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Reviews For: ICOM IC-2720H

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

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Review Summary For : ICOM IC-2720H
Reviews: 147MSRP: ???
Description:
2M/440MHz Dual Band Mobile
Product is not in production
More Info: http://
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
001473.3
KA1THM Rating: 2004-05-11
Don't even waste your time! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
1. Intermod so bad the radio is unuseable from home to work even with attenuator turned on full.
2. Dealer KJI refuses to take back radio even with knowledge of intermod problems (few days old).
3. Audio is low
4. 800 Mhz. reception is non-existant even when using a high-gain scanner antenna

Icom says only 2 people have had these problems....WHO ARE THEY KIDDING?

Thinking of crushing the radio after buying an 8800 Yaseu, and using it to hold down water plants in my Japanese KOI Pond.

K4WDE Rating: 2004-04-06
Potential lost Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
At once, got bad on the air audio reports. Found the rubber of the keypad blocks the little hole on the front of the mike. The rubber is offset and had to cut out a fair amount to clear the hole. Set the audio to high and seems to be ok now. Very unfortunate that the crossband repeat feature is not remotely controlable on this unit. Manual doesn't mention crossband repeat. Flyers on table beside the dealer at the hamfest where I purchased it advertised all the wonderful crossband repeat features of some Icom models, but didn't tell which ones could be remotely controlled. I'm another one who thinks the remote unit to main unit solution for base use is just plain stupid.
I'm amazed I've not had any intermod problems yet and still have my fingers crossed. I'll report again in 3 to 6 months and advise if the finals survived that long.
K7TYE Rating: 2004-03-05
Ok features but intermod is terrible Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I've had this radio for about 6 months. Overall it's an ok radio. I like the memory bank set up for this radio. The crossband repeat seems to work for me so far. The mic took some getting used to with all of the functions but now I've come to like having the controls all in one spot. I will say though that the intermod this radio receives is terrible. It does not receive much of anything else in the city. I ended up purchasing a PAR electronics VHF152158 intermod filter and low and behold that fixed the problem. If you are going to get one of these radios please take my advice and get the filter with it. Saves a lot of hassle in the long run. Only other gripe would be the lack of alphanumeric display capability but I'm coping. So again, all in all, an ok radio. However in retrospect I would probably have purchased the yaesu 8800 instead.
WA9SXK Rating: 2004-02-25
Finals Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I bought this radio because of it's size so I could set the control head in my console. Its to bad it is not in the console. I have had it less than 6 months now and it's back getting its second set of finals. The first time the output just fell off. The second time I thought the car had an electrical fire it smelled so bad. I hope they get this thing fixed before the warranty runs out. To bad the warranty is ticking while it is at the shop. I have 3 IC-2100's and not a problem, but this unit is starting to torque me off. Hope it gets better.
KA9IZM Rating: 2004-02-23
very impressed Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
this is a very good radio its construction is based on icom's commericial tech. and this radio is very close to being just that even the "spec's themselves show that this radio could be and should be "type accepted" the intermod problim can be totaly resolved by using a "motorola" type 1/4 wave mobile antenna on an NMO mount it has a "gain" of 1 and thats all you need with this radio because of its high sensitivity have used mine in several cities including Milwaulkee,Wisc Chicago, Ill and Buffalo NY all with no intermod problims am curious as to what antennas are being used by other users yes mine has has the mars-cap mod done this radio works flawless at least the one i have does I highly recomend it also...remember this radio is sort of a clone of icom commericial equipment and therefore both the transmit and recvive sections were not designed to cover hundreds of miles rather to cover with good reliable communication over a large city-county area using simplex or a repeater...also the same thing can be said for the icom 2100 which I own, a icom 207 which I own, a icom v-8000 which I own and a icom w32a which i own
just my 2 cents
a lonmg time icom owner....icom, the only brand i own

note.... have any of you seen what acc. is available for teh icom v-8000....even a Dig voice scrambling module is now available.....can anyone say public service "commericial" equipment.....
KK7D Rating: 2004-02-23
Good Solid Rig Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
First, I would like to express that every radio has a negative verus a positive to it. The radio does have its problems, but so does other radios as well. The Icom 2720 does have intermod, but that comes with wide-band receive and like all other wide band radios it suffers worse in a large area with different RF equipment. I travel alot and when I come across a large city, the intermod is greater.

I enjoy the radio. Dont get me wrong, I had a problem with a LCD problem, sent it back and was given a new LCD heads display.

Enjoy the radio for the price... It is a good dual band radio.

Thanks and 73's
Joe
KK7D
K9PO Rating: 2004-02-10
Really Bad Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
So now I know what the IC-821h engineers went off to do after they messed up that particular Icom product. It seems there is a pattern starting to form with Icom and many should start to look elsewhere for their products until Icom wakes up and fixes their problems in design and quality
AB0PO Rating: 2004-01-17
A real loser of a rig!! Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I bought a 2720H in May of 2003. I have had trouble with it even since. The audio is low if you don't go into the menu and set the mic level to high. The rig is next to impossible to get to work correctly on packet due to the auto select for the packet audio, it has two speaker jacks, so it is a bit confusing when constructing an interface cable. Didn't care for the separation cable and separate control head at all, it makes it very difficult to use as a base rig. There is no way of mounting the head to the main body unless you buy a new bracket. I used my 2720H on APRS and it burnt out the finals. I sent it back to Icom and they "fixed" it, but it blew a final again. I hate this rig and will NEVER buy another one. In my opinion the FT-8900 is far superior.
KD7UBI Rating: 2003-12-28
Good Rig but too sensitive Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
The 2720 is a great rig and it top of the line for the Icom V/U Dual band mobile series in America. This rig suffers from being to sensitve with a sensitivity level of 0.18/0.45 microvolts from 118-159MHz on the L/R side. I unhooked the antenna and I was still able to hear the repeater that is nearly 2 miles away from me. at S2. They are transmitting with 100 watts (approx) this rig gets alot of intermod. And also suffers from not having WFM (This way you can recieve TV Audio.) I have to switch the mode to AM just to be able to hear TV AUDIO. It is nice to be able to hear those who used to way down in the noise level. But the intermod is terriable. In order to solve the intermod I use tone squelch on simplex with friends(that isnt 100% intermod proof. I was sitting on another frequency about 2 mhz away from the input of the repeater that a local ham was using and i could hear his transmission like he was on the frequency I was on. Kudos on the wideband reciever but Icom dont get any kudos on the sensitivity. It would of been great if they put a filter in there that activates on the hambands only example 144.000-148.00 that BANDPASSES that band only. after you go above or below it would disengage. I beleive Yaesu does this with thier 8800 which makes that rig a better choice than the 2720. I bought this rig used. It's a nice rig although it suffers from the problems in a high RF area like mine.

Being in between 3 hospitals, a Towing company, the Police department, the Fire department, amblance company, Department of Emergency Management, VHF repeaters, Pagers, City services, Radio station repeaters, Television stations, ship yards (Port of Tacoma), and taxi companies there is alot of RF in this area. Thus I get intermod all day long but at least it isn't continueous.

the Yaesu 8800 is a better choice for this area. I will purchase that next and sell this Icom off.
73

KD7UBI
KG6SZY Rating: 2003-12-11
Terrific radio with great functionality! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
By no means am I a “hard core” ham, but I’ll tell you one thing: This radio is awesome! I can’t believe all the negative reviews I’ve been reading regarding this unit. I have yet to replicate a single one of the problems discussed by eHam members. Audio quality is crystal clear (I’m using an external speaker); my transmission audio is excellent as well. I’ve gotten nothing but positive comments regarding the quality of transmission this radio puts out. Many people are surprised at the quality of my voice after hearing others say audio levels are low when using this unit.

Anyway, I digress. This radio has terrific features, is very easy to use, etc… I could go on, but I don’t want to bore you. This radio is great and I would recommend it to anybody looking for a mobile radio. 5/5.