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Lineup of my current GMRS radios. Newest addition is the XPR7550e on the far right. That was just purchased recently, and is being programmed for use on local repeaters and simplex freqs. HT-1250's like the one on the left are still very useful for this purpose as well. Starting left to right: Motorola HT1250, Garmin Rino 530, Anytone UV-878D, Motorola XPR6550, Motorola XTS1500 M1.5, Motorola XPR7550e.

Motorola UHF commercial band 470-512 MHz EX600XLS handheld, Garmin Rino 530 GPS/radio, and Motorola XPR7550e UHF 403-523MHz handhelds, on top of a Panasonic CF-53 used to program the Motorola radios. In front of a cheap Lenovo running SDR# (SDR Sharp) software, showing the waterfall for Channel 4 FRS, and where I keyed up the Garmin Rino a few seconds before taking the picture. SDR# is handy for watching swaths of RF spectrum to see what is going on in range of the RTL USB SDR stick and antenna.

Radios used in hiking throughout the recent snow storm in the Pacific Northwest. On the left is a Radioddity GM-30 radio that is the most recently purchased unit. For Chinese radios, I prefer the Anytone AT-D878UV, but the GM-30 is one fifth the price. Next is some older Motorola TalkAbout, possibly a 62xx series, but it does not say, so it may be newer vintage. On the right is my old Garmin Rino 530, pre-SD card version. All three worked well in temperatures hovering around 25 degrees Fahrenheit, and over distances of about a mile apart.

My "listening post" for my recent trip to the forest. Went into the Olympic National Forest to get away from it all, to include cell phone and radio station signals. But, I still took some gear to hear what was available. One weather channel was noted on the Garmin Rino 530 when scanning weather channels. Channel 4 FRS was also noticed, in use by what sounded like a family unloading luggage at one of the nearby lake resorts. This is the original Garmin Rino 530, that does not have mini SD card capability, and I bought after being issued and using a Garmin Rino 120 while on military deployments to Afghanistan. The 530 has a color display, which does not work too well with image intensifying night vision, where the monochrome 120 does much better. As radios, they work as well as low power UHF can be expected, and being able to send location was helpful at times. The Rino 120 was issued to many military personnel as a sort of intra-team radio that also had a basemap, something the military issued AN/PSM-11 Rockwell units lacked (the newer GPS now has a map display). The Rino 120's acted as a backup measure for areas where accurate maps were often only found in old National Geographic magazines, while the radio worked well for short range (intra-team) comms. (Most of us were also issued Harris AN/PRC-117F portable radios and Thales AN/PRC-148 MBITR's as well). I still use my Rino 120 and 530 as they still work, and are very helpful running around the woods. The GP-7/SSB receiver picked up about a dozen FM and six AM frequencies but none were local. While driving around, there was a piece of cardboard near a house with what looked like an amateur antenna, and a frequency listed. It turned out to be low power radio sending music around the nearby area, about three miles or so away.