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My review of the Radtel RT490

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WPXS472

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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.
 

AK9R

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There is no FCC label in the radio.
If the radio scans programmed channels, it needs an FCC certification...even if it's an "Amateur Radio". The FCC wants to be sure that amateur radios can't scan things that we aren't supposed to hear, like old cordless phones, baby monitors, and early cellphones. ;)

As for the user interface, I think I made the same observations about another similar radio: the digits on the display are crammed together making them hard to read and the "0" key is on the wrong place (an OCD thing with me).
 

WPXS472

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If the radio scans programmed channels, it needs an FCC certification...even if it's an "Amateur Radio". The FCC wants to be sure that amateur radios can't scan things that we aren't supposed to hear, like old cordless phones, baby monitors, and early cellphones. ;)

As for the user interface, I think I made the same observations about another similar radio: the digits on the display are crammed together making them hard to read and the "0" key is on the wrong place (an OCD thing with me).


I don't know if can actually scan. I haven't gotten that far yet. I suspect that even if it can scan, it will be painfully slow. I have since noticed that it doesn't cover all of the mil-sat band. I guess I will have to see if I can hack the codeplug to make it do that. But, before I do that, a littie research is in order to see which frequencies are active. Same with mil air. I don't know if it transmits in those ranges, and don't care. I have no need to transmit there. I guess having a Yaesu FT10, FT40 spoiled me. Their user interface is just so simple and intuitive. And yes, the "0" is in the wrong place. As to FCC certification, I believe the receiver needs it regardless.
 

WPXS472

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A little update.
I got an aftermarket programming cable, and using the "Multiband" software, was able to program a small number of memory channels. I tried to use Chirp, but got weird results. I'll try again it later. Programming is fairly straight forward. When I entered 280 MHz, for instance, a frequency outside its range, the software didn't complain, but when the radio was programmed, that frequency was blank. Attempting to enter something like 750 MHz resulted in an error message from the software. I took a quick look at a codeplug with a hex editor, and didn't find anything immediately helpful. It does have a section where the words "Baofeng UV5R" appear. Hmmm. I get a feeling that programming it out of band for use as a scanner might be possible. I will investigate further. I find it is a reasonably good scanner, if only a few frequencies are entered. It is capable of 256, but so far, I only have 23, and it seems to take maybe 3 seconds to scan them all. Not too bad. Certainly not in the realm of modern day scanners with their 100 freqs per second rates, but fine for my use. The radio displays the battery voltage when powered up. A useful feature in my mind. I want to play with the "encryption" feature as soon as I can get some vital test equipment repaired and going again. As I understand, this is not true encryption in any sense of the word, but I want to see just what it is, and how it works. I will post more findings when available. I would also be interested in hearing from any other owners, if there are any.
 
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