Instruction manual

Diversity
A diversity receiving system gives a dramatic improvement to the dead spot (signal dropout) problem,
when compared to a simple receiver. This is because the diversity receiver has a choice of two RF
signals, and when one antenna is receiving a weak signal, the other antenna will be receiving a stronger
signal.
Signal dropout is usually caused by the direct and reflected signals happening to cancel each other out at
the antenna. In reflective steel lined rooms such as studios these dead spots happen regularly at
1
/
2
wavelength intervals as the transmitter is moved.
In the MICRON diversity receiver the combining circuitry automatically rejects the output from the
receiving section with the weaker RF signal before it can degrade the audio output. By this means the
best signal to noise ratio can be maintained over a large safe operating area.
The same result could not be achieved just by connecting two antennas in parallel, either directly or
through simple amplifiers. The relative phase of the signals from the two antennas would change as the
transmitter was moved and cancellation effects would still occur at the summing point.