Xts5000 vhf

[hootis]

Hello.

New to the forum.

I'm a firefighter in Oklahoma. At the department we use Kenwood TK-272g's for VHF and Motorola XTS5000's for 800. Our VHF systems are all conventional. There has been little discussion of digital or trunking. Probably not on the horizon for our rural community.

I am also a General class Ham, but operate very seldom these days, and only on 2M.

I have been thinking of getting a XTS5000 for my personal radio (I have a 272 now) because of the FPP. The 5000 is a lot more expensive, but I could get rid of my Yeasu VX-7R and just have one radio for monitoring the FD and for occasional Ham operations.

I cannot justify the cost of buying an XTS5000 new. I see radios pop up on eBay and elsewhere that are reflashed. I have been considering buying one, but am afraid of a potential headache. Also, there might be some hidden costs that need considering. The Kenwood USB cable and software are readily available and inexpensive. I don't get the sense that's the case with Motorola. Do I need software, or can I program the 30-40 channels directly into the radio?

Can you guys share some opinions about the reflashed radios? What option codes should I be looking for? I think I want:
Q52 Fed FPP
Q53 FCC FPP
H35 Conventional Systems
Q445 Fireground Accountability
Q446 Fireground Channel Announcement

If reflashed radios are OK....any sellers to recommend or avoid?

Thanks in advance for the help.

Ryan

 

[cabletech]

I am not going to get into buying 'reflashed' radios off ^%bay or the options of this radio.

But I will tell you that you will need to buy the software thru Motorola and it will only allow you to program frequency's as 12.5kz UNLESS you have taken a 15 minute on line class thru Moto and then you can get a special 'key' that will allow for doing wide band 25kz frequency's like for ham.

Cost of software is running around $265.00, cable can be found on ^%^%bay and work well.

You can go to motorola online at: businessonline.motorola.com to sign up for an account and request the course called narrownbanding course number PRD0001.00E

 

[mmckenna]

Been there, done that.

XTS-5000's are certainly nice radios, I have an XTS-2500, XTL-2500, CDM-1550, etc.
While I like the radios, I wouldn't have purchased any of them if I didn't have legal copies of the software at work as well as the correct programming cables. These items can get expensive quick, and often put these radios out of the reach of hobbyists. You can often find the software from less than reputable sources, and you can find aftermarket cables on e-bay, but some of the cables and software can create more issues than you'd want. I'm not sure about the FPP on these radios, but I know on some of the older ones they let you change frequency, PL and the like, but alpha tagging requires the software.

Out of all the radios I have, my VHF HT-1000 is my favorite, and if I need more, I have a TK-290 with FPP enabled.

When I needed to purchase a high end P-25 capable radio for work, I went with the Kenwoods. We are slowly switching to them here at work. I use a TK-5210, TK-5410 and a few of the NX NexEdge radios. If I was personally going to buy a radio for my own use, I'd look closely at the Kenwood radios. The radios themselves are just as good as the Motorola counterparts, they are less expensive, the software is easier to obtain legally, the programming cables are cheaper and the accessories are the same price if not a bit less expensive.
For what you are looking for, I'd look for a Kenwood TK290 or newer model. TK-5210's pop up every now and then for a reasonable price.

 

[hootis]

Thanks for that info. I understand (and am only interested in) legally obtained software. The primary reason I'm considering Motorola is for the FPP. My needs are modest...VHF, robust, and able to be reprogrammed in the field. In our rural area we can really benefit from being able to work with other departments radio systems. On a large mutual aid, there are sometimes just not enough tac channels, and nobody seems to be able to switch on the fly.

 

[diskmonger]

I know this is the Motorola forum but take a look at the EF Johnson 5100's that have been showing up on ebay. Many of those are P25 FPP and comparable to the XTS5000.

 

[FFPM571]

EFJ5100s are only simular to the XTS5000 in that they are FPP if optioned right and use the same battery and audio accessiories. Programming and options are different. I have had both and sold my 5100 and kept the 5000. With a 5000 you can edit TX.RX, PL,DPL, Analog/digital(p25),NAC, 25/12.5khz Channel name and zone name. If the zone you have is set up for FPP with the CPS>

 

[hootis]

Other than the five Motorola radios and the EMJ 5100 that allow Front Panel Programming, are you aware of other radios (maybe a Kenwood?) with that feature?

 

[SD70MAC]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 4.0.4; en-us; DROID BIONIC 4G Build/6.7.2-223_DBN_M4-23) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/534.30)

I use my XTS5000 VHF FPP for commercial band and Ham band. I love this radio for many reasons, but it is an expensive purchase. I stopped using my HT1550XLS VHF after I got the 5k.

Please use a factory Moto cable .

 

[MTS2000des]

I know this is the Motorola forum but take a look at the EF Johnson 5100's that have been showing up on ebay. Many of those are P25 FPP and comparable to the XTS5000.

Be very wary of the older (V1 and V2) 5100's, they are problematic, and no longer supported by EFJ.

The V4 radios are just fine. But most of the Ebay ones are old V1 garbage.