• Coelacanthus@lemmy.kde.social
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    2 days ago

    PL259 has non-constant impedance, which is the main reason I don’t like it.
    N type is a near perfect connector except huge size, which has constant impedance, supports frequency up to 11GHz, is waterproof and can be used with high power.
    SMA is similar to N type but has smaller size and lower power.
    U.FL will be the only choice if you only have very tiny space. (The situation never happened in ham radio)

  • cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de
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    2 months ago

    SMA is too fragile and PL-259 is a pain to weatherproof. I prefer BNC for portable use and N connectors for just about everything else.

    • ghost_towels
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      2 months ago

      That’s interesting as PL-259 is the standard for marine use. I wish we had something better

  • Gustephan@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    SMA or bust. The other three connector types introduce a lot of noise compared to SMA in my experience. BNC is my goto if I want a noise profile similar to SMA but the device I’m working with isn’t vibration damped.

      • Gustephan@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        Oh dang, I totally missed the name of this community when I commented. My knowledge of and opinions on rf connectors come from working on large aircraft mounted systems, where turbulence can cause a nightmare of threaded connector sleeves vibrating loose and bent pins. In this situation you either need vibration damping or a more mechanically robust connector like BNC