Cheap Comms - Baofeng Radios

[Grant H.]

Anyone have the new 8 watt vs the normal in-5r? How’s the antenna

I have an 8 watt. Same junk antenna as the 5r+.

Either the Radioddity or Nagoya (NA-701/NA-771) are good upgrades for not a lot of money...

How do these work if I want to use one with a buddy on a road trip or something? I don't know Jack shit about radio stuff. What frequency would I use


Did some reading looks like FRS and there are 22 channels?

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Correct. For that kind of purpose I would program them to use the FRS channels, pick one, and go to town.

This is relatively simple, and will be covered in my write up of programming them.

[brutal]

I have an 8 watt. Same junk antenna as the 5r+.

Either the Radioddity or Nagoya (NA-701/NA-771) are good upgrades for not a lot of money...




Correct. For that kind of purpose I would program them to use the FRS channels, pick one, and go to town.

This is relatively simple, and will be covered in my write up of programming them.

The Radioddity antennas are coming slow boat out of China so I ordered some 7.5" and 14.5" ExpertPower antenna for around twice the price, still pretty cheap. Hell, after I ordered some UV-5R+ I dove in and ordered two UV-82. Still only 5/1W but the reviews on them seemed more positive (bigger buttons). extra batteries, larger batteries, etc. it's starting to add up and I haven't even touched one. LOL.

Now I have to go figure out a sub $100 RC boat that I can get before Monday...

[Grant H.]

I never really got into the Baofeng. I mostly have Icom, Yaesu, and a few B.K.s. But for the money it would be worth having a few tucked away.
The thing that kills it is trying to find a good cable to program it with. Manually programming can be a pain but it's doable.

I have all the big name brands as well (been buying radios since I got into ham when I was like 7...) and I will never argue that these are in the same realm. However, as you mentioned, for the price I can stash a pile of these with the batteries removed and in a metal container, and they will likely survive even an EMP type of SHTF scenario. I now have my better radios for personal/family, and cheaper radios that I can hand out to folks as our plans unfold and a number of groups link up and head to BFE.

Any of the FTDI cables, like the one I linked, will work just fine with windows and mac (I think linux as well, but I honestly haven't tried... I have an rdp linux machine if someone needs me to try it)...

The Radioddity antennas are coming slow boat out of China so I ordered some 7.5" and 14.5" ExpertPower antenna for around twice the price, still pretty cheap. Hell, after I ordered some UV-5R+ I dove in and ordered two UV-82. Still only 5/1W but the reviews on them seemed more positive (bigger buttons). extra batteries, larger batteries, etc. it's starting to add up and I haven't even touched one. LOL.

Now I have to go figure out a sub $100 RC boat that I can get before Monday...

Yep. I have a handful of them already, and just bought a few more to stash. Upgraded antennas, a couple of 25W truck radios that cover the same bands (playing with a solar powered, "drop" repeater for SHTF), batteries, etc... I've spent more than a few dollars with china on these...