| VK1JV |
Rating:  |
2006-07-27 | |
| Just Great |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
Been on air since January 06 and the 756 is my first Amateur rig. I have since installed the optional filters, voice synthesizer and high stability CO. Having been an active SWL for many years I am impressed with the receive performance - the 756 dual receive capability is really useful. Have worked the world using 100 watts and a G5RV. Being able to pull a weak signal out of the hash using DSP and filter PBT is impressive. For under 1000 bucks I believe this rig to be excellent value. Have not had any problems at all with this rig.
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| N4DEK |
Rating: |
2005-03-20 | |
| Still hard to beat |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| Ok guys it's just my opinion but the original IC-756 is still to this day hard to beat. I've owned just about every modern day era radio out there including the 756PRO and the 756PROII and the good old 756 is the one I came back to. This is one solid rig. Compared to the latter two radios it holds it's own very well. Mine is serial #14xx and I've had no display issues at all. Still looks like the day it left Icom. Maybe when the prices on the PROII's drop to around $1k I'll buy another one but untill then I'll just stick to the good old original 756. What a rig. |
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| N1IZE |
Rating:  |
2005-01-21 | |
| Good rig if not for the CRT screen |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| The 756 is an awsome rig, too bad the crt screen makes it sucks- yes soiree.. I know Icom does not have any other spare crt screens left, and my eyesight is just going looking at the horizontal lines now numbering 12 across the screen. The functionality of the rig is VERY good. I have written Icom and asked for them to prorate this beast of burden so that maybe I could send them back this rig for a boats anchor and purchase a new not so-crt screen oriented. I sold my Icom 751A and thought I was moving up, instead.. as my grandparents once would say this radio is schmutzy (yiddish for dirt, crappy, and other explitives). I can't believe that Icom really didn't put the radio through its paces before sending defective product out into the market.. For those of you who want to get a hold of me for some more input my email address is actman81@yahoo.com Looking forward to hearing from U.. |
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| M1BWM |
Rating: |
2005-01-19 | |
| Great Performer |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
This is the second one of these i have had since 1998 very easy to use and the scope is good
I have had two 706s 1 and 2 and a 746 which the scope on these is a bit of a joke.
All in all for the money you could do a lot worse would like a pro etc |
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| NE0P |
Rating: |
2004-12-06 | |
| Love mine so far! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I picked up this rig a couple of months ago expecting it to be a 746 without 2 meters, but with dual receive and a bandscope. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it is a totally different rig, and in many ways better.
It is easier to use than the 746, as more settings have a dedicated control instead of going into the menus (CW offset for one). Also, the compression control is on the front, instead of on the rear like the 746. And the screen gives you more information, like what filter you have set at both IFs, and what you have programmed in all 4 CW memories.
The dual receive is excellent. Makes DXing in pileups so much easier. Find out where the DX is listening, and listen to hear when to drop your call in. Wish I had this ability for the first 307 countries I worked. It would be nice to separate the audio from each receive to a different ear, but the balance control works nicely also.
The receiver is pretty quiet, as long as you don't turn the preamps on when they aren't needed (like at all on 30-160, or use preamp 1 for 20-15 and preamp 2 for 12-6m), or use the NB when the band gets really crowded, as it adds lots of IMD products to the receive. Guess that is true of most NB today. This one is average at best. Wish they put the NB from the Icom 740 or Yaesu FT100D into it.
The DSP works pretty good, but is more aggressive than the DSP in the 746. You can only set it about 1/2 way max or it starts to put digital artifacts into the receiver. Still, it works great at this setting.
Never thought that the bandscope would be that useful, but it is growing on me. I think it will be really useful during the 6 meter Eskip seasons.
The tuner is great-it will load things the LDG Z100 wouldn't. The memory keyer is great-it will do contest serial numbers. The receiver is great-haven't seen it overload yet in 3 different contests, and already snagged country #308 with it in the CQWW phone contest.
Just wish the NB worked better, and do wish there were a few more filter slots, but the passband tuning does work good on SSB, and the APF filter really helps at times on CW. I have just the 9mhz 500hz filter installed so far. You can also trick the software into letting you use the CW filter on SSB for digital modes.
Overall, I love this rig so far. Wish I would have gotten one earlier. Now maybe to try a PROIII in a couple of years. For what these are going for, they are a best buy under $1000.
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| S58J |
Rating: |
2004-11-08 | |
| after 7 years still running cool |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| I bought mine in spring 1997. So far, let me immediatelly knock on the wood, it works great, same as the first day. My previous HF TRX where TS-140S and TS-850S - but IC-756 is without comparison the best. With my barefoot IC-756 I managed to work 5BDXCC as well as 6m DXCC (currently 123 countries) and some 15.000+ contest QSOs without a single distraction. More filters would be nice, but I can live with it. Display is sometimes a problem, in my case blue lines appeared twice. In both cases the TRX was exposed to higher humidity, and after some time in dry place they dissapeared. It looks cool, works great and regardless that I will go for IC-756 PRO III, the "oldie" will stay in the shack. |
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| W7BO |
Rating: |
2004-07-20 | |
| Display Problems |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
After calling Icom, emailing, and working with the technician, NO display can be found and the rebuild success rate is 60% for 250 bucks. If you have the radio, they work nice, but since there is NO program like the 746 has, the radio is almost useless since you can't see what frequency you are on !! ICOM, WAKE UP and find a way to repair what you sell. My display went out after the radio was repaired for other reasons and got it back with the screwed up display. Comes on and off then dies and has a blue line across the digits on the sub band.
Stay away from the 756 and 746 becasue of this..
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Earlier 2-star review posted by W7BO on 2003-11-10
Well, after a couple of years, I thought I had a great radio, but now I got the problems most have. The BLUE LINES in the display. I sent radio in for repair for a tuner because radio creeped up to 150 watts output and burned it out, then it came back with a bum display. upsetting for what I thought was a good radio. I bought a Kenwood TS-2000, and fantastic. Icom has lost my respect since I got a new radio a few years ago, and now they dont have parts to fix it. |
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| KB0PGO |
Rating: |
2004-02-14 | |
| Nice deal and a great radio |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| I bought the radio by accident on ebay - It was so cheap that I had to make a bid - less than $700. After 5 days no one else bid on it so I was stuck with it. It had lines on the display and the owner correctly advertised that fact. After using it a few monthes it doesn't compare to any radio that I've ever used before and to try to would be like comparing apples to oranges. I mostly use PSK on this radio and do miss the ability to shut off the AGC completly but have found the pass band filters quite easy to use to cut off unwanted strong stations which will shut you down on that mode. I am a technition and decided to repair the display but before starting I called Icom to verify the price of a new one before attempting to repair mine. The woman on the telephone told me the price and also said there was only 2 left. There will be no more because the manufacturer of the display - Sanyo - does not make it anymore. I immediatly ordered it. With the exception of the display problem the operation of this radio has been flawless and a joy to operate. |
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| W2FS |
Rating: |
2003-11-17 | |
| Best Radio I've Ever Owned |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
I purchased my 756 new at Dayton several years ago. I've been in love with it ever since. The things that made it a killer radio from my perspective were:
1. It was (at the time) the cheapest radio on the market ($1800) that had dual watch. I remember what a wonderful thing it was to discover the TF-SET button on my old Kenwood 440 for operating split, but dual watch raises this to a whole new level. You can hear the transmit frequency of the DX station operating split and hear the stations calling him on a completely different frequency at the same time. It makes it so much easier to know when and where to call.
2. It is the finest shortwave receiver I've ever owned. The audio is incredible... very warm. I added the 6 kHz AM filter (WELL worth the money, BTW) and found it got even better. And the bandscope, which was pretty, but definitely a "bell or whistle" on the ham bands, is very useful in tuning shortwave AM stations. If only it had synchronous AM.
I've given a lot of thought to upgrading to a PRO II or an Orion, but I've heard a lot of people say the audio quality on the 756 is superior and less "digital-sounding".
Mine was not one of the early units, but I've had absolutely no problems with it. It still works like new. |
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| N0XE |
Rating: |
2003-11-10 | |
| Great rig |
Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. |
I also sold my Icom 756 due to the concerns about the display problems. I spoke with Icom in Washington State about this issue and they informed me it was due to a bad lot of display units that only affected the early units that first came off the line. If You have a later Icom 756 you should be ok. There was another problem they addressed and that is the internet mod that increases your power to 150 watts out. If you do this mod plan on sending the radio back to Icom, something about it messes up the carrier balance setting and eventually burns the finals up. The radio was a great rig, but being mine was a very early model, I did not want to take any chances. I was also upset that Icom had already dropped the display unit for this radio as they only make parts to support current models, so if your rig is 5 or 6 years old you could be in trouble for parts if your radio needs certain unique parts like a display unit. I guess a lot of these radio manufactors are going the way of consumer electronics now, just toss it away when it breaks and buy a new rig. I had no complaints with the radio and it performed very well, just made me nervous to keep it for very long.
73 N0XE
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Earlier 5-star review posted by N0XE on 2003-01-28
This is what I hate about these kind of reviews, the last two say it is a great rig but say totally opposite on which is better the 756 or the Pro.??? Who do you believe.? Can give you a headache sometimes, hi hi,
The one I used was super and loved it, but one other reviewer pointed out it's short comings if you are a low band DXer and use Beverage antennas, now I am reluctant as I would like that capability but I don't want to spend a lot of money on repairs if it can not handle it. Decisions, how we hate them sometimes!!!!!
73 N0XE
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