Well - 200 watts is just for the CB'rs as far as I am concerned.
Unfortunately today we give amateur radio exams and then we hang out to dry the new hams by not requiring them to learn anything or do anything.
Had their learned how to calculate power and gain, they would learn that 100 watts is probably the most efficient use of power on the HF band.
To move the S meter needle one S unit below S-9, you would need a power increase of 6 - or 600 watts.
To move the S meter needle one S unit above S-9 you would need a power increase of 10. Hence with a 100w transceiver you would need 1000 watts to move the needle from 10/9 to 20/9 and you would need 10,000 watts to move it to 30/9 and 100,000 watts to move it to 40/9..
You can get a lot better power increases by just using a more efficient beam antenna with some gain. A 3 or 4 or 5 element beam will make a 100 watt signal look like a 1000 watt signal - with no distortion and no increase to your electric bill.
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