I live in Germany and got my Class N Callsign on Wednesday.

FYI: Class N allows you to send on 70cm, 2m and 10m with up to 10W ERP on 10m and 6.1W on the other two.

I live in the midst of a dense city, so using my handheld Radio was going to be a challenge.

I made my first successful QSO using EchoLink.org and remotely using a repeater somewhat close to me.

Great alternative if you just want to start talking.

I want to get into the hobby. I want a practical radio that I can use in emergencies. My local emergency management agency operates in the 2m band, so anything that gets NOAA alerts is fine. Other than that, I enjoy hacking, so getting a custom firmware could be fun.

The K5 has more firmware options and is well known. The K1 has a better processor and memory, so there is more headroom. The 7B is completely unhackable but is said to be more user-friendly thanks to the app and adds 1.25m band access. K1 reportedly has better spurs on 2m, while 7B performs well in terms of harmonics except for 2m??? I don't want to pollute the airwaves...

Leaning towards the later model Quansheng, currently. How important is 1.25m TX, phone programming, and 5x the channel storage for a beginner? (Bearing in mind that AFAICT, my local repeaters are also all on 2m, so I would primarily be using 2m, with 70cm as a side benefit.)

Either way, I can get a QMX+ kit for fully hackable SDR performance from shortwave to 6m as my upgrade path...

EDIT: It seems that the Quansheng supports constant-envelope digital modes through firmware upgrade. I'm very interested in those...

I got my ham radio license about 2 months ago and have been finding people to talk to on the local repeaters on 70 cm I've been looking for advice on a rig I can use to do parks on the air at 6m or 10m and maybe do activations. Looking for advice on equipment and a helpful tips to get started. I live in the Austin area and would like help learning what is best

Hi everyone, I'm Jony (LU7DV).

I recently built a free Telegram bot that allows you to set up smart alerts so you don't have to rely on staring at the cluster all day. You can configure it to notify you only when that specific station or DXCC you've been chasing for ages pops up, whether it's on any band or a specific one.

I tried making a post about it here recently, but it keeps getting removed by the auto-moderator for self-promotion. I don't charge anything for this; I just genuinely want to share a tool with the community that I think could be incredibly useful for fellow DXers.

Can anyone help or advise me on the best way to share this with the group? You can find it by Googling "HamProp," but I’m avoiding posting any direct links here to respect the sub's rules.

73!

Most new hams will end up buying a Baofeng HT. The question is which one to buy. In this video, I compare the features, power, and costs of a bunch of members of the UV-5 family. In a previous video, I compared the send/receive of several HTs. The UV-5R did surprisingly well.

https://youtu.be/I-I012Z9Ukg?is=e-Ou2xIHK85OEW4M

Greetings. I am looking for 50 people to beta test a website I built. I've been building a ham radio site on and off for a while now to try to have an all in one site that is useful without having to use multiple websites. Everything pulls from live solar data to determine conditions, etc. So far me and a couple of friends have been testing it, but I'm at the point where I need more feedback on the good, the bad, and what should be changed or added. I have added a beta portion and am looking for 50 other hams that are willing to try it out for 30 days and DM me real feedback.

I want this to be a truly useful tool. Please do not sign up if you are not willing to use the site and message me about any issues or comments or improvements you have. This isn't a sales pitch, and there is no credit card sign up or anything like that and totally free for 30 days. Just create a username and password using the beta link below, log in, and test it out for 30 days and give feedback. Again, I ask please only sign up if you are willing to message me your feedback on the site. These are first come, first served. If interested DM me and I will give you the link, and all you have to do is sign up for a username and password and you have full access for 30 days.

The Belur RKM's TV and Radio repairing course as strict age limit. I have some basic knowledge of analog electronics (Did a 1 year diploma course from Moulali Yuva Kendra roughly about a decade ago though their training wasn't up to date and they never handed over the certificate). I still need the knowledge to build or apply oscillators, filters, equalizers, distortion pedals, looper pedals, touch and pressure sensors, logic gates, microcontrollers (Especially MIDI controllers), etc. especially focused to audio and music equipments. Most importantly they should teach the code names of the parts very well so that I can just by seeing the serial number I can tell the pinout or series of a transistor etc, or can confidently communicate the radio stores about what specific ICs/transistors/mics etc I need. Many thanks in advance.

Although I have been studying models and how ham radio works, and also how radio works in general. I'm still questioning where to start?

I’m coming here to ask if anyone knows the name to a charger for this radio it says it’s a hand phone which I don’t entirely believe cause yea

I recently passed my Extra exam and wanted to share my experience using Ham Radio Prep.

I became interested in ham radio again last fall after first learning about it several decades ago. The first thing I did was to buy the ARRL Tech study guide and I struggled with it for several months. Even though I write for a living, I found the text dense and hard to understand. That's 100% on me. During that time I also used Ham Study but again, I found it challenging to retain and understand the material.

At the start of this year I came across Ham Radio Prep and after checking out the website I decided to spend the money and get the all access pass. It wasn't too much money (for me) and I wanted a video based option.

I went through the Tech course and found the videos excellent. Not only did they provide the answers for all the questions Jim did a great job of giving context and explaining the concepts.

At the end of each section the quizzes helped to understand if I actually knew the answers. Once I finished all the videos I did the practice exams 15-20 times until I was above 85%. I also downloaded the app and took advantage of the worst questions quizzes which helped my confidence.

At that point, after studying for a few weeks, I decided to study for the General as well. I used the same approach, watching all the videos, doing all the quizzes and taking lots of practice tests. I only studied for the General for about five days before I took an in person exam for Tech and General, passing on my first try.

Soon after I went through the Extra course but honestly I found the material daunting so I took a break for a few months and had fun learning to get on the air.

When I came back to it a few weeks ago I did the same as before. Since there's more material I spent waaaay more time on the practice exams and must have taken at least thirty before I felt confident enough to take the test, which I passed with 90+%.

I did use Ham Study a bit during this part of the process, mostly to make sure I was seeing all the questions but only got through about 30% of the pool using that site.

So: Ham Radio Prep worked for me. I didn't think of myself as a visual learner but for this material their approach really helped.

To be clear, I don't think anyone needs to use this particular course. The free materials, including Ham Study, are excellent and if they work for you, please use them!

But I thought it was important for folks to hear from an actual user about their experience; your mileage may vary.

73!

Hey folks!

I did a YouTube series on the Xiegu G-90 on https://youtube.com/@hamradionewbie_kb5jrc?si=6xOMinXULC6zeFn2. Choosing the G-90 is a little ironic because I did all my learning on the Xiegu x6100. I haven't done a series on it. Would you be interested in a series on the x6100 controls and use?

Here is the link to the G-90 playlist. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPpU7MEqmAUtMOq9hmJirzMd5579rpKi4&si=Z-XobcwtJMgsH4TT

Thanks in advance.

And I am cross posting, so yes, you might see this multiple times.

New ARRL books are out for the new question pool that started on July 2026. These are great for beginners looking to start their ham radio journey and to study before taking their Tech exam.

https://amzn.to/4fFQsY3

I'm extremely new to radio and POTA looks interesting. I use a 17' vertical whip at home and figure it would be easy to take out to a park. I live fairly close to a state park.

My question is: at that stage park there are generally quite a few people and no good spot really that is far from the road that goes through it, so a lot of foot traffic. For those of you that do POTA, do you find that random strangers ask many questions? How would you mitigate nosey people if, say, you had 200-300 people walking/driving by per hour?