ICOM 7850

[SCPD]

ICOM-7850 ‹ SPARKY's Blog

Looks pretty sweet.

 

[n9mxq]

Good Lord, wonder if they ran out of buttons.. Nice looking rig tho..

 

[iMONITOR]

Good Lord, wonder if they ran out of buttons.. Nice looking rig tho..

Think that's bad, look at the user manual!

 

[n9mxq]

hehe I bet it's about that big..

 

[AK9R]

Remember back a few years when many of the high-end Japanese cars were coming with gold-plated trim and badges? I always thought it was kinda tacky, but you sure saw a lot of them on the road.

Now, Icom comes along with gold plating on their top-of-the-line transceiver. Makes me wonder if we'll see the same sort of thing on the Kenwood TS-990 or Yaesu FT-DX9000. Of course, the new Icom is supposed to have performance and features to go with the bling.

 

[SCPD]

hehe I bet it's about that big..

Actually, you know ICOM has done a very good job with their layouts. They "look" overly complex but once you play with one they are very logical.

When I first bought my ICOM 7600 it looked a little daunting but in reality it was actually very simple to use.

Some radios love the deep menu structure and other radios rely on more buttons. My TS-590s (while not shy of buttons) does a pretty good job of balancing the layout.

In a lot of ways though, the TS-590s is far more confusing at times.

 

[n9mxq]

Oh, I agree. I was up and flying with my 706MKIIG in no time when I got it, and never touched the manual for about 2 weeks when I was done playing HF and decided to program in some memories..

I'd love to "take a walk" around a 7800.. Unfortunately it's a shade outside my disposable income.. So I don't tempt myself.

 

[K8cpa-chuck]

That's a radio for people with more money than common sense.

 

[acyddrop]

I love my 706 MKIIG.

I had the 7800 for awhile and sold it and funded a couple other rigs with it. There isn't really anything new under the hood of the 7800 that hasn't been done elsewhere. It was one of the things I purchased and had some buyers remorse over. Sure it looks good and it's a solid rig, but I just don't feel there's anything there to justify it's price tag. The 7850 is going to sell for somewhere right around $14.5k and for that price you could pick up a couple of rigs that are as good, or better than that beast. Here's a short list:

Kenwood FT-990
Yaesu FTDX-9000D

Rigs there are good enough and you can buy more than 1:

Yaesu FTDX-5000MP
Elecraft K3
Icom IC-7200

Hell pick up an FTDX-5000MP + an Alpha 97a and you're off to the races.

I'm not saying the 7800 isn't a good rig, just for the record. I'm just saying for the money you can do better and have a little something left over.

Oh, I agree. I was up and flying with my 706MKIIG in no time when I got it, and never touched the manual for about 2 weeks when I was done playing HF and decided to program in some memories..

I'd love to "take a walk" around a 7800.. Unfortunately it's a shade outside my disposable income.. So I don't tempt myself.

 

[acyddrop]

I'm not sure I'd go that far, but it's not an entirely unjustified statement. If you're going to own one rigs, and you want a solid performer and one you can slap on your desk and know it's going to work for years to come and sounds and work very very well... The 7800 isn't a horrible buy. You're also buying into Icom, and you know they will be standing behind this radio for quite some time. It's a solid investment if you intend to go no further. But it's not the most bang for the buck, that's for sure.

That's a radio for people with more money than common sense.