OffRoaderX

Your Baofeng and the hypothetical baofeng standing next to the repeater have 6 inch antennas, low quality components, and output only a couple of watts.. The repeater has (probably) a perfectly tuned 10-foot or larger antenna, (probably) very high-end expensive and very sensitive components, and is outputting (probably) upwards of 50 watts.. So not only can the repeater hear everything much better than your $19 Baofeng, but it can squirt it's RF electricities many more fars as well.

When you do it on the keypad, are you saving it as a channel?

Welcome to the exciting and dynamic world of GMRS radio! Nobody on the repeater is going to be bothered by you making sexy-talk with your wife from your handhelds, but you will likely be bothered by them, so you may want to avoid Ch16 just so they dont upset you. As for books, there are probably a lot, but you can probably learn everything you know by just reading through the old topics here.. and of course, by watching the Youtubes.

I haven't played with the XPRs but I have played with several of their predecessors, the XTLs.. So, my (semi) educated guess is that IF they are the UHF versions and IF you can get the software for them, then yes, they will work. But I will yield to whatever anyone that has more experience with the XPRs than I do has to say. I dont understand your question about linking the radios with a cable, because, why would you want to do that? Unless what you are asking is "can these radios be used AS a repeater".. If so, please deconfuckulate us.

Go in and look at your settings in the software and see if it shows anything for the password and try to change/remove it... If you dont see anything, try 00000 .. if that doesn't work, contact the seller as they have a way to reset it (then let us know what that way is).

not really.. you have to push all the power before the duplexer, and cheaper/smaller duplexers eat a huge %% of the power. So you will either need to push more power into the duplexer (if it can handle it), or get a better duplexer that doesnt eat so many RF electricities. HOWEVER - the difference between ~20 watts and 50 watts is probably not going to be noticeable.. I have tested my base setup at 40 watts vs 110 watts, and people at the outskirts of my range (around 60 miles) can't even hear a difference between 40 and 110W ..

Its broken. Send it back to the guy you bought it from and tell him to send you one that works.

"worth" is a subjective term. If all you are going to do is check an antenna once in a while, then the SW-102 is perfectly fine.. It's not perfect, its not the best in the world, but it only costs $60, and it is more than plenty good-enough for most normal people. I have read that the MFJ *might* be a *little* more accurate, sometimes, but again, for most normal people the SW102 is perfectly accurate enough. Whether that slight, minor bit of possible tiny extra accuracy is worth an extra $22.. only you can decide. The SW102, in my not very humble opinion is also much easier to use and read, so many people prefer it for that reason alone... BEWARE of "some people" that love to spend other people's money and will decree that the SW102 is "cheap chinese junk!!!1" - even though it works just fine for hundreds of thousands of normal people.. They should be completely ignored.. and laughed at...

So, just for deconfuckulation porpoises: You pull the talk-trigger and you speak into the microphone, but nobody is hearing what you say on the repeater, even though you are hitting the repeater and getting the kerchunk? If that is what you are saying, can people hear you on simplex? If that is not what you are saying, then please try again.

They do not sound like friends.

Dude.. The chicks must be flocking to you!

The fan maybe?

The struggle is real.

More proof that "some people" should be ignored with extreme prejudice.

Could be any number of aBazillion reasons, but based on all the details you have provided I am guessing that you are hearing a repeater, but trying to talk back on a simplex channel instead of the repeater channel.

I was going to suggest a Motorola XTS 3000 or 5000 and the XTL-5000, but then you had to throw in the "easy to acquire the software" part.. So, stay way from the XTS and XTLs... But I'm really just here waiting for "some people" to proclaim that you will get a $10,000 fine if you even think about using a commercial radio on the GMRS.

You will never get any programming software to run on that iPad.. Just set aside an hour of your life and get familiar with how the menus work. Real men program their radios via the keypad, the old fashioned way! ...although you might check to see if any of those new Bluetooth radio-programming dongles are compatible with the GM-15Pro.. that software should run on your iPad (but confirm before buying one).

Wait, did he say something to me that I missed?

You must be new to the exciting and dynamic radio world where dorks think they know everything... You will quickly learn to laugh at and then ignore "some people".. Or just make fun of them like everyone else in their lives do.

I have created a custom "Learn GMRS With The NotARubcion" GPT on OpenAI. If you have access to ChatGPT4 / Are a ChatGPT Plus user you can access this custom GPT here: https://chat.openai.com/g/g-lltaQJ8ro-learn-gmrs-with-the-notarubicon The idea is that you can ask it any questions about GMRS and you will get the kind of answers that only The Notarubicon would give - so if you want to learn about GMRS, or if you just want a new buddy to chit-chat with, feel free to give it a try. If you run into any problems, or if the AI version of me gets something wrong, leave a comment here and let me know.

never mind

I recommend you try it. I have used other emulation solutions and they were all far too fiddly and a PITA, but Parallels made the entire process so easy, painless, and idiot-proof I was very impressed and ended up buying it and finding other reasons to use Windows programs on my Mac.

It had a free 30 day trial when I first started using it.. Might want to check to see if they still offer that - you only need it for 29 days to program your radio!

FYI - You can use Parallels to run the software on your Mac. I avoided using it for years, but it they make it so easy, its really a no-brainer (other than the cost$)

What has Talkpod support had to say about all this? Surely you contacted support for help?