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Reviews For: Icom IC-2200H

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

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Review Summary For : Icom IC-2200H
Reviews: 100MSRP: 230.00
Description:
2 meter mobile.
Product is not in production
More Info: http://
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
001004.5
N5EAT Rating: 2008-01-01
Very good rig Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I generally agree with NQ5L - the programming for D-Star use is a pain. However, once setup - it performs well in that mode.

The radio has a nice, loud speaker. Voices come through easy to understand.

I get great reports from the included microphone.

The radio is quite beautiful in it's appearance. Once setup - it's a very functional rig. I can recommend this radio to anyone needing a single band vhf rig. It does DStar very well - but you may have to sleep with the manual to get it programmed...
NQ5L Rating: 2008-01-01
Great but not for D-Star Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I bought the 2200 specifically to try out D-Star. That was a mistake! The radio is a good, solid 2M only transceiver. It has its own programming quirks, but all the compact radios suffer from that. I'd highly recommend it for that purpose. But I bought it to be able to experiment with D-Star which is catching on around here. I am highly disappointed for that application. The D-Star programming is poor, and the human factors design of this radio is absolutely horrible. There are no usable displays of how you have D-Star programmed. D-Star itself contains lots of information about the repeater, other stations call signs, etc. None of that is avaiable on the display. You have to dig really deep into the menus to find it. Same with the call signs you have stored in memory. There is no way to display the memory without drilling down through a zillion menu trees. Buy this radio if you want a 2M only radio that is solid and inexpensive. Do not waste your money on it for D-Star.
KB1NBB Rating: 2007-11-30
Seems like a great unit after 1.5 years. Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have had this in a couple of different cars for over a year and a half. I talk at least 3 times a week and often use the high power for extended durations. It has never failed once. It has great audio and is nice and loud. I was a new ham when I bought it and it took some time to figure out how to use it, but it is not that hard.
I have an MFJ mag mount 2-meter only 5/8 wave antenna and it works excellent. I get good audio reports and have conversations on repeaters as far as 100 miles away on high power.
This unit is hard to beat in my opinion.
Microphone click is solid and clear. It reminds me of older HP RPN calculators and the solid feel of the buttons.

Good stuff.

Jeremy
kb1nbb
EA2CWZ Rating: 2007-11-19
Bad selectivity or filtering Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Excelent construction, menus little bit complicate for me, but the most important thing for me is the selectivity or filtering interferences. That is the main problem for me on this radio. I had to return it to the shop after 2 months.

Be careful if you go to a places with too much interferences like high mountains with lot of repeaters.

I fly with a power paraglider and in the place where I usually take off IS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE to listen any frecuency, because all the time s-meter marks the top of interferences, all the time.

Bad experience with that ICOM which perfect for me because receives airport frecuencies in aerial band too (118Mhz-136Mhz).

In the end, I returned to the shop after testing in the same place with the same mobile-antenna with a Kenwood TM 271E, better filtered with less interferences (some times only 3 or 5 signal of them, but in some frecuencies nothing of them). Great difference!

The last test that I did, was with a Puxing 777PLUS chinesse talkye in to my car. The hand held talkye received better into the car, that the icom 2200h with external car antenna (too many interferencies).

I read that forum befor buying that radio, and someone said that with his v8 ENGINE of his 4x4 car has much problems with it. (I drive a little opel corsa car, so I thought it would not happen that problem to me).

Very bad experience, which show me that icom 2200h not serves for me. Sorry, but that was my experience: So think if you live in a crowd place, with many of interferences:

NOTE: My english is very poor, I know, but I thought was important thing to say.
K9GTJ Rating: 2007-11-08
Excellent Radio Time Owned: more than 12 months.
The Icom IC-2200H is a great single band 2 meter radio. I purchased mine for home use and really like the idea of 65 watts being available when needed. (It really is seldom used.)

The radio is not hard to use. I did struggle a bit with programming it early on but I was also a new ham so I struggled with a lot of stuff. (Being a wiz at Radio Shack and Uniden Scanners is not at all helpful with amateur radio equipment.) I have purchased the programming software and cable and that has been very helpful to really load it up.

Audio quality is very good and I receive good reports on my sound. The option to change the back light color is nice so if you have some other devices and wish to color coordinate the shack, you can.

WX Priority is fine but like so many radios or scanner it cuts over for a brief couple of microseconds to check and that causes an audio dropout. Some don’t mine but I do. It also doesn’t do SAME codes which would be helpful.

While my primary purpose was to get a rig up for home after my license, I have also taken it mobile. (There is a Yeasu ft-8900 mounted in my primary vehicle full time but this Icom is simple to take when I need a temporary mobile unit.) It works great with cigarette light connector. (I have not run 65 watts that way.) One nice feature is it has a lock so when I used it mobile for SAG support in a bike race, I didn’t have to worry about knocking it about and it getting off frequency or something else changed.

No mechanical or electrical issues with several hundred hours of use (mostly receive). It has a clean look and solid feel and never gets got during long QSOs. I worked 4 or 5 hours one evening during a 2 meter band opening at full power and talked all over the New England and Eastern Canada from my QTH in Indiana. (I have just a little Comet 2 5/8 wave stick.)

The best thing is I picked up the radio new for $119 at a hamfest from a larger dealer. It has been worth every penny.
OH3HNU Rating: 2007-11-08
jippii Time Owned: more than 12 months.
last good 2 meter radio from icom SUPER
LA4WNA Rating: 2007-09-25
The best Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I am so lucky that i have one IC 2200 and one Ic V 8000, and they are great radioes.
Easy to use and easy to program,and wery solid radioes both of them, Icom has the best 2 mtr.transmitters. The price in Norway is about 367 US dollars for the Ic. 2200, V 8000 is not available in Norway.
WA1KBE Rating: 2007-09-20
Great 2m radio! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I recently purchased a IC-2200H and I am very pleased with the quality of construction and the radio's performance. I especially lke the ability to program an alpha numeric description of the memory channel contents. Sensitivity and selectivity are both good in an urban environment - 4 level power adjustment is also a plus. Programming is relatively straight forward once you get used to the multifunctional front panel buttons. Truly a feature packed radio that performs well. Very good audio on both transmit and receive - long mike cable is a plus.
KD0JBN Rating: 2007-09-20
More bang for the buck Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I spent about 2 weeks researching features/prices on 2 meter mobiles. Except for the V8000, which was about $60 more than the 2200, all the ones that were in my price range were 45 or 55 watt and had either 2 or 3 power levels.

I also live a few miles from a major airport and I like that the frequency range on this radio includes the aviation frequencies - with AM recieve.

Over all I have been having a lot of fun with this radio - including great QSOs on the way to and from Florida.

73,

Don - KDØJBN
KI6GVL Rating: 2007-09-03
Heat Sink with a great 2m radio! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
After getting sick of trying to hook up my FT-60 HT to an external antenna and power supply, I realized I needed a real mobile unit. My thoughts were that I would get the best low cost 2m rig out there. I found the reviews here on Eham to be very good so I bought 2, 1 for each car. Price was right. Hardest part about the install was routing the power cable through the firewall. Programming was a bit tricky at first, but a few minutes in the manual got me through it fine. The sound was loud and clear, and controls felt solid. WX stations came in very strong! The one thing that was a bit irritating was the BEEP. It is very loud and can't be turned down. Turning it off is an option but that makes operation difficult. I love the mic's click on PTT, reminds me of the old IBM computer keyboards. When the PTT clicks, there is no doubt your transmitting. Looks like a great 1st mobile rig!