it's 4" screen. It is extremely difficult to distinguish between a slash
zero and an 8 in bright light.
Also, the H4 shows the stimulus range for each saved band, which is a big
help.

On Sun, May 4, 2025 at 10:00?AM Bob Manning N7AW via groups.io <rfmanning=
[email protected]> wrote:

Looking at the number of different versions available on Amazon, I'm
confused. Although not an abnormal state for me, I try to keep it to a
minimum.

Can the group make some recommendations for a nanoNVA version fo antenna
tuning and other uses not known to a new user on a nanoNVA?

thanks for any recommendtions,
Bob

if not going above 900 mhz , get the nano h4, get from randl electronics, it will NOT be a clone.

Make certain that you are buying a genuine nanoVNA and not a knockoff. The list of approved vendors can be found here...

NanoVNA.com is the place to go to about your new VNA.

I bought a NanoVNA-H v3.6 recently and I am happy with it. I use it mainly
for antenna tuning.
Here is my little 'NanoVNA for Antenna Tuning: A Beginner's Guide':


Other uses which I have tried are:
Measuring the characteristic impedance of a coax.
Measuring length of a coax (actually distance to first fault).
Testing a unun for End Fed Half Wave Antenna.

There are many more which I am yet to learn and try out and you will
certainly learn from the posts on this group with many experts.

I chose a previous version as it was cheaper and my friend told me that it
is enough for my type of basic use. It was bought from another VU ham's
online store.

I was also confused like you for about two years and kept looking for a
reliable source till my friend recommended one after he had used it.

Please note that it is a very delicate piece of equipment to be used with
extreme care. Some have lost it by inadvertently transmitting while NanoVNA
is connected to another nearby antenna.

73

Jon, VU2JO

On Sun, May 4, 2025 at 7:30?PM Bob Manning N7AW via groups.io <rfmanning=
[email protected]> wrote:

Looking at the number of different versions available on Amazon, I'm
confused. Although not an abnormal state for me, I try to keep it to a
minimum.

Can the group make some recommendations for a nanoNVA version fo antenna
tuning and other uses not known to a new user on a nanoNVA?

thanks for any recommendtions,
Bob

Looking at the number of different versions available on Amazon, I'm confused. Although not an abnormal state for me, I try to keep it to a minimum.

Can the group make some recommendations for a nanoNVA version fo antenna tuning and other uses not known to a new user on a nanoNVA?

thanks for any recommendtions,
Bob

Reading the sticker at the backside of two NanoVNa units I see a difference. One is HW version 4.2 and the other is HW 4.3_MS
I have understood that the additional _MS refers to the MS5351M (message thread #26386)
But what should be the difference between version 4.2 and 4.3?

On the NanoVNA unit with HW 4.3_MS I read (via Config->Version) firmware 1.2.43 [p:401, IF:12k, ADC:384k, Lcd:400x320], Build Time: Feb 19 -2025
The NanoVNA HW 4.2 has firmware 0.5.0
When I look to the Menu Structure Map of the The NanoVNA HW 4.3_MS unit then I see a huge difference w.r.t. the HW 4.2 unit.
A lot of added Menus. Some of them are clear, but from a lot of them I have to guess.
Is there an overview or document of what these new menu items have for meaning and how to use them and under what circumstance should they be used?

Your help would be very greathfull.
Kees

Hi Peter. I limited the number of traces to two because that's the minimum number that allows comparison for optimization. I didn't think about your application, which is more documentation. To do more than two traces I'd have to use a different display mode. The current mode is limited to 16 colors and I just used up the last free color this morning. I'd have to figure out what using a different display mode entails (many things change). The other issue is that I want the user to be able to set each trace and grid color. That becomes cumbersome for many traces. But I'll think about it. If you could email your article to me, I'd appreciate it. I want to see what the eight return loss curves look like.

I know this isn't what you meant by analog computing, but I when I read that phrase my mind flashed back to the time I programmed an underwater acoustics simulation on a a vacuum tube analog computer. I was told it was the largest installation in the world. It covered a whole wall and had zillions of vacuum tubes.

I'll post version 2.06 of the plotter in an hour or two:



Brian

Hello Brian,

I've been following the evolution of your Smith chart plotting and am pleased you've been able to add the feature to your plotting package. As a user of Smith charts in both RF design and acoustics I think it's a useful feature to retain for visualization purposes, although it's a long time since I've been motivated to do any actual analog computing.

If you'll forgive a more general question on your plotting software, is there a reason why (at least) the rectangular coordinate plots are limited to two traces? I only ask because I've just finished a short article on my LF/MF IoT antenna coupler (with the big coil!) and I had a bit of a search to find a free plotter that coped with all 8 return loss curves generated by the embedded vector analyzer in response to tap changes on the impedance matching transformer. In the end I found that RigExpert AntScope did a passable job, but the presentation is a little "functional" compared with more refined packages. (That's not a criticism of the value of the instruments or the software - just a comment about my need to get some publication quality plots). Anyway, if the limit on the number of traces displayed doesn't have to be a low-ish hard one, I think your plotter could offer even more advantage over many other packages.

Best wishes,
Peter.

Correct Brian.

It is a clever engineering concatenation of the two descriptions for Y and Z COMBINED... Good stuff!

On Tue, Apr 29, 2025 at 05:44 AM, alan victor wrote:

a portion of the immittance chart

Alan, when I first read this I thought it was a typo for admittance. I learned this morning that it means impedance or admittance. I have been using Y + Z for lack of a better term. The next version of my program will use immittance. Thanks for the education, however unintentional.

Brian

Hi Hugen

Thanks
Pse did you mean slightly better below 100Khz or below 100Mhz ?

73s Nizar

Thank you for your information.

Kees, PE0CWK


Op 30-4-2025 om 04:05 schreef Hugen via groups.io:

Hello, after NXP discontinued the SA602A we designed a compatible chip for the continued production of the NanoVNA. This chip has a slightly lower noise figure, but also a slightly lower IIP3. I modified the circuitry of the NanoVNA-H and NanoVNA-H4 to accommodate these new chips. the difference in effective dynamics between the NanoVNA-H4 V4.4 and the NanoVNA-H v4.3 is not very large, the main difference is a slight improvement in the dynamic range below 100kHz.

If my memory serves me correctly the major difference between the ne and se
version had to do with the temperature range they were spec'd over.

On Tue, Apr 29, 2025, 2:15 PM PE0CWK via groups.io <pe0cwk@...>
wrote:

At when selected Zeenko then one may
order a NanoVNA H4 HW version 4.3
Enlarging the photo of the backside of the housing, it shows HW version
4.4_ZK

I found at the page descrition why HW
version 4.4_ZK is released:

"The latest version is NanoVNA-H rev3.6 and NanoVNA-H4 rev4.3. NXP has
discontinued the dual balanced mixers SA602A/SA612A/NE602A/NE612A in
November 2022,
Hugen is using ZeenKo NE602A to replace the SA602A/SA612A starting with
the NanoVNA-H v3.7 and NanoVNA-H4 v4.4 versions,
and that the version also improves the dynamics when using the base wave.

I am curious what the improvement of the dynamics
entails.Doesanyonehaveexperiencewiththis?

This shows what I'm considering for my default Smith grid colors. The user can override the defaults for any color (except text), as shown in the second image.

I may do some grid tuning before I release this.

Brian

At when selected Zeenko then one may order a NanoVNA H4 HW version 4.3
Enlarging the photo of the backside of the housing,? it shows HW version 4.4_ZK

I found at the page descrition why HW version 4.4_ZK is released:

"The latest version is NanoVNA-H rev3.6 and NanoVNA-H4 rev4.3. NXP has discontinued the dual balanced mixers SA602A/SA612A/NE602A/NE612A in November 2022,
Hugen is using ZeenKo NE602A to replace the SA602A/SA612A starting with the NanoVNA-H v3.7 and NanoVNA-H4 v4.4 versions,
and that the version also improves the dynamics when using the base wave.

I am curious what the improvement of the dynamics entails.Doesanyonehaveexperiencewiththis?

I've posted a new version of the plotter with admittance here:



Brian

I think that having two grid colors is pretty important to help visually distinguish between the impedance and admittance grids. Traditionally impedance has been plotted in red and admittance in green or blue.
Thanks for your work.
73, Don N2VGU

On Tue, Apr 29, 2025 at 08:21 AM, Donald S Brant Jr wrote:

I suspect that the expanded-center function would be most useful for the
majority of the users

That's what I was hoping, Don. It was so easy to implement!

I think I'm going to leave two grid colors for another time. I could do two gray intensities without much trouble, but I don't think that would help much.

Incidentally, I have no plans to label the grids. To do that properly requires a smaller font, which I don't have. I assume people mainly use the grids for basic orientation and then use a marker to extract values.

Brian