Manager


Manager - NA4M
Manager Notes

Reviews For: Yaesu FT-2800M

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

eMail Subscription

Registered users are allowed to subscribe to specific review topics and receive eMail notifications when new reviews are posted.
Review Summary For : Yaesu FT-2800M
Reviews: 196MSRP: 195.00
Description:
Yaesu 2m Transceiver Introuduced 2/2003. 65 Watt Output,- 4 power levels, 2M Transmit, 134-174 Receive, 219 Memories w/ 6 char AlphaNumeric display, NOAA Weather, CTCSS & DTS encode/decode, rugged case.
Product is not in production
More Info: http://www.yaesu.com
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
001963.7
W4BRU Rating: 2012-07-19
Failure after short life Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Great 2-meter mobile but not reliable. After 18 months the squelch failed. That's 6 months after the warranty ended! E-mail and calls to Yaesu for a schematic and/or service manual yielded "none available". So repair seems impractical. A friend told me today his failed also with what appears to be a PIN (TR switch) failure after about 2 years. So it's a disposable. Now to find a less costly disposable.
KC0VOE Rating: 2012-04-28
4.5 Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Well,

Its a really, really cheap 2 meter mobile. it does what it should. When you crank the volume up the sound gets kind of distorted.

For this price, i cant complain too much.... id buy another one for the prices I am seeing used.
KI6IAU Rating: 2012-02-23
great basic radio Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I bought this radio on sale at HRO. I needed a simple mobile for my truck. The unit has worked well for about 2 years of almost daily use. The menu is a little non-intuitive compared to other Yaesu radios, but gets the job done. After 2 years of almost daily use, my radio had a problem with the female mic-jack. I may have caused the problem switching mics as it had worked flawless for 2 years. I sent to Yaesu, had unit back in a week fixed for a fair price! Yaesu's customer service is excellent I must say!!
KI4GTJ Rating: 2012-01-20
GREAT RADIO Time Owned: more than 12 months.
type -o- fix Got my ft-2800m back in 03 ran it in my truck till I sold it back in 05 to get a IC-208h. Big mistake did not like it the 208H is replace with the 2900r/e that was a gift great radio too
KD8BQN Rating: 2012-01-04
One Tough Radio! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
My father bought this radio for me as a gift the day I got my ticket at the Dayton Hamvention in 2005. I've run this radio now for nearly 7 years with absolutely NO problems whatsoever! I get great audio reports, and this radio is EXTREMELY rugged. I do a lot of outdoor activities, and the radio has been in my car down to well below 0 F and done just fine. I am extremely hard on my equipment and this radio has truly withstood the test of time.

The 65 watts of power is GREAT and has helped me out of a few binds when the radio was my only means of communications. Obviously the antenna I'm using helps as well, but this radio is probably the toughest radio I've ever seen!

It does get a bit warm after lots of high power usage, but i have it mounted on the passenger side of the center console so I don't notice it.

Gave a 5 star rating because I have yet to find a problem with this equipment!
KD8HAM Rating: 2011-11-08
Nice little base unit Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
This is my 3rd Yaesu radio in the last few years. I owned a FT-60R HT. I also own a FT-2900R that I use as a mobile rig.

I bought the 2800, used, for less than 80 bucks. I have it hooked up to a jetstream power supply and runs in to a j-pole. Great audio reports and the radio does well. I hardly ever run the radio on high power and have yet to experience any heating issues. The memory management is quite different than the FT-2900 and is quite simple. The radio has a Memory Only mode - that some people might find helpful. Large display, intuitive controls and menus.

On the downside, the front knobs feel a little cheap and fragile. However, I cannot complain for the price I paid for this unit.

Overall good value for money.
AE6ZW Rating: 2011-09-14
Good , except it get too hot Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have FT-2800M for more than 2 years now and use it quite often.
the radio works well, except I did added 120 mm square 12V DC FAN ( normal computer case fan ) on top of the radio to keep it cool during transmission. with 65 watts, after several minutes, the radio get very hot without this FAN, but with this FAN, it keep less than body temperature ( 36 deg C. )
add some type of FAN either 140 mm, 120 mm, on top , or 50 mm SQ on back, everything is fine.
W4YJ Rating: 2011-08-13
Bad audio-Bad transmit Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have had 3 of these over the years. The last two I had sounded horrible on transmit and the last one blew out a final. If you can get one that has decent transmit audio just be careful to not run high power a lot. I won't buy another one!

----------------------
Earlier 2-star review posted by W4YJ on 2006-09-01

I have 2 of these rigs now for almost a year. They have the hottest receive I have ever seen but the transmit audio is awful! The ones in this area ALL sound fuzzy and distored. I wish there were a cure for this as I like the rig otherwise. Programming is a pain but ok after you get used to it. I will be replacing these unless I can get a fix for the transmit audio as I have trouble understanding what my wife is saying when she is using her 2800 in her van.

73s, Steve
AB3FW Rating: 2011-06-30
no problems Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I bought this rig about 3 years ago. I run it into a home-made 1/4 wave ground plane and work all the repeaters in south central PA. It's never given me a problem. All for $140. I couldn't be happier.
KA4WJB Rating: 2011-06-30
Some problems but still a good rig Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I purchased 2 of these radios. One for base and one for mobile. The base rig developed a microphone input problem which was the radio and not the mic since the mic had been swapped for testing. What was worse was that it was an intermittent problem that cut the mic audio off. No obvious connection problems on the circuit board, so to the junk pile it went. A third rig was purchased. The mobile rig seemed to be sensitive to voltage drops as being on high power and the car at an idle sometimes the rig would cycle. Of course the microphone coiled cords disintegrate and the crumbs end up on the floor of the car. Thank you Yaesu for the quality microphone cords. I have mic cords that are 50 years old that are still intact. On the good side the display is large enough to read in the mobile, the rig has plenty of power, the menus are reasonably easy for today’s rigs, good audio and the price is right. Would I buy another? Yes I probably would. Overall it’s a good simple single band rig.