so ive been going back and forth on this for like three weeks now and i just need someone to tell me to stop second guessing myself. im putting up my first real HF antenna for 40m and i cant decide between a simple half wave dipole at about 30 feet or a vertical with a decent radial field. my lot is maybe 80x120 feet so space isnt terrible but the neighbors on one side are close and i was thinking a vertical might be less visible. the dipole seems like the obvious choice for simplicity but everything i read says verticals are better for DX because of the lower takeoff angle and i do want to work some DX eventually, not just ragchew on 7.250 or whatever. but then someone at the club last week said my radial field would need to be really extensive to compete with a dipole at even modest height and now im second guessing the whole vertical idea. ive got some rg8x and a pretty basic tuner. anyone actually compared these in a real backyard situation not just on paper

honestly at 30 feet a dipole on 40m is going to do fine and probably outperform a vertical unless you put down a serious radial field, like 30+ radials minimum to really get the ground loss down. ive run both at my place and the dipole just works, no fuss. the takeoff angle argument is real but at 30 feet youre not exactly low angle anyway so the difference in practice is smaller than the theory makes it sound. put up the dipole, get on the air, and if you still want the vertical later you can always add it. dont let perfect be the enemy of on the air

i had almost the exact same debate a couple years ago and went with a vertical first because i thought DX, low angle, all that. ended up spending more time messing with radials than actually operating. eventually put up a dipole kind of sloppy inverted V style tied off to a tree and a fence post and it just worked. worked JA on it first weekend which i was not expecting at all. the vertical is still up but i honestly reach for the dipole config most of the time now. your mileage may vary and all that but sometimes simpler really is better especially when youre starting out on a band