Or why I learned to read up on a radio before I buy it.
Luckily this is about cheap radios, and not mid/high-tier handhelds, like the Yaesu I continue to ask myself why I bought. I do a bit of HAM radio-ing (is that how you say it?). Radio stuff is fun, I’ve gone deep enough to get my ‘general’ license so I have access to all the bands so I can talk to people hundreds of miles away.
One of my favorite things is APRS, which is a form of packet radio that sends out a telemetry packet with GPS info at set intervals. I run it on bike rides, hikes and road trips. Other people tuned in can pick up those packets, and there are also some devices out that also log the contact to the internet. There’s some fun paths out there from days out, vacations, and trips to my favorite camping weekend.
Recently I really learned to love a good Baofeng. They had a bad rep for a while, but they’ve cleaned up their act, and now they set the benchmark for cheap-but-good radios. Can’t go wrong with UV-5R.
Their easy to program, their scan feature aligns with how my brain works – truth be told, they are the only one I understand.
But since they are cheap and easy to program you don’t die inside when something happens to it. No biggie, $20 and a couple days later and you have a new radio. In fact, I end up buying the two pack and usually end up giving the other one away.
So in my head, I’m thinking a UV-5R is almost the perfect little radio to carry around, if only it had APRS. I do a quick search and find the Baofeng BF-F8HP PRO, $60 bucks, it’s got GPS, great. let’s get it.
It arrives a couple days later (one of the few benefits of Southern California – everything is here so you get it fast). Its a chonky boy, but not a deal breaker, I flash it with my saved repeaters and other frequencies.
I start to go through the menu, not seeing anything about APRS, not worried though, different radios handle it differently. I found where to put my call sign in, a glimmer of hope. But nothing about APRS. Keep digging. Not finding anything on my own, I get on the internet and get the user manual. Search through it, no mention of APRS. Oh no, doubt sets in.
I do a deeper dive on the user manual, and find out all you can do with the GPS is send an APRS-like packet to a set of predefined contacts/radios on the same frequency. But you can’t tune into the default US APRS frequency and decode what’s coming in and your certainly not sending any packets out.
Fudge. this isn’t THE radio, and I’m out $60. Why would I carry this bigger thing that is just as good as a much smaller, lighter radio. Not going to return it though, will hold onto it in case it’s an alternate firmware that opens up APRS, or if I just need a radio for an experiment or project.
I’m convinced there’s another Baofeng out there that can handle APRS. I find the 5RH Pro, I confirm it has GPS and APRS support, its only $30? Its almost the same as the BF-F8HP, it has 1 extra button and a different knob. Cool, let’s go.
A couple days later it shows up. I’m excited. I charge it, and later that night I sit down, and plug in my info for APRS, and get things configured. I tune to the frequency, and almost immediately get some packets. I send out a couple, cool. great. This works. Lets plug it on the computer and get all my presets on there.
Get Chirp running, go to pull from the radio, and can’t find this radio in the menu. Go to the internet, see what others have found.
Sinking feeling. Turns out this radio is not compatible with Chirp, and does not look like anyone is going to be able to set it up. The company recommends another set of software that only works with a small sub set of their ‘pro’ radios. I’m not doing this. I had to do it to program my Yaesu. I’m not installing single radio specific software. No.
What a burn. I’m $90 in, and don’t have THAT Baofeng radio, I don’t think it exists right now, and I’m not going to just keep buying radios, I already have a bunch as-is.
Both of those radios are so close, the hardware is there, the body is willing. But the software mind says otherwise. I know I can use a cable and some external gear to open up that functionality, but I’m already the antenna weirdo out in public, I don’t need to be an antenna and wires weirdo out in public. I’ll hold onto them, put them away, and maybe use them to make some DIY repeater or something later on.
In the mean time, I have two daily radios that cover my needs:
- VGC VR-N76 is a full featured radio, mid tier price, but can’t argue with its capability.
- UV-5R small, solid and $16.
If anybody out there at Baofeng is listening, take the UV-5R Mini, remove the light, put a GPS antenna there and setup the firmware to handle APRS. You would have the new benchmark for a solid radio. Then we can start talking about putting KISSTNC in radios.