Here is a post on the Baofeng UV-5R dual band VHF/UHF ham radio.
I have received mine in yellow, and I'll edit later with a pic.
Price was about $62 shipped from hong kong with the programming cable and an adapter to a bnc type antenna connector.
I got it off of eBay from radiogearpro.com. They have the radio only for $48 shipped and anyone interested can use my cable to program.
The programming software is a little goofy, but it works, and you can edit/share the saved file outside the app.
The antenna is a little small, but it works ok. An upgrade is $12-30 bucks.
This morning I listened to the same ham (or maybe gmrs) conversation from my house at little York and hwy 6 all the way to post oak and hwy 90 and the beltway just south of hwy 59 south.
This is a dual band UHF/VHF ham radio, but it will also receive and transmit on FRS/GMRS.
It is not capable of RX/TX on CB frequencies or the 222mhz band.
I think these have a better FRS "Privacy Code" than the straight frs radios.
It does have tones for RX and TX but it doesn't look like it does 2 tone for the VFD or the europoean 5 tone equivalent......meaning if you are VFD, you probably want a different radio. If you are like me and don't care or know enough about 2 tone, this radio seems nice. I think it has DPL but not PL.
The scanning seems to work well and using the cable to program it, I think it is going to handle repeater offset RX/TX fine. I'm currently scanning 31 channels but it is capable of 128 channels.
It will receive and I assume transmit on other frequencies like the fire dept because it is not a Part 97 ham radio, it is a Part 90 Commercial radio. Dislaimer: if you purchase this radio, please program it to transmit only on frequencies you are licensed to transmit on.
This is what i have done. While in channel mode, do not have to worry about accidental keying. In an true emergency, I
can switch to frequency mode and transmit on the fire channel if there is no other means to contact.
Future plans are a longer Duckie antenna, a fixed jeep antenna and a fixed home antenna.
I think this radio will work well for us offroading with jeep antennas. If needed, we can setup a base repeater with a short tower antenna at events that would give us the extra advantage over cb at bigger diverse trails.
Update 6/26 I'm monitoring the downtown 146.920 repeater in my kitchen at Hwy6 and Little York. I'm hearing 4 guys talk to each other: 59N, I-45 and 1960, Austin, and San Antonio. I'm not transmitting yet but
I wanted to note the reception and leveraging repeaters.
Update 1/4/13 With a fixed home antenna that is simply clamped on my desk, I have been able to talk with the Katy KARS folks on their repeater that is about 11 miles from my house as the crow flies. With the original antenna, I can communicate on the Cyfair FD Repeater at West Rd and Barker Cypress from Katy JR High on Katy Hockley Rd.
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