AT-D878UVII Plus For ANALOG

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Wrhu920

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Looking at the AT-D878UVII Plus for some potential digital use, but does anyone have feedback on its ability on the analog bands?

All if the reviews skip over the analog capabilities. Is it poor, middle of the road, or good?

It seems like it could be a good radio for analog and digital (as well as some other monitoring of things like gmrs). Basically a decent do-it-all.
 

AB4BF

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Looking at the AT-D878UVII Plus for some potential digital use, but does anyone have feedback on its ability on the analog bands?

All if the reviews skip over the analog capabilities. Is it poor, middle of the road, or good?

It seems like it could be a good radio for analog and digital (as well as some other monitoring of things like gmrs). Basically a decent do-it-all.
My 878 is used mostly for analog and has excellent signal quality and good power. What I like most about it is the battery. The battery seems to stay charged for days - even when in constant use. I purchased an extra battery when I bought mine, I keep it topped off, but I have never used it. Of all the digital radios I have had the pleasure to own and others to use, the 878 is by far the easiest to program with a computer and it doesn't take long to learn how to program manually. I don't like to, because of my fat fingers that press too many buttons at one time. I have to use a stylus of some sort and they aren't readily available sometimes. IMHO, AnyTone hit a homerun with this one!
 

Wrhu920

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Awesome. Thank you. Just getting into this and I like the capabilities of this radio. Went ahead and ordered one.

Taking my test in a few days!
 

N4GIX

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I've had the 868 for several years and I considered it my daily HT. I bought an AT-D878UVII Plus recently and found it simply will not handshake with either of my local repeaters (UHF and VHF). Analog mode works just fine however, as does digital on my SkyBridge.

I returned it to Bridgecom and they bench tested and determined that my analysis was correct: extremely low (milliwatt) power in digital mode. They replaced it and when it arrived I shot my code plug into it. It too is apparently defective! Yesterday I drove out to the tower site and it still failed to handshake. All I get is a repeated audio alert stating "Repeater is out of range!"

Since the receive antenna is 525' from where I was standing (mostly vertical distance of course), it is quite obviously not producing any power.

W9CTO_Tower.jpg
 

alcahuete

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I've had the 868 for several years and I considered it my daily HT. I bought an AT-D878UVII Plus recently and found it simply will not handshake with either of my local repeaters (UHF and VHF). Analog mode works just fine however, as does digital on my SkyBridge.

I returned it to Bridgecom and they bench tested and determined that my analysis was correct: extremely low (milliwatt) power in digital mode. They replaced it and when it arrived I shot my code plug into it. It too is apparently defective! Yesterday I drove out to the tower site and it still failed to handshake. All I get is a repeated audio alert stating "Repeater is out of range!"

Since the receive antenna is 525' from where I was standing (mostly vertical distance of course), it is quite obviously not producing any power.

View attachment 106310

That seems extremely unlikely that two units in a row would be defective, but I guess you never know. Extremely strange.
 

N4GIX

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That seems extremely unlikely that two units in a row would be defective, but I guess you never know. Extremely strange.
That strikes me also as being unlikely, but there's no other explanation! I can easily hit the repeater(s) with my AT-868UV full quieting from here in my front office (window facing the tower, which is 7 airline miles from me, but two AT-878UV Plus radios have failed. I have noticed that both radios have very close serial numbers, so it is possible that they are part of a "bad batch" from the factory.

It's pretty annoying though since it cost me $25.82 to ship the first one back via UPS!

The receive antennas are at the very top and the xmit antennas are on the right candelabra 60' below the top. Jim's (W9CTO) repeaters have ~90 mile radius footprint. It is a terrific set of 2m, 1.25cm and 70cm repeaters!
 

alcahuete

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Yeah, that's definitely odd. Suppose it could be a bad batch. Honestly, I might try programming the digital repeater in manually on the VFO without loading a codeplug. I can't imagine a codeplug corrupting the radio and causing that issue, but you never know. Did you try a factory reset? That's just so strange.
 

N4GIX

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Factory reset and manual programming makes no difference. I just programmed in an analog repeater that is around 45 air miles and get full quieting. It's just the digital portion that isn't working. Time to get another RMA so I can send this one back, darn it all! :cautious:
 

alcahuete

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Factory reset and manual programming makes no difference. I just programmed in an analog repeater that is around 45 air miles and get full quieting. It's just the digital portion that isn't working. Time to get another RMA so I can send this one back, darn it all! :cautious:

Hmmmmm. Yeah, so weird. I would ask for one with a serial number way off if they have one.
 

N4GIX

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Hmmmmm. Yeah, so weird. I would ask for one with a serial number way off if they have one.
I sent an email with my results but won't hear back until sometime tomorrow. I'll see what they have to say. I've bought a lot of equipment from Bridgecom over the years and this is the first time I've run into a problem.
 

rescuecomm

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I also have an Anytone AT-878UV that doesn't work anymore except my receiver is clipping audio. It does work on FM broadcast. A factory reset and test using only the VFO was the same. Tried a speaker mic and the audio was distorted through it. My son bought the radio for my birthday and BridgeCom is not wanting to cooperate with me. Might just open it up do some tracing with a scope. Figures!
 

900mhz

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I also have an Anytone AT-878UV that doesn't work anymore except my receiver is clipping audio. It does work on FM broadcast. A factory reset and test using only the VFO was the same. Tried a speaker mic and the audio was distorted through it. My son bought the radio for my birthday and BridgeCom is not wanting to cooperate with me. Might just open it up do some tracing with a scope. Figures!
how old is it?
 

n9upc

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For analog I found the Rx sensitivity to be a little less that what I have found on other analog radios. In my testing I found it to be around the .35mV @ 12 dB SINAD. This is not so much a shocker as this is designed to be a digital radio.

This test result was across two new radios purchased within the last week. Frequency was 152.0000 Mhz with no signaling modes used.
 

PACNWDude

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+1 on the AV-878UV radio working well in both analog and digital modes. Using Motorola XPR6550 and later XPR7550e handhelds, I wanted something that did not require hex editing to get the entire UHF band (XPR6550) and had promiscuous mode so it could be used with other manufacturers DMR radios. I still use my XPR6550 for testing Motorola systems, but the Anytone radio is what I have switched to carrying the most, as it has great analog and digital transmission and reception. I added talk permit tones that emulate Motorola hardware, and it is funny how many people do not even notice any difference if they do not know which radio I am using.
 

rescuecomm

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Looks like BridgeCom has sent me an RMA to send it back. I was getting ready to order a TYT to use on the Hotspot. I really liked it on analog repeaters and the promiscuous mode for monitoring random systems. I had ordered an extra battery for extended use.
 

K4EET

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Looking at the AT-D878UVII Plus for some potential digital use, but does anyone have feedback on its ability on the analog bands?

All if the reviews skip over the analog capabilities. Is it poor, middle of the road, or good?

It seems like it could be a good radio for analog and digital (as well as some other monitoring of things like gmrs). Basically a decent do-it-all.
I just received my AnyTone AT-D878UVll Plus last week. I have received good reports on my audio using the analog FM repeaters. With respect to sounding like myself, one ham-friend of mine said that I sound more like myself using the BridgeCom BCS-200 Water Resistant Speaker Mic versus using the built-in mic on the HT. He went on to say that the audio quality was great on either; he just liked the tonal qualities of the speaker-mic better. He said the speaker-mic had more "lows" in the received audio on his end.

Overall, I am extremely pleased with this HT.

73, Dave K4EET
 
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