mrgmrs Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 (FYI: I am adding this prefacing text to my original post to tip manufacturers and readers off that I am creating a new reply today, 9/2, which will serve as a running, bullet list summary of the various points. You can go there for a quicker summary and look throughout this entire post for more specifics. Back to the original post...) A post to GMRS radio manufacturers... (For other folks, admittedly this post is a bit lengthy. This is because my main target audience are radio manufacturers who might read this forum, so I wanted to include details for their benefit. Of course, if not a manufacturer, feel free to continue reading if you'd like.) I'm fairly recent to GMRS. Even so, in that short time I've found myself in astonished [not in a good way] amazement regarding radio design decisions, quality control issues, and documentation issues. Taking these one at a time (and throwing in the bonus topic of price creep) ... Radio Design Decisions Hopefully manufacturers realize that many people buying what-should-be-more-capable GMRS radios want to use them with GMRS repeaters and not just to talk with their children on simplex. However, the design decisions I've witnessed leave me in stunned it-can't-be disbelief: + Some radios allow for the storage of the eight GMRS repeater pair channels in only eight memories. This entirely misses the mark that repeater users may need to access repeaters which use the same freq pair but with different access tones. What are GMRS repeater users expected to do in this case? Keep programming / reprogramming the tones as the users switch between those repeaters? This is inconvenient and annoying. It is even more inconvenient if the radio has to be programmed with a PC and programming cable instead of being programmable in the field using a radio's keypad. + Though I'm not sure, I seem to recall reading that at least one radio was designed with access tones in an all or nothing mode. That is, specifying an access tone applied it to all of the stored frequencies. Not good. And even if this was not the case, some radios do not (or did not) support split tones. Split tones are important for GMRS repeater use. These days some repeaters utilize a DCS transmit tone and a CTCSS receive tone, or vice versa, or two different CTCSS tones, or two different DCS tones. Split tone capability please. + Some radios were released with narrow band only. For people with wide band radios, the apparent volume of a narrow band transmission is lower, which can be annoying to listen to. Capable GMRS radios (i.e., "non-bubble-pack" variety) especially should be designed with selectable wide band and narrow band capability. Quality Control Issues It's amazing what quality control issues were released to consumers: + Without specifying which manufacturers, even recently released radios capable of both wide and narrow band were factory pre-programmed with memories set to narrow band. So right away, especially non-bubble-pack radio users will likely want to change those to wide band. This is not convenient if such radios must be programmed via a PC and programming cable, and even worse if the cable is not provided with the radio. A before-it's-released-to-the-consumer quality check should have detected and prevented this. + Similar to the above, without specifying which manufacturers, some recently released radios were factory pre-programmed with access tones stored in the memories. Not good. For example, if a particular memory had CTCSS receive tone 156.7 stored and the radio is set to use that memory, that means a transmission would be heard only if the corresponding 156.7 transmit tone is transmitted by a sender. This would be bad especially for new users - they might not even realize that they are not receiving transmissions which don't send the appropriate tone. And as above, this is a irritant if such radios require a PC and programming cable to correct this, and even worse if the cable is not included with the radio. A before-it's-released-to-the-consumer quality check should have detected and prevented this. + OEM programming software is often buggy. Or the ability to copy/paste whole row(s) or selected cells of programming data is not supported. This makes programming painful. Documentation Issues To put it kindly, often the documentation, especially for Chinese radios, is lacking. Important details are omitted. The English is poor. Please hire people with a better command of English. But that is not enough. Also make sure that the document writers understand radios well enough to know what to write. Both of these skills are needed to create worthwhile documentation. Price Creep I've been noticing price creep recently. For example, one manufacturer released a radio not long ago, then fairly recently released an updated model for $20 more, and then released an even more recent model shortly later for $50 more than the first model. I'm not saying necessarily that the two latter radios do not warrant their increased prices, but the higher prices in rapid succession have been noticed by others as well. This manufacturer also sells a mobile GMRS radio that is a bit shy of $400, which is in the mucho dinero level of the established, big name manufacturers. Again, I'm not saying necessarily that this manufacturer doesn't deserve such prices, but as the saying goes, "people are beginning to talk." This manufacturer can afford to charge these prices at least currently due to the design features incorporated in their radios versus the past, lacking offerings from their competitors. But if their competitors incorporate such features at more modest prices, they might woo customers away. Such is the waltz that is capitalism. Consumers are noticing the rapidity with which the increasingly priced radios with incremental improvements (perhaps an intentional business model) are released. As such, the consumers and their wallets might hold off on future purchases for a few beats to see what's coming 'round the bend. Examples of Good Execution I didn't want to provide only examples of bad execution. Here are some examples of good execution: + I don't know what Wouxun did or didn't do in say the last five years, but they seem to have their act together in the more recent past I'm aware of. For example, I purchased a KG-905G radio recently. Rightfully so, it did not arrive from the factory programmed in narrow band for channels in which wide band is permissible. Rightfully so, it did not arrive with access tones factory pre-programmed in memories instead of the more desirable case of no factory pre-programmed tones. Also, this radio allows a user to store multiple versions of the same repeater freqs with different tones. + Randy, from youtube channel "NotaRubicon Productions," reviewed the newly released Wouxun KG-935G handheld GMRS radio recently. It is apparent that the designers understand features to include which facilitate the use of this radio. Or possibly they included such features due to listening to influencers such as Randy and/or buytwowayradios.com. For example, the radio can be operated in a dual receive mode. To make it readily apparent which of the two selectable channels is the one that will be transmitted on when pressing the PTT button, an attention-getting red bar is present in the portion of the display corresponding to that frequency. Nice. Now let's take the case in which dual receive is active and one steps away from the radio but can hear that a transmission was received. Was it frequency A or B? There is an indicator which shows which frequency last received a transmission. Nice. But let's say you're a person who likes to keep things simple. You might find dual receive confusing or annoying. Dual receive is selectable; one is not forced to use it. Nice. * Recently, buytwowayradios.com has made the Wouxun KG-XS20G mobile radio available for purchase. While I'm waiting for reviews of this radio (believe one will be coming soon from Randy), a feature I like is one that was abandoned by many manufacturers, including the big name $$$ ones. I'm referring to the use of the sturdy, old-style mic connector. This is the connector which utilizes the strain-relieved mic cord secured by a rotating, threaded locking collar instead of the RJ-45 type of connector. I, and plenty of others, dislike the RJ-45 type of connector, especially for mobile radios. Disclosures + I have no connection with Wouxun, other than I purchased their KG-905G radio. I mention them simply because I like many of their design decisions. In case anyone thinks that I'm an automatic Wouxun fan-boy, that is not the case. For example, I wish the KG-905G radio was fully field programmable via it's key pad and knobs. As far as I know, to add or change frequencies in its memories, a PC and programming cable is required. Once that's been done, one can use the radio's limited keypad and knobs to specify or change things such as access tones, power level, and wide or narrow band. While this is better than radios that don't allow for any or next-to-nothing programmability from their keypad/knobs, I wish that the KG-905G was more field programmable in addition to the PC and programming cable method. Since the keypad of this radio is basic (i.e., numeric keys are not included), even if a convoluted way of inputting or updating frequencies could be done via the radio's keypad and knobs, I would like that. This would make the radio more flexible when traveling or otherwise away from home. + I have no connection with Randy nor his NotaRubicon youtube channel. I mention them only because he and his channel provide spot-on information about GMRS and GMRS radios. + I have no connection with buytwowayradios.com other than that's the web site from which I bought the KG-905G radio and some accessories. It is my understanding that BTWR may have interfaced with manufacturers such as Wouxun to drive design decisions for certain, uniquely-offered radios. If so, BTWR is a good asset for the GMRS world. And if that helps the manufacturer create desirable products which differentiate them from competitors and therefore drives sales, it's a win-win. Summary For the radio manufacturer's, I've provided examples of problematic radio designs, quality control issues, documentation issues, and a potential warning about increasing price creep. I've also provided examples of good execution. Finally, while providing radios with good features is nice, it is important that manufacturers also ensure reliability. The allure of whiz-bang features is long forgotten if a radio/its battery/etc fail a short time after the warranty period ends. But the bad reputation for such a manufacturer will exist long after in this case. Bad or non-existent after-purchase support also falls in this category. Note: The opinions expressed are my own. The opinions of others may vary. DeoVindice, mbrun, BKmetzWRKZ843 and 1 other 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrgmrs Posted August 31, 2021 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 It was not my intention to create my original post with large font. This is my first original post rather than one I merely replied to. Due to the amount of information I wanted to convey to manufacturers which might read it, and wanting to get it right, I composed the text initially in my phone's Notes app. Then I copy/pasted it. Apparently this resulted in the original posting's large font. If necessary, I was going to rescale the font smaller using a trick and painstakingly retyping the text. However, I figured out a simpler technique which bypassed the need for the re-typing. First, I copy/pasted the text from my phone's Notes app into the Microsoft Word app I also have on the phone. Then, after logging in to the mygmrs.com forum and selecting edit, I deleted the large font text and replaced it by copy/pasting the text from Word. This resulted in the more normal sized text. Sure beat having to re-type everything. My apologies to everyone who viewed the initial Mr. Magoo sized font. (If you're not sure what that refers to, do a web search.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcradio Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 I'm new to radio and was shocked too at how bad, like completely terrible, the execution has been. No wonder Wouxun is taking off like they are. The term in my industry for this is called Product Management and User Experience. All of these companies need to do some user and field testing, get feedback, iterate, etc. I was trying to standardized on Retevis for my uses. The new models from Wouxun are very interesting. I don't need or want a $400 radio that lives in a glass case. Need something that can bet beat up. However, I do appreciate fine art and there is a place for $400. BKmetzWRKZ843 and mrgmrs 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MozartMan Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 1 hour ago, mrgmrs said: I may have found a painful way to rescale the font, basically requiring manual re-entry of the text. I am also trying another approach that hopefully avoids that approach. Please stand by. You don't have to re-type all text. Copy all text from your post and paste it in Notepad. Go edit your post on the forum, delete all text, copy all your text from Notepad and paste it in the EDIT window. Copying from Notepad and pasting into EDIT window should remove all formatting. PS. Ha ha. I see you already fixed your font while I was typing reply. mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrgmrs Posted August 31, 2021 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 pcradio, thanks for your reply. I see you share my observations. MozartMan, even though I came up with a slightly different fix that utilized Word, I appreciate your taking the time to suggest the Notepad approach. That would have come in handy if the Word approach did not work. (It's nice to see people providing solutions rather than snarky comments.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gortex2 Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 I think your forgetting for decades GMRS radios were simple radios and most if not all were 8 channel with repeater and TA. Many did not eve allow programming. My Unidens have a dip switch for CTCSS and it can only use that CTCSS in all channels. Later on I got the programmable Uniden. I couldn't program it and had to take it to a 2 way shop to have PL set via computer. I can assure you it wasn't cheap to do GMRS then either. There was no $25.00 radios around, nor cheap mobiles. Over the years many serious GMRS users switched to Part 90 radios. Those still cost a lot of money, but with the narrowband changes it has put alot of that gear reasonable on the secondary markets. Lets fast forward 20 years to now. GMRS is the new craze, not because of new products or quality systems but because the rules got changed and now some folks that are promoting GMRS doesn't even know what GMRS was for in the past. In the 4x4 world they are pushing GMRS with mobiles as its better than CB. 99% of that is simplex. Midland doesn't care as many others about wide vs narrow. As long as it talks to there other offerings they are happy. While I agree GMRS market could use some good quality radios, your never going to see it as everyone wants cheap. The CCR mentality ruined it for manufacturers trying to stay in the market. As you said $400 is too rich for you. Many are in same boat, however many spend way more than that on gear and use it daily. I have said over and over if you want quality communications spend money. We tend to loose folks from the service because they think this is something that will do miracles, but they cheap out and find out it doesn't do what they want. For some its not an issue. I can attest some folks also dont know any better. I'll use my parents. I installed the midland radios in there Class C, and both vehicles. I have the Midland MTX275 in both my Jeeps. Why. Simple Easy to use radios. All my parents know is when going down the road behind me they talk on the channel. When at home they go to another channel to use my repeater. My jeeps have it because Jeep Jamboree has switched from CB to GMRS. We use simplex and that's it. No one knows the frequency or PL, they just say a channel number. mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoxCar Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 There is allso the issue of support costs. Developing the necessary infrastructure to support a radio that retails at a low price point can end up costing the company more than sales returns. mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrgmrs Posted August 31, 2021 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 kb2ztx, thanks for your reply. I was not aware of the past history of GMRS radios from years ago, but it parallels that of the old ham radios of yore (e.g., dip switches to select CTCSS tones). Even so, time has marched on, and certain programming decisions and quality expectations should be the norm now. You bring up good points. Even so, my comments are applicable to even the most recent GMRS radios which were introduced say within the last month or so. For example, there is no good excuse for poor documentation of a current radio. Also, once a decision has been made to create a new radio currently, there is no good excuse regarding why manufacturers release such radios with access tones inadvertently pre-programmed into memories. The only logical conclusion is that such manufacturers do not fully understand good quality control or don't pay enough attention to it. I agree that the CCR inexpensive mentality may be contributing to this. To use the CCR radio manufacturers as an example, I have to believe that their coffers are flush due to volume of sales. If they used a small fraction of that money to hire one to three capable people to drive radio feature decisions, quality control, and good documentation, they would step up their game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrgmrs Posted August 31, 2021 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 BoxCar, you brought up a good point regarding the challenge of support costs for inexpensive radios. However, sometimes good design decisions upfront and quality control might prevent the need for a large return load. It also doesn't help in such return cases when manufacturers are resistant to good, inexpensive improvement suggestions. For example, years ago a CCR manufacturer released a radio with an inexpensive eprom (or some such device) with a very limited number of write cycles. If I recall, every time the radio was turned on, a write cycle occurred. A significant number of radios failed within the warranty period. Unfortunately for the American with the sole or main distributorship of that radio in the US, the manufacturer did not provide the expected warranty support. They cited custom fees to receive the returned radios as being cost prohibitive. (Somehow that translated to this being his problem.) They suggested that he hand deliver the bad radios to them in China. This is bad even if he was going to happen to visit China anyway. But what about the next batch of bad radios? According to the man's account on his web site, when he suggested an inexpensive design change, he was ignored. Due to the effort needed to replace the failing device in a surface mount board, and the fact that the device failed regularly enough, he suggested an inexpensive design change. He suggested that the manufacturer install an IC socket under the device so a replacement could be swapped out easily. As such, the warranty or even post-warranty repairs needed in the US could be done in the US. The proposed, good, inexpensive solution fell on deaf ears. Now while I'm sympathetic to the idea of not expecting premium support for an inexpensive radio, I don't believe a CCR manufacturer should be allowed to play that trump card to the nth degree. And in today's equivalent dollars, that radio was not as inexpensive as today's most inexpensive CCR radios. In my opinion, rightfully so the American decided to no longer sell that manufacturer's radio nor to continue spending his money to cover the manufacturer's warranty. Now fast forward years later. I might give that manufacturer a chance. Hopefully they learned from that experience. However, if I were to hear that this manufacturer ever did something like this again today, then in the words of a particular, outspoken Shark Tank celebrity, that manufacturer would be dead to me. My $0.02. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gortex2 Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 Well I guess I'm not sure about other radios but Midland comes pre programmed with no PLDPL tones on any channel. It also comes with a decent users manual. As said Ive never looked at other options as Midland is the leader in GMRS from a user base standpoint. I just returned from a Jeep Expo last week. No one in the facility other than Midland. I've been to a few other events this year and Midland is the only players. Personally I don't see the other vendors doing stuff like that. It all goes back to the mighty dollar. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wayoverthere Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 1 hour ago, kb2ztx said: Well I guess I'm not sure about other radios but Midland comes pre programmed with no PLDPL tones on any channel. It also comes with a decent users manual. As said Ive never looked at other options as Midland is the leader in GMRS from a user base standpoint. I just returned from a Jeep Expo last week. No one in the facility other than Midland. I've been to a few other events this year and Midland is the only players. Personally I don't see the other vendors doing stuff like that. It all goes back to the mighty dollar. It was one (or more) of the newer overseas entries coming with preprogramming issues. Midland is pushing hard (from a sponsorship standpoint) on the overland/off-road community, especially in the move from cb to gmrs; can't argue with this as a smart business tactic. Also can't argue with Midland being very good at things being off the shelf ready. The weakness until the recent updates has been their missing tones and lack of ability for split tones (minus compute programming the mxt400), though this is less of an issue with simplex use. The whole tone to code conversion you have to do to change tones isn't exactly intuitive either. Maybe repeater usage is more of an afterthought, and their main focus is simplex users. The other manufacturers just don't have the presence here that Midland does to get behind the marketing, I think. Wouxun is definitely making some big progress in terms of product with others not all that far behind, but how much of that is wouxun, and how much is it more them custom programming something for a given vendor, with the vendor being the one taking the big risk to put something better on the market? mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gortex2 Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 I would almost bet 99% of midlands mobiles get used simplex only mode. I know I have heard stories about the split tone issue but I've never encountered a repeater that I needed to use that had split tones. Todays marketing email from Midland was to Farmers. They have many markets. I asked the REP at Jeep Invasion about wideband and repeaters and he said they hear from very few about those issues. I am guessing he is indeed correct as many of the folks I talked to and asked about radios last week knew nothing more than we were on channel 4 or 16. On top of that most had no license....entirely another topic...Is what it is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLeikhim Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 I think the lesson here is that if all you want is a cheap simplex radio to talk short distances in your group, then by all means buy a couple Midland radios. They will unfortunately be low performance narrow band radios by design.If you want to talk through repeaters and talk to other licensees, you need a commercial grade radio like many of the Kenwood radios. They are plentiful from used market at cheap price. They will have wide band capability, better receivers, multiple CTCSS ( PL ) / DCSS (DCS), split tone , repeater capability. EtcSent from my SM-T350 using Tapatalk mrgmrs and wayoverthere 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wayoverthere Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 8 minutes ago, JLeikhim said: I think the lesson here is that if all you want is a cheap simplex radio to talk short distances in your group, then by all means buy a couple Midland radios. I think that sums up the markets they're mostly aiming for...."if you need more, oh well" 1 hour ago, kb2ztx said: I would almost bet 99% of midlands mobiles get used simplex only mode. I know I have heard stories about the split tone issue but I've never encountered a repeater that I needed to use that had split tones. Todays marketing email from Midland was to Farmers. They have many markets. I asked the REP at Jeep Invasion about wideband and repeaters and he said they hear from very few about those issues. I am guessing he is indeed correct as many of the folks I talked to and asked about radios last week knew nothing more than we were on channel 4 or 16. On top of that most had no license....entirely another topic...Is what it is. Which...agrees with the above....they have markets they're aiming for, and make a product good enough for those markets, and that's it. On split tones, I've run across a couple out here that used it as a control for whether the repeater would link or be in standalone mode (more common on the ham side), and spotted a a few in the database. I've also run across comments of repeater owners that did it with the specific intent of excluding Midland users from their system (this may go back to the lack of licensE issue too, general inexperience, or both). mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoxCar Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 A good portion of the support costs for a product can be distributed over a group of radios using common components and design firmware in the unit. That would allow products such as programming software would have a common core with modules linked in for different versions to support addition features on higher end units. mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbrun Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 BuyTwoWayRadios needs to be given credit for the improvements that the have made to happen with the recent crop of Wouxun Radios. I can’t honestly say that I can attribute any of the recent improvements to the manufacturer directly. Some background for you.I received one of the first shipment of KG905G radios. I had preordered it the first I learned it was in the works. Within the first couple of hours I discovered major flaws. Wouxun thought this was perfectly acceptable apparently, because no respectable quality control department ever would have passed it. They must think we Americans are to stupid to notice. Within a short time after reporting the issue to BTWR independently verifying the issues, production on the radio was halted. I believe early action on their part saved the 905G from being a disaster and I suspect it was likely a major contributor to the long delay before Wouxun got the issues resolved and product begin shipping again. They earned a lot of respect from me for this.Since that time I have had many interactions with BTWR regarding product performance and have assisted with pre-release testing of product, including the two most recent releases. I am pleased to report that many issues were caught by both parties and corrected before units went into full production. It is sad however that it is taking a distributor to do the manufacturer’s job for them, but for those of us that own Wouxun GMRS radios we should be very thankful they are involved. And as far as the UI improvements in the latest crop of radios, we have BTWR to thank, both for opening the door to external collaboration but also pushing the manufacturer to do a better job.I am actively lobbying for still a much improved user experience and a way of doing field programming of channelized radios. Comments in this thread may prove helpful in making the case further that change is necessary. mrGMRS, I agree with you. The 905G (or its successor) can and should be able to be fully and conveniently field programmed, and it should be able to be done faster and more conveniently that any of the current crop of GMRS radios, even those with keypads. The story is written. The question is whether the manufacturer cares.However, all of this is mute if everyone wants radios at bottom of the barrel prices. If there is no money to be made…Just my two cents. I must admit I was thrilled to see this thread start.MichaelWRHS965KE8PLM plarkinjr, BKmetzWRKZ843 and mrgmrs 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MozartMan Posted August 31, 2021 Report Share Posted August 31, 2021 7 minutes ago, mbrun said: I received one of the first shipment of KG905G radios. I had preordered it the first I learned it was in the works. Within the first couple of hours I discovered major flaws. What was the flaws? I am curious because I also have KG-905G and wondering if it has the same flaws that you discovered or if it the fixed one. mrgmrs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wayoverthere Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 (edited) 1 hour ago, mbrun said: BuyTwoWayRadios needs to be given credit for the improvements that the have made to happen with the recent crop of Wouxun Radios. I can’t honestly say that I can attribute any of the recent improvements to the manufacturer directly. Glad to see a little confirmation to what I strongly suspected (and have alluded to a bit lately)...between the current state of things, and info I've run across on both both wouxun and retevis regarding quantity buying, I've had a hunch it was really the distributors more to thank than just the manufacturer. I know BTWR also has a strong presence on Reddit gathering feedback, I'm fairly sure bettersaferradio does also. That combined with another distributors experiences theyve been quite public about. While I do have a little issue with some of BSR's marketing (all the "SHTF!" and similar buzzwords), I can't fault their or BTWR's efforts at getting better products to the market. It's kind of cool seeing the market finally get a little focus on better products, and i do think there's room to get above the bare minimum and keep an easy to use radio for the basic simplex crowd while including enough features for the somewhat more advanced user (and spreading the cost across both)...the current growth of options would seem to support that. Edited September 1, 2021 by wayoverthere BKmetzWRKZ843 and mrgmrs 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelLAX Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 1 hour ago, mbrun said: ... Just my two cents. I must admit I was thrilled to see this thread start. What compensation do you receive from either of them for all of your valuable R&D and marketing services? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcradio Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 3 hours ago, mbrun said: I am actively lobbying for still a much improved user experience and a way of doing field programming of channelized radios. Comments in this thread may prove helpful in making the case further that change is necessary. I have a software programming background. The PC software for these units is bizarre. I don't mean to insult the people who are working there to make it. Its just not acceptable. Like, simple features providing copy/paste, sane defaults, drop down combo-box behavior, multi selection, and so on. CHIRP is not much better. mrgmrs and plarkinjr 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wayoverthere Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 2 hours ago, pcradio said: I have a software programming background. The PC software for these units is bizarre. I don't mean to insult the people who are working there to make it. Its just not acceptable. Like, simple features providing copy/paste, sane defaults, drop down combo-box behavior, multi selection, and so on. CHIRP is not much better. I would say the fact that there's enough market to support aftermarket programming software is pretty telling in itself (RT Systems), though that does have a few quirks in it's interface as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbrun Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 I have a software programming background. The PC software for these units is bizarre. I don't mean to insult the people who are working there to make it. Its just not acceptable. Like, simple features providing copy/paste, sane defaults, drop down combo-box behavior, multi selection, and so on. CHIRP is not much better.I am right there with you. I recently purchased RTSystems software to use with all the radios I own that it supports. While still not as feature rich as I thought it would be, it is at least a professional experience and is supported.MichaelWRHS965KE8PLM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelLAX Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 4 hours ago, mbrun said: I am right there with you. I recently purchased RTSystems software to use with all the radios I own that it supports... One RT System software package works with all of your radios, or...? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbrun Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 One RT System software package works with all of your radios, or...?Separate licenses purchased for each model. FT-991A, KG-1000G, KG-UV9P. License for each model installs separately but one is able to copy and past between them as well as export and import compatible data between them.MichaelWRHS965KE8PLM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcradio Posted September 1, 2021 Report Share Posted September 1, 2021 5 hours ago, mbrun said: I recently purchased RTSystems software to use with all the radios I own that it supports. Wow, I guess I overlooked this. Doesn't have RT76P or RA25 from Retevis listed. I guess I could ask. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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