IanM

Ditto re: a used Motorola coming in affordable vs a new dual-band DMR. Picked up an XPR6500 series for surprisingly cheap, and on analog the audio quality blows the Wouxuns out of the water. Heck, on DMR it blows the Anytones out of the water. Luckily we have a large DMR network around here, and while they definitely promote the Anytone 878 for newcomers, most of the long-timers are on Mototrbos and they hooked me up with a club-license copy of CPS. of course you lose the niceties of FPP and dual-band/dual VFO. It's also huge, and probably overkill for GMRS-only. On the Gen 2 HTs you're stuck with the odd proprietary antenna socket, and the Gen 1s don't seem to want to play nice with my 24J antennas. The 6500 series has one little advantage of an RF connector in the accessory port and can use PSM remote mics, if that floats your boat. Part of me is tempted to search out an XPR3500 series for the SO (who is not ham licensed), but there's already too many radios in this house and the 905G is 90% of the way there and works well for us.

First was, I think, an old set of those neon-yellow waterproof Talkabouts. Nothing could kill them, aside from leaky batteries. Latest is a Motorola LMR set. I have three of the Wouxuns, and I do absolutely love how solid the 905 is, but the Moto knocks it out of the park. A little lower power on TX, but just edges out the superhet Wouxuns on reception. Also have a PSM mic for it, which doesn't get a whole lot of use, but is handy when it does—popped one of the Wouxun UHF antennas on it and stick the radio in a pack and you're good to go. IMPRES smart batteries are nice, too. Downside of course with Part 90 gear, as @Lscott mentioned, is no field programming, and expensive/difficult to find/complex software. And those IMPRES batteries and chargers are pricy—thankfully mine came with both, and the battery, first activated in 2019, still had a lot of life.

@mbrun I hear ya on all counts, especially re: 'if it has a feature, I need to figure it out.' It's why I've had a bit of an interest in the amateur use of DMR long before I got licensed. For sure, I wouldn't use DTMF over a repeater. Easy way to quickly irritate others, or inadvertently mess things up, since you are correct, they're often used for remote command. If I did implement this it would be over a PL-coded simplex channel. Ditto on the quirks, and it is frustrating, especially with the 905—I understand it is based on a single-band LMR model, but you're right, it's like they really only got halfway through re-writing the firmware for a user-configurable GMRS radio. My biggest frustration is the menu list seems to go backwards, and there's so much wasted screen real estate. I got the 805 specifically for a family member to use, who wanted something lightweight with few buttons to deal with. But the strange quirk there is the keypad lock also locks the channel knob, which sort of negates its use as a 'hand-over-and-go' radio. The tradeoff is that the audio and reception is very, very good, and while I looked at used business radios from VS and Motorola, wasn't finding anything at that price point that wasn't trashed or needed $100 in batteries and chargers. Good luck on trying Remote Monitor. It's a cool feature I could also see some niche applications for in amateur or GMRS use—say you're out of doors and aren't getting a reply, you could ping the radio and try and see if they're out or range or incapacitated or what have you. Killing an open mic would be nice, too—I know it's possible on digital but I don't think there's any analog sets that do that to my knowledge.

Interesting observation, and might explain my experiences. I'm maybe a mile and a half from a local 2m repeater up on a hill I regularly use, and the voice modulation comes in strong and clear, there's a very high noise floor of static and buzz. UHF, both 70cm and GMRS come in just fine, very quiet. I'm in a midrise in the middle of Seattle. There's for sure a lot of noise pollution in every band (don't even get me started about WiFi interference in a 150 unit building!), but that might be why VHF is particularly problematic. To the earlier topic about power vs sensitivity/selectivity; my observations jive with @mbrun as well as to there being little correlation; I was up on the roof doing a side-by-side with the 905G, UV8H and a commercial-grade Motorola this evening, playing musical antennas (a test for another thread) and testing with someone on a distant repeater, both 70cm and GMRS. The 8W, SoC UV8H was the loser on all counts, and the 4W Motorola ( @gman1971—an XPR6550, also with the stock, albeit UHF antenna) came out way ahead on reception. Again, we're talking very fringe situations on a site 30+ miles away. That all said—I have no idea how Wyoming's SAR operates, but good on them for advertising this frequency. Looks like it's not actively monitored. @GuySagi, thanks for sharing your SAR experience as well, and I wonder what equipment they specifically will implement; around here, both SAR volunteers and the Sheriff's Office are on VHF, so at the very least its another radio to pack. Remember, we're not talking about intra-agency communications. We're talking about them being able to monitor a frequency in the off chance someone's got a radio on them, which is such a huge advantage. No, cheap bubble-packs are not the optimum means of communications backwoods, but it's still another tool, period—I can't think of anyone else I know outside my family and regular hiking friends that carry a radio of any kind, let alone the kind of gear we use here. If someone is going to have anything at all outside a cellphone, It'll likely be a Talkabout or a Midland or some such, capped at 5W, so the channel itself is sort of a moot point as long as it's memorable. That might be a problem for those with a 50W mobile with power output locked on certain channels, but I also think most of us here might be savvy enough to figure a way around that. For myself, if I'm in the woods (as I somewhat often am) and an emergency arises outside a cell site, heck, I'll try anything—146.52, GMRS 1 or 20, any repeater on either service. Tremendously valuable just to have that with me anyway.

I'm doing well with a couple of DIYed Slim Jims tuned for a few different bands. The advantage over just using a mobile antenna is they obviate the need for a ground plane (the ubiquitous cookie sheet), and can be hung up in a window or something like that. You should be fine provided it's not, you know, right next to your head. I plugged it into the ARRL safe exposure calculator, assuming a generous 3dBi antenna, and it gives you about 3 feet safe distance for a worst-case, 5-minute transmission. The bigger issue is that most linear antennas are omnidirectional, and you're wasting power radiating into your house when you want to be pointing more of it outside. A Yagi-Uda or corner reflector would be far more directionally efficient. But it's a lot harder to find a convenient place to put inside, and isn't so easy on the eyes. What sort of install are you looking at building? If you're in a multifamily building you might be out of luck (as I am), but if you're setting up in an attic or the like, you might have better luck with a bigger (or uglier) antenna, and might have decent enough penetration coupled with a height advantage to forgo mounting externally.

Honestly, I wouldn't be totally opposed to the cost—I agree, copying and pasting is a nightmare, and even more so trying to run a VM on my long-in-the-tooth iMac. But I still put up with it, because I'm cheap and spent that money on more gear.... Mentioned in another thread someone is working on a UV8H driver for Chirp that, hopefully, will either mostly work or will get ported over for the 935.

Michael, I did find out this works with the 905 as well. Again, the trick is to change the muting to QT+DTMF or QT*DTMF, and works akin to SelCall. May have said it before but I think a few (much older) VS and Kenwood analog LMR units support DTMF paging/calling but I don't know if it's compatible (Moto is a different beast with MDC and Quik-Call). The downside with the 905 of course is that the actual string to be assigned to the call button is programmed in software on a per-channel basis. Still experimenting with the 805. It doesn't appear to have an option to send a call other than the emergency alert, and DTMF muting is a system-wide option rather than per-channel. No luck on being able to page it yet. I don't think any of us are operating a GMRS system with enough radios to warrant a full-fledged selective calling system plan, but again, it's useful just for sending an alert tone between multiple parties, since there doesn't appear to be any way to set an 'incoming call' alert. I suppose you could turn on BOT Roger Beep but you'll irritate anyone else using a repeater if you don't remember to turn it off.

Also truly sorry that's the case, especially if you can't get anyone to join in. There are cellular two-way radios that can run Zello and there seem to be a handful of GMRS repeaters (and just a lot of various chatrooms in general) on that platform, but that's another piece of gear to find room for if you want to keep an RF radio too. I can't think of any mobile units that do RF and LTE. If you're looking to chat with strangers at random while out on the road or the trail, you might get the most use out of a DMR transceiver, assuming there's networked repeaters in your area and depending on what national talk groups they host.

I'm of the same mind; as I understand the certification rules, both 90 and 95, they're mostly directed at/enforced against manufacturers and distributors, and the intention seems to be aimed at preventing LMR/GMRS users from accidentally stepping over on other bands—both services are under the assumption that (most) end-users are less-than-savvy utility users, and the radios should be idiot-proof. As you said, if you're behaving, there's really no noticeable difference to other users of the service if you're not technically on a GMRS set. A bigger problem seems to be people buying business-band radios on Amazon and having no idea they're stepping on other licensed users. I've posted here about some software hacks on several models, and give out the disclaimer that they do violate certification; on another forum I got burned mentioning that I used a ham radio model on a GMRS channel (incidentally from someone who encouraged some more questionable practices on a different thread that nearly amount to jamming. I'm taking the risk legal but it's on others as well. But I digress; on the UV-5 series: I've read a number of reports of people upgrading antennas and ending up with worse reception, which seems to be owing to the front end being overwhelmed, but that obviously is dependent on how much RF is floating around in your area. A real 1/4 wave will definitely make a huge improvement on TX though. The battery for sure is a nice upgrade just for handling sake as well—I was shocked out how small the UV-5G was out of the box. Pocketable but almost hard to hold. Re: the external charging socket, Miklor has a neat hack for building a USB charger for it. And another side note: I did like how the GMRS-V1 handled, but not how limited it was on programming repeaters. There's a couple places around the web, both sellers and reviewers, who have suggested the parent UV-82 has some improved guts over the 5R on the front end, but I'm not sure I believe it. The UV-5G/X is definitely an improvement on programmability over the V1, and on the ham front, I'd guess some of the newer Baofengs probably add a lot of features over the getting-long-in-the-tooth UV82. That said, I don't know if the UV82 is frequency-hackable or has if it's been locked down the way the 5R has. What's $30 to experiment? (again, caveat emptor re: part 95.)

Western Washington. We've got at least 3 daily (if not multiple times a day) social nets on VHF open to anyone licensed, and one GMRS repeater covering the entire Puget Sound area set aside for general chatter, though the latter tends to be the same couple guys talking about traffic during rush hour. Used to be an amateur license study net on it but that seems to have died down. I totally understand that not everyone's area is as friendly on ham repeaters to strangers as they are here. I was just saying that, unless you start making your own traffic, you're likely not going to meet as many on GMRS.

No, there's no prohibition against contacting strangers, and I don't think that's what he was implying, so much as that most traffic on GMRS is, well, not that. There is, however, a prohibition on using repeaters without permission ("In transient use, a mobile station from one GMRS system may communicate through a mobile relay station (repeater) in another GMRS system with the permission of its licensee"), and I would guess a lot of repeaters one comes across that aren't listed on here as public probably have a specific intended purpose other than random visitors. I've seen reports on here and elsewhere of people driving around trying to find unlisted repeaters. Please don't. As I said in the other thread re: open/closed repeaters, it's also just discourteous to jump into random other conversations; more than once while trying to get ahold of a family member I've gotten back "hey man, I just got this Baofeng radio and I'm flipping through the channels, how are ya buddy". No, that's not illegal (unless it rises to the level of willful interference), but it's not a good way to make friends in the hobby! But I agree with @wayoverthere, I have nothing against people taking it up as a hobby, but it's important to have realistic expectations that it's not like amateur radio, where they might find far more repeaters and strangers to strike up conversation with. There's a handful of 'why won't strangers answer me' threads around the internet, and, well, it is what it is. I'm licensed in both, and each have a separate purpose. There's a very lively ham repeater network in my area, but there's no way it would be practical to use for general family/friends communications, and vice-versa. I do hope OP does get some friends in on it, maybe organize a formal simplex net or something if you're within range. I think having some real-life friends and something to chat about other than weather or radios is what makes the hobby interesting. The local ham net I join in is much more social in nature, and I think that's why it's so busy. Truth be told a lot of the random contacts I hear on amateur is a lot of "Hey, this is XXXXX in YYYY city, it's 52º right now." "Oh hey XXXXX, this is ZZZZZ, yeah, it's a little cloudy here in _____. 73, signing off." (Bonus points if they're both on Echolink and nobody's actually using a radio.)

The 935G and UV8H do not have dual scan; I don't believe the product literature says it does anywhere. No way to switch to a different slot while scanning, since, as mentioned, pressing any key stops scanning. Bit of a pain. Some LMR radios will let you set a channel to default to on PTT while scanning, and the dual-display would otherwise be a nice way to replicate that. But I believe the UV9 series is the only one that allows you to scan in the 'background' so to speak. Something mentioned specifically on the sales pages as an upgrade over the UV8 models. One workaround is to set the top soft key as PTT on the secondary frequency. It'll still stop scanning but let you switch back to the static channel a little quicker.

Glad I could help, and usual caveats apply (driver is in development, use at own risk, part 95 yadda yadda). Really do hope some fully fledged drivers for the Wouxun GMRS models get developed eventually. Definitely wouldn't be hard to port over the existing ones that sort-of work on the 805 and 935; I just don't have that sort of coding skill or confidence! It is a huge help to have CHIRP just for channel editing alone. It's downright painful to move or reorder channels in the manufacturer software.

Ha, yeah, I've heard some positive things about the TYT (I think they used to be marketed as "Tytera", not to be confused with "Hytera," or just "Tera) line on both GMRS and amateur but it's probably a get-what-you-pay-for sort of device. There is someone out there that managed a workaround, to be able to monitor some Canadian LMR frequencies. As I just said in my prior comment, the UV9 series is superhet and might suit your needs. Remember of course, that only the 9G is Part 95 certified.

@MichaelLAX—yes and no. I see we're both commenting on similar topics in different threads and I apologize about the confusion... the 'trick' I'm mentioning here in this thread is solely for programming memory channels on the 935G and the 805G with CHIRP. There doesn't appear to be any way to unblock TX on non-GMRS frequencies on the 935. Locked up tight. the 805 is a bit simpler in how it's configured to operate on GMRS-only, and that's mostly down to the dedicated software only allowing drop-down selection. The 935 is VHF and UHF, receive-only. You are correct, it is not a superhet, it's based on an RDA Microelectronics SoC. I believe the primary differences between the UV8 series that it's based on, and the UV9 series, is that the latter uses a superheterodyne receiver, and can demodulate AM on aviation band.