Kenwood: New Kenwood TH-D75

[wd9ewk]

Hi!

Things lined up for me yesterday to finally try my TH-D75 with the 145.825 MHz ISS packet/APRS digipeater. That digipeater had been off-line for a while, and recently operating with different settings (145.800 MHz instead of 145.825 MHz, using RS0ISS as the packet path instead of the normal ARISS path). And it was a weekend without work!

I was out at the DM52/DM53 grid line working satellites yesterday, along US-70 near Safford AZ (southeast of Phoenix, northeast of Tucson), and had a couple of ISS passes around the middle of the day. I worked the FM repeater on the first ISS pass I had that went to my east, and then tried the digipeater on the later pass. It seems like the TH-D75 did better decoding packets, especially near the start and end of passes. Otherwise, its functionality is almost identical to the TH-D74 for packet (not a surprise).

Rather than duplicating what I already wrote, here's a link to those posts:

Patrick WD9EWK (@wd9ewk@mastodon.radio)

Another thread... I bought my Kenwood TH-D75 a few weeks ago. I tried the packet/APRS functionality on the local 144.390 MHz APRS network shortly after buying the radio, but haven't had a chance to try it with an orbiting digipeater... until yesterday. The ISS packet digipeater was operational...

mastodon.radio

73!

 

[MTS2000des]

Got mine yesterday and am glad I did. First impressions is a nice cosmetic upgrade, PTT button feels more solid. Downloaded the FREE D75 MCP and RCP. I loaded her up with local repeater and my HotSpot and went to town. The audio coming out of this is quite a bit louder and fuller than the D74. Will spend some time with the RCP software and report back.

Performance is excellent and this radio is worth every penny. It is a QUALITY subscriber unit from a heritage company that builds QUALITY subscriber radios. If cheap hams cry about $749 being pricey, they'd lose their minds over what REAL radios cost. I own a Kenwood VP8000 with is their top tier P25/DMR multi-band portable and I paid $3300 out of pocket for it- which is about half of what agency pricing is. Hams have little clue how much quality LMR stuff really costs.

I have an ID-52 and I like the Kenwood form factor better.

 

[AF1UD]

Got mine yesterday and am glad I did. First impressions is a nice cosmetic upgrade, PTT button feels more solid. Downloaded the FREE D75 MCP and RCP. I loaded her up with local repeater and my HotSpot and went to town. The audio coming out of this is quite a bit louder and fuller than the D74. Will spend some time with the RCP software and report back.

Performance is excellent and this radio is worth every penny. It is a QUALITY subscriber unit from a heritage company that builds QUALITY subscriber radios. If cheap hams cry about $749 being pricey, they'd lose their minds over what REAL radios cost. I own a Kenwood VP8000 with is their top tier P25/DMR multi-band portable and I paid $3300 out of pocket for it- which is about half of what agency pricing is. Hams have little clue how much quality LMR stuff really costs.

I have an ID-52 and I like the Kenwood form factor better.

How's the battery life? Or are there aftermarket batteries?

 

[MTS2000des]

How's the battery life? Or are there aftermarket batteries?

Ran it all day out of the box, so I got a solid 9 hours of use with no battery saver and A LOT of TX time on L1-M power on VHF/UHF. Uses the same batteries as the D74. I have a couple of KSC-25LS chargers that I use with my NX-3200 LMR radios so I have drop in chargers already. Will probably be buying a second battery.

 

[palmerjrusa]

Got mine yesterday and am glad I did. First impressions is a nice cosmetic upgrade, PTT button feels more solid. Downloaded the FREE D75 MCP and RCP. I loaded her up with local repeater and my HotSpot and went to town. The audio coming out of this is quite a bit louder and fuller than the D74. Will spend some time with the RCP software and report back.

Performance is excellent and this radio is worth every penny. It is a QUALITY subscriber unit from a heritage company that builds QUALITY subscriber radios. If cheap hams cry about $749 being pricey, they'd lose their minds over what REAL radios cost. I own a Kenwood VP8000 with is their top tier P25/DMR multi-band portable and I paid $3300 out of pocket for it- which is about half of what agency pricing is. Hams have little clue how much quality LMR stuff really costs.

I have an ID-52 and I like the Kenwood form factor better.

Now the question is, do I sell my D74 and go for the upgrade...

 

[01689720a]

Mine comes tomorrow. I have the Icom-ID-52 and the IC-705. This will be my first Kenwood unit. I am looking forward to APRS as I am an avid hiker.

 

[vagrant]

Now the question is, do I sell my D74 and go for the upgrade...

Wait to sell the D74 until you compare it to the D75. In particular, comparing sensitivity and selectivity.

 

[palmerjrusa]

Wait to sell the D74 until you compare it to the D75. In particular, comparing sensitivity and selectivity.

Have you read any reports re this?

Good or bad?

 

[eorange]

I can't believe the D75 would be significantly better in that regard compared to the D74 or most other big 3 transceivers. After all, we're only talking about FM, D-STAR, and APRS.

 

[vagrant]

Have you read any reports re this?

Good or bad?

I have not read/observed that comparison. My post was a suggestion to share your results should you purchase the D75.

 

[AK9R]

Here are the published receive sensitivity specifications for the TH-D75. I would expect individual radios to meet or exceed the published specs when tested with calibrated equipment. The first column of specs is for Band A and the second column is for Band B.


Note that 0.2 µV is pretty much the standard for superheterodyne VHF/UHF radios.