ajk170

Since I do not know, I'll ask, when you say "...minus the VHF Bands" are you saying the overall VHF bands or just the ability to transmit? I thought the ability to get the NOAA stations would inherently make this a dual-band (VHF/UHF) radio except that either a hardware or software component has the transmit part locked down except for on the GMRS and FRS frequencies. Not that it really matters, I think there are other aspects to this radio that matter more, like the ability to figure out the CTCSS codes and how to make those work for small group communication within the family. From what I see in the manual, that's not well covered.

Ok, so in the spirit of discovery learning, I'm slowly figuring out these radios. I've learned that I can indeed manually tune this radio to NOAA stations and more specifically the one that reports on our area (162.475). As a result, I seemed to have answered my own question, i.e. these are dual bands. I found the way to do this, not as a result of the manual but piecing together various bits of information from other threads on this particular radio as well as ham Youtubers talking about various ways to hold down different keys/buttons with the power off and then turning it on while holding them down to enter various menus.

Thanks for posting this! I assume you did this on a PC?

I didn't want to highjack another thread with this question regarding the RT76P so I'll post it here - What type of radio does the Retevis RT76P seem to be based on? Is it a UHF only or some type of locked-down dual band? Since Retevis claims the radio supports NOAA, I'm led to believe it's some sort of dual band. I say it this way because my radios do not have the NOAA pre-programmed into any of the 30 channels. Maybe this aspect was too much of an expectation on my part (I'm new to this so what do I know) but it does not appear that I can tune the radio to any frequency either. So either it comes pre-tuned or you get to tune it yourself, that's the expectation when the feature is advertised.

Micheal- thank you for the clarification on where NOAA stations are on the spectrum and how basing GMRS on a particular radio platform (UHF or VHF only or Dual Band and then locking it) affects the overall GMRS capabilities. That makes my understanding of what GMRS is and what it is not, a lot clearer!

So what I'm hearing you say is hold off on a purchase until the release this one?

So if I understand what you are implying, the 805G (or any GMRS) will not be able to receive NOAA due to those freqs being locked out?

@bulletpoints - since I'm brand new to the world of GMRS I am not sure if updating radios out of the box is noraml like it is with digital computer equipment. I am hoping to learn if you had to update the firmware when you first purchased your RT76Ps? On mine, I cannot change the CTCSS codes or get the NOAA stations. So now I am trying to figure out how to to get the NOAA and the Retevis C/S is telling me that I have to update the firmware. Once I do so, I am told I will be able to change the CTCSS codes and receive the NOAA stations. However, Retevis tells me that the firmware is not support by iOS and I have no PCs to conduct the update with so I maybe SOL. I just purchased these from Amazon so maybe it's old stock? But I agree the Customer Support is really responsive and they said they sent out a firmware cable in order to make the update.