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1-5 of 5 messages
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icom 703 or yaesu 817 - what's the better receiver
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by FOXBAT426 on October 10, 2009
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I realize each rig has its pros and cons vs. each other. The 703 has compression, dsp, 10watts. The 817 has vhf, uhf, is smaller, 200 bucks cheaper.
what i'm interested in is hearing from people who have used both side by side and done direct comparisons on the receivers. could someone tell me what rig has the better sounding receiver and if possible is one more sensitive than the other.
thx, john
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RE: icom 703 or yaesu 817 - what's the better receiver
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by SWL377 on October 23, 2009
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Id pick the 703 since it has audio DSP (most if not all 703s came with that DSP board installed). The 817 and 703 have nearly identical rcvr sensitivity specs, but the DSP can make a difference in whether you can copy a weak sig or not in thge presence of certain kinds of noise. I'd prefer IF DSP over AF DSP, but any DSP is better than none. The 817 has lower current draw on receive than the 703 which can make a difference if you are operating on battery power. Both are good sets. The new 703+ xcvrs are too pricey though. Plenty of used ones (incl some non "pluses" without 6M) out there in the $450 range. Be careful of early 703 models with improerly adjusted bias on final transistors, they will blow up. Lots writen out there about how to test and adjust if needed.
73
Mark
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RE: icom 703 or yaesu 817 - what's the better receiver
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by KI6PDQ on October 23, 2009
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Stay away from both the present is digital filtering. Entry level units for what you are looking for are Yaesu ft 450 and Icom Ic 7200.
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RE: icom 703 or yaesu 817 - what's the better receiver
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by K7ZOV on October 31, 2009
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I have a 703 and 817. I have had them on a "A-B" switch and found the 703 to hear a lot better. With the DSP kicked in the 703 is far better. True the 817 is cheaper. But is it really? To bring the 817 up to the 703 hardware level you need to make friends with W4RT and buy a speech compressor mike mod, external ATU, and internal DSP module. Then you have to order from yeasu a TCXO since it is not usually standard. By the time your done you spent as much if not more then the 703. Then you have to deal with a tiny screen, more complicated menus, and head can't be removed. The 703 does have a low power mode that limits the output to 5 watts pep but can tune down lower then the 817. The finals on both the early 817 and 703 did blow. It was a bias problem with the 703 and by now that has been fixed and is easily adjusted. The 817 just has a bad stability problem and for about $50 the driver board can be purchased and replaced in less then a hour. Both are great and both are really fun QRP rigs. The FT-450 and the IC-7200 both beat the crap out of both rigs with their DSP IF. But they suck power thus not making them really qrp rigs. They are in a different market and to compare them to the 817 and 703 really is not fair ... actually stupid. Sorry that's how I feel when I hear people compare radios that have different designs for different markets and try to make them equal. Their not and never can be. Well that turned out to be my 10 cents worth... Hope it helped
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RE: icom 703 or yaesu 817 - what's the better receiver
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by WB2WIK on November 1, 2009
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I think I agree with the last post.
I had a 703+ (version with 6m) and also an FT-817ND which I still have (I sold the 703), so I never really got to use them "side by side."
However, my impression is the 703's receiver was better. One thing I usually try with all rigs is to see what happens if I connect them to "big" antennas here at the home station, even though these are portable rigs.
The FT-817ND "collapses" completely here...just pure signal overload with the beams, makes it difficult to hear weak signals. I don't recall that happening nearly as much with the 703.
Unfortunately, I didn't have them both at the same time so I can't make a true "comparison."
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