| W7ZZT_NOW_W6DO |
Rating:      |
2005-04-02 | |
| If I had only one HT... |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| This little radio has been one of the most useful test instruments in my shack. The range of frequencies and different modes is outstanding in such a small package. I've been using this rig for over a year in all sorts of situations: testing transceviers from HF to UHF, scanning public service freqs while travelling, and an occasional FM QSO. I've got three or four other HTs that I rarely use, but this little guy is always front and center and ready to go when I need it's help. Kind of pricey, but worth every penny if you can use a remarkable broadband receiver and a reasonably good VHF HT that you can stuff into a shirt pocket. |
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| WO4C |
Rating:      |
2005-03-06 | |
| A Real Master Piece |
Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. |
Bought mine about 4 months ago and have no regret.
A REAL KENWOOD - Excellent features, Can control from the front without fishing through the menu. Loaded with features - too many to mention. Extremely long lasting battery is a real plus. Multi-band, multi-mode reciever is outstanding - V/V, V/U, U/V, U/U, V or U/HF or SUHF. Rubber duck works perfect and doesn't pierce your side. Mine goes everywhere with me, just drop it in my carry on. Totally amazing jam packed unit. Wouldn't trade it for any other on the market today. I have 4 other HT's and they stay on the shelf this one has become a dear friend. I just love it. |
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| WA7H |
Rating:      |
2005-02-11 | |
| It's fun |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| I’ve had the TH-F6A for two weeks and I really like it. It’s a fun little radio that keeps me amused evenings in my motel room when I’m deployed with FEMA. The only things that could be better are the volume knob and the battery charging system; no drop in quick charger and the battery has to be attached to the radio. Other than those little irritants it’s fun stringing a wire antenna around my room and listening to the HF bands at night. I bought it at the same time I bought the Yaesu VX-5R because I couldn’t make up my mind, when I was at HRO, which one I liked the best. I love both of them and they each have something the other one is lacking. Now if I could just combine them into one radio it would be the perfect handheld, would that make it a Kensu or a Yaewood? |
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| KD5WPX |
Rating:      |
2005-01-05 | |
| I like it! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I've only had this radio for a couple of months, but I like it enough that I'd buy another in a heartbeat! I use the radio (with a Comet ht-224) to check into a couple of nets from work and on both 2 and 440 I can talk from what were "dead spots" with the radio & antenna I had before. I found the radio to be pretty easy to learn and easy to get along with. I have the standard complaint that the keypad buttons are too small, but to have a larger keypad the radio would have to be bigger, so I'm thinkin' Kenwood made the right choice! I also use the radio for scanning the local air, police, fire & business frequencies. There seems to be a little interference from my PC, and ocasionally I hear the weather channels in the 222mhz band, but I think that's a pretty small price to pay for transceive on 3 usefull ham bands and the virtually dc to daylight receive on the "B" side. The manual talks about shifting the internal frequencies around to resolve some of these issues, but I haven't felt the need to play with that yet. In short I can't find much to dislike and am really happy with the "one tiny radio that does everything" that is the F6A. Buy it, you'll like it!
73s - Bob |
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| KD7WPQ |
Rating:     |
2004-12-31 | |
| good place to start |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
Well, I have had this radio about a year now and I have to say it is quite nice.
I'll sum it up and make this simple
Pros.
- Easily modifiable
- When modified it makes a super radio cause it allows you to transmit in the police bads (Emergency use only!) and on the FRS bands (EL power only for FCC reasons). Bisicly it becomes a all in one wonder.
- Has 1200 and 9600 baud modes (minus the TNC)
- Dual recieve on any bands (great for camping so you can listen to the Hams and talk to your friends via the FRS bands.
- Nice battery time
Cons.
- Does get intermod, speciall around paging systems, high voltage and computers
- Has a SMA connector so watch for cross threading
- The joy stick, unless you set the housing back on correctly won't work verticly, but that is made up for by the top nob which can take the place of the joy stick.
Over all I like it and I wold buy another.
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Earlier 4-star review posted by KD7WPQ on 2004-08-06
Well I don't like to write stories so I'll make this short and sweet, just the way I like it!!!!
These are my opinions......
Pros.-
Dual channel (Dual Recieve)
Lots of memory channels
Modifiable so one radio is all you need (At Your Risk)
Small and easy to pack
6 to 48hr monitor time
With normal use will run 6+ hrs
easy to use menu
Cons.
Highly prone to intermod!!! This radio can not be used near computers without intermod unless you find a sweet spot.
Kenwood's Mic is very poorly built. I've been told I sound better without it! not worth 30 bucks, NO WAY!
SMA Connector is easy to break!!! So be careful!
Stock antenna isn't worth a hoot |
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| N9TSL |
Rating:     |
2004-12-05 | |
| Great HT |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
The intermod problem is the only reason it don't get a 5 from me. Luckily I live out in the boonies and don't have a problem until I visit the city. If you live in the city try to borrow a friends to try first before buying because you may very well have a major intermod issue.
The supplied antenna is not much more than a dummy load on 222 either but that is easily remedied with a aftermarket antenna.
Other than that this HT is great.
Has an unbelievable ammount of features that are easy to navigate through.
Reliability has been great. I bought it used when it was a yr. old. I have owned it now for allmost a yr. and no problems at all.
Would I ever buy one again? Your darn tootin!! |
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| KG4PTZ |
Rating:      |
2004-11-18 | |
| Nice little wonderbox... |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
I acquired this rig after Field Day in 2003, and so far it has stayed with me through a thousand or more miles of bicycle portable, golf-cart portable, pedestrian portable, and many a fox hunt (on 217 CW, not 2m FM). For fox-hunting, this rig isn't the best, since its s-meter is very generous, giving S-9's to most signals. I have intermod issues every once in a while in town, but no worse than my friends' Motorola and GE gear experiences. The dual receive is quite nice to have, as well as the volume balance feature (this comes in more hand with my D7 while doing APRS though). PL and DPL scan are also quite nice to have, especially when there are itenerant users who run tones (mostly construction workers though).
Granted, I don't like the concentric volume/channel knobs, but I got used to it fairly quick. The quasi-menu-driven squelch is annoying, but it almost never has to be adjusted, so it's easily delt with. The only other real trouble I had was about 5 months after I bought it, when the antenna connector went bad. After taking it to the local Kenwood commercial dealer and having them put it on the service monitor, they figured the connector was bad, or the finals were toast. I sent it to the Kenwood service center in its original box, and in 3 days, it was back! So I must give 'em credit for excellent warranty repair service. The antenna connector problem has yet to happen again.
All in all though, this is a good rig, that I also use as my scanner around here, from low-band all the way up to 800. It's also a LOT lighter than an HT600 too. |
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| WB9YCJ |
Rating:      |
2004-10-31 | |
| Icom please top it ! |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
GREAT - except for the receiver intermod. I may be waiting a while for that to improve in other mfg versions.
Icom, lets see your version! |
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| N5PRE |
Rating:      |
2004-10-31 | |
| Kenwood TH-F6 a great HT and multi-purpose radio |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| I came here to eham.com to review what was available in a small form factor that had the features I was looking for. I had it narrowed down to an Icom TC-90 because the thought of 6m on a HT intrigued me or a Yaesu VX-7R, also w/6m but I decided to go with the Kenwood TH-F6 instead. There were issues with cost of accessories and charging time with Icom and the Yaesu looked really good except, I wanted to be able to receive the HF ham bands with USB and LSB and CW settings and for that, only Kenwood filled the bill. I'm glad I decided to get the Kenwood. I'm happy with the VHF and UHF performance and the construction quality of the radio. It also has very good audio, plenty loud. The built in ferrite bar antenna does an adequate, but not really good job on the AM broadcast band, but it really doesn't help with the HF band. I decided to put up a dipole tuned for the 80m band outside my study window on the wooden fence (there are antenna restrictions and this was for receive only) and it really did the trick with this little radio. I've been listening to all the HF bands with relatively low noise and a good signal so far. I have heard a few state that all the bands were open this weekend and they are flooded with contesters. The few negative things I have found so far concerning this radio are the "special instructions" on how to plug in the charger... which seems very silly, but necessary if you want to ensure you don't blow the little fuse internally. There is a little bit of a learning curve on how to access all the features. Also, I do wish I could watch the built in visual band display and listen at the same time (without having to hold down the monitor button.) It also throws the tuning out of "fine" mode on HF when you use the visual band mode, which I don't like, but I suppose it isn't really intended to be used for HF reception anyway, it would prove more useful in VHF and UHF reception. I bought the computer interface cable and tried the Kenwood supplied software, but I was disappointed that it didn't have the capability to be actually controlled by computer, with graphical feedback on the computer monitor. That would have been sweet. I do prefer using the computer to add and arrange frequencies, PL tones and offsets, however. For that purpose, the software does a really good job. Overall, I think that I could recommend this radio to anyone who travels and is looking for something very small, with a good battery life. |
|
| WD4AQX |
Rating:     |
2004-10-26 | |
| Good all around handheld |
Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. |
| Bought this rig about 4 months ago. It is great general coverage rcvr and as far as the 2mtr, 220,440 ham bands go, it is very good on xmit and good to vg on rcv. Rcv volume leaves a little to be desired. One of the big problems is intermod. I have to keep the attenuator on while driving around Greenville, or all I get is intermod noise while scanning my 3 favorite repeaters. I bought the maldol 610 but find it only marginally better than the stock duck. I now use the maldol and a magmount when I use the XYL's van. The programing via the keypad is remakably simple to master. One of the best I've found. Using the programing cable and the free software is an added bonus.All in all I would buy it again, in fact I just ordered another one to keep in my truck from a seller here in Eham. |
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