[VHFcontesting] New Gear at Dayton

[Peter Laws]

On Tue, May 22, 2018 at 7:06 AM, Bob Burns W9BU <w9bu_lists at rlburns.net> wrote:

> The radio that Icom showed at the Tokyo Hamfair last summer was a "concept
> radio". I took that to mean that the engineers had mocked-up what they
> thought a new VHF/UHF base radio might look like using the IC-7300 SDR
> architecture as starting point. I got the impression that there was no
> guarantee that Icom would actually build the mocked-up radio, but that they
> were just testing the waters.

I have mostly Icom stuff and like it a lot ... but ... Icom isn't
really interested in what I think (or you or anyone on the list
thinks) and is gonna do what Icom is gonna do.  Maybe they'll do the
9700, maybe they won't.  Maybe they'll be smart and build L-band into
the chassis (raises price but lowers their cost relative to that price
because less packaging parts, cost), maybe they'll continue to make it
an optional "UX-9700" (and only make 1 of those for every 10 radios so
that they become Unobtanium after a few years).  Maybe they'll improve
how multiple radios behave on a CI-V bus, maybe they won't.  Maybe
they'll do a better job with D-STAR, maybe ... no, they definitely
won't do that.  They ain't tellin' and they don't care what you or I
think about their plans.  :-)

But I still like their stuff and expect to buy more in the future.

Also, the people paying money to vendors to "reserve" a radio that
doesn't exist are nuts.  :-D

-- 
Peter Laws | N5UWY | plaws plaws net | Travel by Train!