This is not an exhaustive review, but more general impressions. This radio seems to be available under several brands, and even in several different case configurations, but all seem to share the same basic features. I was interested in doing some mil air and mil satellite listening, so this looked interesting. It was on "sale" at Aliexpress. I opted for the version that has bluetooth and GPS as well as an optional longer antenna.
The radio looks kind of cool. It is a compact handful, not a lot bigger than a UV5. The battery is 2000 MaH, good enough for me. A lot of the ads say it is much larger. Some of the advertised models say they include 800 to 900 mhz coverage, which would be of interest to me. The box mine came in actually does say that as well, though I can find nowhere in the manual that says it. Trying to enter frequencies in that range is useless as well. This may be something that was initially included , but scrapped when they went into production. There is no FCC label in the radio. It does say "Amateur Radio" on the label. I don't like the user interface at all. This is a criticism of almost any Chinese radio I have ever used, and one of the big reasons I rarely use my UV5. To me, it is the opposite of intuitive. There is software available, and though I haven't used it yet, it looks like it will be easy, and much more intuitive than the front panel. This brings up another of my criticisms. There are 53 menu items that can be set, or adjusted. There are quite a few that remain somewhat cryptic, there being little, or no explanation of what they are, or do. There is a section where " encryption" can be enabled. Curious, I researched this a little. It seems that this is nothing more than some sort of non standard CTCSS. The explanation I read said that radios using CTCSS could not receive transmissions from "encrypted" radios, but those using carrier squelch could. So, not really "encryption" at all. I have some Retevis RT10s that actually use some form of real encryption. Exactly what, I can't say. Overall, it seems to perform pretty well. I haven't subjected it to a lot of actual testing yet due to a recent equipment failure. Entering some known frequencies resulted in decent audio, and what seems to be acceptable sensitivity. A quick check of FM band reception surprised me. It was actually decent. Not great, but decent. I won't comment on the transmit side, since I don't really see a need to use it in that way. I am looking forward to loading some mil sat and air frequencies, as well as VHF AM aircraft frequencies, and really seeing what it will do. So far, I will say, it isn't bad. Oh, yeah, the GPS is next to useless. If you are contemplating getting one of these, save a few bucks, and get the version that doesn't have it. I haven't used the bluetooth feature, and don't intend to. So I can't comment on that.
The radio looks kind of cool. It is a compact handful, not a lot bigger than a UV5. The battery is 2000 MaH, good enough for me. A lot of the ads say it is much larger. Some of the advertised models say they include 800 to 900 mhz coverage, which would be of interest to me. The box mine came in actually does say that as well, though I can find nowhere in the manual that says it. Trying to enter frequencies in that range is useless as well. This may be something that was initially included , but scrapped when they went into production. There is no FCC label in the radio. It does say "Amateur Radio" on the label. I don't like the user interface at all. This is a criticism of almost any Chinese radio I have ever used, and one of the big reasons I rarely use my UV5. To me, it is the opposite of intuitive. There is software available, and though I haven't used it yet, it looks like it will be easy, and much more intuitive than the front panel. This brings up another of my criticisms. There are 53 menu items that can be set, or adjusted. There are quite a few that remain somewhat cryptic, there being little, or no explanation of what they are, or do. There is a section where " encryption" can be enabled. Curious, I researched this a little. It seems that this is nothing more than some sort of non standard CTCSS. The explanation I read said that radios using CTCSS could not receive transmissions from "encrypted" radios, but those using carrier squelch could. So, not really "encryption" at all. I have some Retevis RT10s that actually use some form of real encryption. Exactly what, I can't say. Overall, it seems to perform pretty well. I haven't subjected it to a lot of actual testing yet due to a recent equipment failure. Entering some known frequencies resulted in decent audio, and what seems to be acceptable sensitivity. A quick check of FM band reception surprised me. It was actually decent. Not great, but decent. I won't comment on the transmit side, since I don't really see a need to use it in that way. I am looking forward to loading some mil sat and air frequencies, as well as VHF AM aircraft frequencies, and really seeing what it will do. So far, I will say, it isn't bad. Oh, yeah, the GPS is next to useless. If you are contemplating getting one of these, save a few bucks, and get the version that doesn't have it. I haven't used the bluetooth feature, and don't intend to. So I can't comment on that.
