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Reviews For: Yaesu FT-7100M

Category: Transceivers: VHF/UHF+ Amateur Base/Mobile (non hand-held)

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Review Summary For : Yaesu FT-7100M
Reviews: 123MSRP: 499
Description:
Dual Band Mobile, V/V, U/U, V/U, Wide Rx, 50W/35W, 262 Memories, 2 Row Alphanumeric Memory Labels,

Product is not in production
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# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
131232.8
N7HFK Rating: 2003-07-07
Works just beautiful Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I have the serial number 2D2####### of this radio and it has been flawless. It does everything it should do and does it well. Receiver is as good as anything else in it's price range and I have owned a bunch of dual banders. Sounds like the Serial 1's were a bunch of dogs, but I believe when they got to the 2's, they got their act together.
KG4TPX Rating: 2003-06-19
Still works great Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I've had my 7100 (ser #2xxxx) for about 8 months now. I have traveled with it from S. FL to Texas and back twice, as well as it's usual use in the congested airways of S. FL. I've never experienced any of the problems mentioned here or on any other web site. It has been set to scan for days at a time. I have had a rag chew at high power for nearly 1 hour (mobile working a base nearly 30 mi away with a S5 signal at both ends most of the time). I have run it at power levels from 14.5 v down to 10.2 (during transmit according to the internal voltage meter). I always get good signal and audio reports.

The only drawbacks I can find with this radio are on reception. That is not to say that reception is poor. It will "hear" repeaters that I cannot hit at high power. I do not have a problem with intermod, some gets in and that's just part of the deal when you have such a wide receive. This radio seems to be incredibly sensitive. I often hear the "noise" (very weak signal) from repeaters 100+ mi away using a Diamond dual band mag mount antenna. I had thought the "noise" was an intermod problem until I started hearing "noise" on frequencies of distant repeaters while traveling. When I bring it into the house (which I do often) and hook it up to my 2M j-pole at abt. 25', I have to really turn up the squelch to keep out the really distant stations while scanning.

This radio has never given me problems of any kind. It has been connected to bad antennae, poor power, and handled often. The only reason that I give it a 4 rather than a 5 is because no radio is perfect and it is difficult ( and dangerous!) to try to go through the menus to change a setting while driving. Also, the receive audio seems to be low on the 70cm side. But with the number of features this radio has, I cannot think of a way to get around the menus. From what I have read, I would avoid a 1xxxx serial number. But from what I've seen with this little radio, the 2xxxx radios are worth a chance.

Mike kg4tpx

----------------------
Earlier 5-star review posted by KG4TPX on 2002-11-08

Yaesu seems to have fixed all of the bugs that I have been reading about. I bought a 2xxx 7100 a couple of weeks ago and have tested for all of the problems. So far, they haven't showed up.

I give this rig a 5 because it does everything advertised, and seems to do it very well. It is my first rig, so I don't have experience with many other radios, but I like what I have seen so far very much. For the features that I "needed", the price just couldn't be beat ($280 at HRO). I chose this radio over the Alinco 605 and the 620(?) dual bands because the features and implementation seemed to match my requirements much better.

Of all of the features, my favorites are:

the ability to split the band audio outputs so you can put one on an external speaker. It makes listening to two different repeaters/stations much easier and I don't have to look to tell what band I want to talk on.

tons of memories. I can program in anything that I might possibly ever want to listen to. I was suprised how much information can be saved in each preset and I have already gotten spoiled to the alpha displays.

The extensive menu system allows me to personalize this rig. With 30+ menu items, it would be doubtful if 2 7100s worked exactly the same by the time their owners got done "playing" with the settings.

Doesn't seem to have as many problems with intermod as the Yaesu FT-5100 I was borrowing. I suspect that some of the intermod that I have been hearing on this rig has actually been signals from some distant repeaters on the same frequency.

I'll report back when this unit gets a few more miles on it, but so far so good. I have been very impressed with the performance.

73, Mike KG4TPX
KC0PAN Rating: 2003-04-29
Got an FT-7100M used from a friend. It worked for a whole day! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
One of the earlier posters said that they thought the FT-7100M had been discontinued, but I think they may have reintroduced it. It is on the list of current offerings on Yaesu's website and has an active product page here...

http://www.yaesu.com/amateur/ft7100m.html

I got an FT-7100M (1Xxxx sn.) from a friend recently. He was using the radio as a mobile in his pickup at the time, and hadn't had any trouble with it in the 7 months since he bought it new. He was using it for casual ragchewing and had only a few repeaters programmed in it. He had never used the scanning feature.

When I got it home, I did notice that the scanner would slow way way down after a few minutes of scanning without hitting anything. Stopping the scan and restarting it would cause it to run fast again. If you allowed it to run slow for too long, then it would freeze and have to be powered down.

I performed a system reset according to the manual and began to reprogram it. After entering one repeater and then leaving it alone for a few minutes, it had powered itself down and wouldn't come back on. I checked my power supply leads and the inline fuse, but they were all good, so off to Yaesu it went.

I shipped it off last Wednesday and Yaesu received it on Friday. I called them on Monday (yesterday) and it had already been assigned to a tech who had replaced some parts, installed all of the update mods and run it through a complete alignment. It had been at Yeasu's support center for less than two full days and was fixed, updated, and ready to be shipped back out. Now that's what I call service.

I believe that the early FT-7100M's were buggy, as recounted by numerous people on this thread. But I also believe that the poor service was due to the Vertex-Yaesu merger. I may not know what I am talking about (often don't), but I have lived through corporate mergers before, and if they are managed properly they only result in chaos for a couple of months. Obviously Yaesu's support center is running very efficiently right now.

I should receive the renewed radio before the end of the week and I look forward to running it through the ringer.

Anybody who has an FT-7100M with problems and are leery of sending it in for repair, it seems that now may be a good time to do it.

I give the radio a low "Needs Help" rating and Yaesu service a "Great!" rating. After a couple of months, I will try to post an update on this radio. All things considered the FT-7100M is an impressive radio and I am very hopeful that the problems are behind this one.

--... ...--
Phillip H. Blanton
-KCØPAN
N1JGA Rating: 2003-04-25
WORKING GREAT Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I INSTALLED THE RADIO OVER SIX MONTHS AGO AND HAVE HAD NO PROBLEMS AT ALL. I FIND THE RADIO TO HAVE GREAT FEATURES AND GOOD RECIEVE. I NOW GET POSITIVE AUDIO REVIEWS FROM OTHER HAMS. I UNDERSTAND THAT YAESU HAS DISCONTINUED THE RADIO.
KG6OPR Rating: 2003-04-07
Works Fine Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I have had mine for 3 months. the only problems I have had is the Mic cord was junk. The intermod is not up to par. I got mine Used can't really complain to much. 73's KG6OPR
KC8SXX Rating: 2003-03-28
abominable Time Owned: more than 12 months.
In the one year that I had this piece of garbage, it went in for repairs 3 times, and I'm still not convinced that it works right! It drops power unexpectedly, freezes up, goes to sleep while scanning, and other neat tricks. When I got it back from Yaesu, I had 50 watts on UHF and 35 watts on VHF, just the opposite of what it should be. Service took forever(measured in months). I would be ashamed to put my name on it if I made it, and wouldn't sell this one to anyone. I have a Yaesu door stop now. Garbage!
K0AWN Rating: 2003-03-28
NO IMD REJECTION AND TERRIBLE WORKMANSHIP - LOTS OF BUGS Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
Owned a FT-7100 for about a year and is now a big black paper weight. Sent to Yaesu three times for work while under warranty for speaker problems, ext audio port replacement and power supply problems. Very bad job of repairs and workmanship with stray solder and piss poor joints in many places.

STILL locks up and shuts down like it is possessed. Don't listen to the sales people they don't really have any control or knowledge of the Yaesu (lack of) quality control.

IMD is the worse I have ever heard. Can hear squeals-and-squawks from every VHF paging system. They should package a band pass filter along with a note of apology to every new owner. Stay away from this one and buy yourself an Icom. Finally discontinued and I say good riddance!! SER # 1E0XXXXXXX
N5ZUA Rating: 2003-03-26
Can't hear through all of the intermod Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Purchased December 2001. I live in Houston, Tx and even away from downtown I receive every VHF pager transmission for miles, there is NO intermod rejection in this unit. VHF RX failed in May 2002, Yaesu repaired under warranty in 2 weeks but did nothing to fix intermod complaint. Unit processor still locks up with number "7" on display and I cannot hear transmissions on EITHER band due to all of the intermod blowing in. Do NOT buy this radio, the factory will not do anything to fix the intermod problems, it is a piece of junk. I can put it in scan mode, walk away, come back and it has either stopped scanning (scan mode set for pause) or it has shut down (APO not enabled). Processor is completely squirely.
KG6INL Rating: 2003-02-20
Functional and easy to use!! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have had my radio now for about a year and have had none of the problems sometimes associated with this radio. I blew something in the radio when I was changing my car battery, even though it should have been protected by the fuse. It was still under warranty and Yaesu fixed it for me. As a first time ham radio operator I found it extremely easy to use and I was up and operating in no time.

What I really like:
1) The big and clear display
2) Removable head.
3) Functions on mic.
4) Scanning features (wide range and memory skip options)
5) reliable

The only noticable problem is the main VFO will pop sometimes if the sub VFO is in scan mode. This can get kind of annoying.

All in all I have had a great experience with this radio and recommend it as an afforable and easy to use 2m/440 rig.
VA3WXM Rating: 2003-02-12
Got a good one! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
After reading all the reviews I decided to put "fingers to keyboard" and write my own.

I purchased my FT-7100 in October 2001. I was looking for a new dual-band rig and liked the detachable face option. Unfortunately, the offerings from ICOM and Kenwood were out of my price range so the Yaesu seemed to fill the bill. Given its checkered past I probably should have done my research, but I bit the bullet and decided to keep the radio. So far it was worked well for me!

Mine has the "1Exxxxxx" serial number with yellow and blue dots on the box. I initally installed it at home to get used to the programming and menus. At first I was disappointed that the rig didn't have full-duplex or crossband repeat options but at the time I could live without it. The manual was typical and really could have used an edit by an English major. The radio looked and felt nice and fired up straight away once all the connections were made. With a dual-band j-pole I found the receive sensitivity to be comparable to my other FM rigs. There was some IMD on the 2m band, but compared to my FT-5100, and considering the extended receive already built in, I could live with it. My audio reports have always been good; never sounded off-frequency or under-deviated. I experienced the "helicopter" noise while scanning the sub-band and listening on the main band. That too I could live with since I really didn't buy the radio to serve as a scanner! In V/V or U/U mode the sub-band has much less sensitivity and is more susceptible to intermod. So far I've been fortunate that my local 2m repeater has PL on the output and a lot of the public service agencies use PL: that pretty much takes care of that problem! I did have the display lock up on me once but cycling it off then on cured that; it hasn't happened since.

The rig is currently installed in my car with a home-made extension kit. After reading some comments that the FT-7100 seems more sensitive to voltage variations I made sure to wire it directly to the battery. After 6 months in a harsh (mobile) environment it has given me NO problems.

Things I like:
- bright display
- multiple RF power levels
- extended receive
- detachable face
- real squelch knobs
- automatic power off (APO)

Things I don't like:
- no x-band repeat
- some intermod distortion
- holding my breath waiting for something to fail!

All in all I've been happy with my FT-7100. I give it a 4/5 because I think the radio is better than average and, in my case, has worked as advertised.