Vertex vx-454

[pssradios]

Looking for any reviews or feedback on the New Vertex Portable Radio Vx-454.

 

[radionerd13669]

Seems to work find once the updated firmware was installed.

Radio preforms well and the speaker is loud.

I have had no issues as of yet.

Cons-

The Radio have a LED indicator for transmit but not receive. Also there is no indiactor the radio is in scan other the looking at the display. A blinking LED indicator would be nice

 

[Axline]

Seems to work find once the updated firmware was installed.

Radio preforms well and the speaker is loud.

I have had no issues as of yet.

Cons-

The Radio have a LED indicator for transmit but not receive. Also there is no indiactor the radio is in scan other the looking at the display. A blinking LED indicator would be nice

All depends on you set it up when programming. Mine has a red led indicator when transmitting and since I have priority scan setup the little scan circle gets a dot in the middle when scanning. It can also be set-up to say -SCAN- instead of displaying the revert channel.

To the OP:

Outer shell: The outer plastic is robust so it wont chip easily when dropped. It is also easy to hold, even with the larger 2400 mAH battery. The front buttons are easy to access due to their larger size and are back light, making it easier to see them at night. The side buttons have plenty of texture to make them easy to push with gloves on. The screen is large and easy to read but the 8 character display does leave something to be desired.

Battery life: I have the 2400 mAH battery and it lasts two days before needing to be charged. You can only get Li-Ion batteries for the 454 so you don't have to worry about cycling the battery the first couple charges because Li-Ion doesn't have memory characteristics. The 3 hour desktop charger does an excellent job charging in 1-3 hours and has an indicator the tell you if it's charging, when it's done, and if there is a problem with either the battery or the charger (no more guessing). The belt clip is on the battery but is replaceable separably and fairly strong.

Features: Volume knob and buttons function the same as other high end VX radios, the programmable buttons do have the push/push-and-hold function. The new change is the channel selector knob, it has no stoppers. This is a love/hate feature for users. It doesn't have any number indicators on the knob because it can go around endlessly and if you have more or less than 16 channels in a group the channels change position on the selector knob. This is nice because you can have up to 32 channels in one group and isn't to difficult to get used to. If you must know the channel number you can activate the channel announce feature, which makes the radio verbally say the channel number with you select the channel. (There is also a direct channel input feature where you can enter the channel number and go right to it, the announce feature would help in that case as well.)

The radio has a 512 channel cap that can be divided into groups of 32. It offers group scan separate from the channel scan, so you can listen to one group with priority scan or listen to multipliable groups that you select. Each channel has many options in the programming menu. The speaker is loud with 700mW output. It is also clean when turned up to the max, there is very little (if any) distortion due to high volume. It also comes with built-in 2-tone and 5-tone encode and decode as well as DTMF ANI/Paging and MCD 1200.​

Programming:
There are so many options when it comes to setting up the radio I wont be able to cover all of them. The nice thing is that the 454 uses the same cable as the 180 series (with the usb converter).
Some of the features include:

• Many different scan options, including PRI 1, PRI 2, DW, FM Scan, Group Scan, User Scan Add/ Del, Scan Display Options.
• Programmable LED options. What color displays for what, ie. blinking green for busy channel. Three colors are yellow, red, and green.
• All programmable options of past radios.
• User unpalatable FW (you do need the FW file from the dealer), CE-115 has a firmware writer built in.
• New software interface which makes it much easier to find options once you get used to the new design.
• 7 programmable buttons that have push/ push-and-hold function. 14 programmable button's overall. There are many options that can be programmed to the buttons, including a SET option, which allows you to change settings like SQ level offset, on the fly.

Size and weight: The 454 with the 2400 mAH battery is a little thicker than other radios, I'm assuming with the stock battery it would be much thinner. The radio is shorter than the older radios like the 180/ 160's. The 454 is lighter than the 180's and 920's even with the larger battery. I would even venture to say it weighs the same, if not less, than my Minitor V.

Simple version:

Pros:

• Very customizable.
• User friendly.
• Robust.
• Smaller lighter size.
• Long battery life.
• New technology.
• PRICE ~ $380-$410.

Cons:

• Only 8 character display instead of 12.

That's all I can think of at the moment, if you have any more questions post em and I'll do my best to answer them.

 

[radionerd13669]

"All depends on you set it up when programming. Mine has a red led indicator when transmitting and since I have priority scan setup the little scan circle gets a dot in the middle when scanning. It can also be set-up to say -SCAN- instead of displaying the revert channel".

Your Correct how ever there is no indicator when the channel is busy other than the signal strenth bar.The Radio has an LED on the top that should be able to be used as a receive indicator and scan. Overall on a scale on 1-10 I would give it a 9 for its overall performance.

 

[radionerd13669]

Yes there is a LED Scan Indicator but it is soldid all the time. I have yet to find the blinking LED indicator for busy channelScan as Vertex advised me that was only in non display models.

 

[Axline]

I'm not sure who you talked to but there is a blinking LED indicator. I will post a video of it later.

 

[Axline]

Here ya go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qluE9UDg9c

 

[radionerd13669]

PM Sent

 

[bryanknj]

Firmware Update

Sorry if you see this 2x, but I posted it in the wrong spot before...
~~~
Good morning,
I understand one can update the firmware version for the new VX45X radios through just the regular software,
How would I sign up for these updates? Do you have a product number? Do you know how much it costs?
I have numerous VX454 and 459 portables in service, both VHF and UHF.
Thank you.

 

[Axline]

Your dealer will be able to get the most up-to-date FW version for you. They'll send it to you in a .zip folder and it can either be written through the FW writer in CE-115 or the writer that is built into the FW can be used.

 

[n3obl]

is there any way to get a uhf to go out of band down to 440. i have the vx-4200 mobiles and its easy to modify to go out of band.

Frank

 

[Axline]

is there any way to get a uhf to go out of band down to 440. i have the vx-4200 mobiles and its easy to modify to go out of band.

Frank

As far as I know the 454 won't go out of the range it's designed for. I don't a lot of hex editing due to the fact that it voids the warrantee and customers don't like that.