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Reviews For: PMR171 GUOHETEC

Category: Transceivers: HF Amateur HF+6M+VHF+UHF models - non QRP <5W

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Review Summary For : PMR171 GUOHETEC
Reviews: 1MSRP: $700
Description:
PMR171 GUOHETEC Shortwave SDR Radio Pmr171 Ultra-Portable Mobile Transceiver VHF UHF HF CW AM SW PMR-171 100KHz-2GHz 20W
Product is in production
More Info: https://www.guohedz.com/PRODUCTS
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0011
EB3CJR Rating: 2023-11-23
DON NOT BUY IT, PLEASE. It is not ready yet. Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I purchased one unit in AliExpress from GREAT HAM Store.
I have one XIEGU G90 for one year now and I am very satisfied with it. I was interested in a light weight all-in-one rig, with HF, VHF and UHF able to easyly operate FT8 and DMR...

(+) good (-) poor (=) neutral

(-) Delivery time longer than announced. Order placed on September 29th. Received on November 20th.
(+) The radio comes in a nice looking box and well protected.
(-) The manual is a bit messy and poor. It looks like an automated translation from the original.
(-) The radio comes without CE or FCC markings.
(+) The case of the rig is compact and roboust.
(=) The keypad is responsive. The screen is tiny (you can't expect a bigger one in a compact rig like this), but it is clear and bright.
(=) Spectrum and water fall are acceptable. It is a bit weird the screen distribution when you set the maximum span, but once you get used to it is ok.
(+) It is possible to visualize and control de SDR radio from a computer using the USB-C rear connection and CNSDR software that comes in a USB dongle. It works well.
(=) The quality of the audio produced by the internal speaker is acceptable, but a bit blurry because the speaker is hidden.
(-) I did not succeded getting audio out from the rear audio output interface (6). I tried connecting an external speaker and also an amplifier. No audio comes out from it.

(-) DMR is not working smoothly. It is not stable, some times works and some others doesn't. The reception sensibity is vey poor. I can only work one of the local DMR repeaters, while I can perfectly work 4 DMR repeaters in my area with my Anytone radio.

(-) SDR front end in VHF is suffering intermodulation issues due to FM boradcast transmissions in the area. The FM transmitters are 10 Km away. Typical situation in big cities. Reducing RF Gain to 30% reduces the problem noticeably.

(+) Antenna Tuner is operative. It is important to check the SWR protection limit in order to let ATU work. For instacnce, if you are trying to tune an antenna with SWR 5:1 and you set the SWR protetion limit to 2:1 transmitter will stop transmitting and no tuning is done.

(-) AM and SSB modulation produce a low quality audio with white noise in the background, that increases significantly as the MIC gain goes beyond 35% (no significant background noise in my shack during the test). I checked with real QSOs receiving very bad reports.

(-) FM modulation is very low, even putting MIC Gaing at 99%

(=) FT8 setting requieres a bit of care. The trick is to set the JTDX that way:
Rig : YAESU FT-847/UNI (the manual specifies to set FT-817)
Baud Rate: 9600 (no information about that in the manual)
Data Bits : Eight
Stop Bits: One

(+) Battery. Simplifies outdoor operation.

(-) It is nice that it is not ncessary external audio adapters what simplifies FT8 outdoor operation, but the USB-C port is in the rear part, what it makes necessary to detach the battery to plug it.

(-) Important!!! The software that controls the radio crashes with certain frequency and it is necessary to switch off and on.

Maximum output power measured
HF bands = 20W
6m band = 10W
4m band = 6W
VHF = 10W
UHF < 6 W (6 W @430MHz 4W @440MHz)