so ive had the 7300 for about three weeks now, came from an old Kenwood TS-450 that i ran for probably 12 years so this is kind of a big jump for me. figured id post some impressions since i spent forever reading threads like this before i bought it.

first thing — the waterfall is just as useful as everyone says. i was skeptical honestly, thought it was a gimmick but being able to see where activity is on 40m without just spinning the dial around is actually a pretty big deal for how i operate. picked up a few dx stations i would have just tuned past before.

the touch screen takes some getting used to. i keep accidentally bumping the wrong thing when im trying to adjust the rf gain, just muscle memory from the old rig i guess. also the menu system is deep, like really deep, ive probably only figured out maybe half of what's in there.

one thing thats bugging me though — im getting what sounds like a low level hum on receive on 80m, doesnt seem to be there on 40 or 20. not sure if its a grounding issue in the shack or something with the rig itself or maybe just my antenna situation. running an inverted V at about 35 feet fed with ladder line into a tuner. anyone else run into anything like that?

congrats on the upgrade, the 7300 is a solid rig. that hum on 80 is almost certainly not the radio — ive seen this come up a bunch and it's almost always either a grounding loop somewhere in the shack or RFI getting in through the feedline. ladder line can pick up all kinds of junk depending on how it's routed and what's near it. do you have a common mode choke at the feedpoint? if not thats probably where i'd start. also check if the hum changes at all when you touch the coax shield or the chassis of the tuner, sometimes you can feel/hear a difference that tells you something about where the noise is coupling in.

the menu system on the 7300 really does take a while, i basically kept the manual open on a tablet next to the rig for the first month. once you find the roofing filter settings and the NR/NB adjustments it gets a lot more useful.

yeah 80m is just rough in general for noise, i dont think ive ever had a totally quiet 80m setup at any qth ive lived at. the waterfall will actually help you track down noise sources too once you get used to reading it — you can usually see interference as a pattern rather than just hearing it and wondering where its coming from. my neighbor had one of those cheap LED grow lights and i found it in like 10 minutes just by watching the waterfall while he turned stuff on and off in his garage.