Mar 16 2015

Anytone Tech models, additional notes

Overall, reviewing these Anytones was a pleasant experience. After the reviews I looked into a few other things.

  • The batteries of the ANILE-8R (1300 mAh) and the NSTIG-8R (1800 mAh) are exchangeable.
  • The belt clips used on the ANILE-8R and NSTIG-8R are never a perfect fit. With the 1300 mAh battery there’s a gap (easy to lose a radio that way), with the 1800 mAh battery it’s too tight.
  • The antenna on the NSTIG-8R heats up fast at maximum RF output; the behavior resembles that of a Baofeng UV-5R stock antenna. The antenna appears to be reasonably efficient though. More tests are in order.
  • No such problems with the antennas of the ANILE-8R, the TERMN-8R or OBLTR-8R.
  • The NSTIG-8R, TERMN-8R and OBLTR-8R can display the remaining battery voltage. Measurements show that the radios are surprisingly accurate. If the radios say “8.1 Volts”, it really is 8.1 Volts. The ANILE-8R will round it down/up to the closest integer.
  • The TERMN-8R is difficult to use on SW because it defaults to 10 KHz steps. SW stations are 5 KHz apart, not 10 KHz. You can use the keypad to enter the correct frequency though. I had the bug confirmed by John; it’s now on the ‘to do’ list and will be fixed.
  • The more I had the TX audio compared by other hams, the more impressed I (and they) became.
  • There’s an odd problem concerning spectral purity with all x-band capable hand helds I reviewed. It only occurs when both VFOs are active; we (me and a few more knowledgeable RF lab gurus) are looking into that right now.

 

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16 comments on “Anytone Tech models, additional notes”

  1. As I expected from the start, the performance on the SW bands is a little bit limited with the stock UHF/VHF antenna. When I ran an adapter with a 15′ piece of wire on the end, the receiver lit up substantially.

    • Yes, but you can’t hold that against the radio. The receiver is fine, but it needs a suitable antenna. The same is true for a Yaesu VX-2 or something similar.

  4. What bugs me about these new radios is that AnytoneTech says we need to read the radio and modify the (empty) codeplug in order to program the radio. I’ve ordered one, and would like to have the data ready so I can upload it into the radio upon receiving it. AnytoneTech says this is not advised. I also take this to mean if I ordered five of them, I’d have to re-enter all of the programming info for each of the five radios by hand, since there’s no way to import or paste data into the programming software. Crazy.

    • No – that is quite the standard operating procedure for just about any rig – from these inexpensive only HTs to Motorola commercial units costing a couple grand. Download each radio’s codeplug FIRST – and establish a unique naming protocol for each.

    • Actually, once the initial template has been created (Read from Radio), that one template can be used to program multiple radios as long as the model is the same (all TERMN-8R or all OBLTR-8R, etc) – and their frequency range is the same.

      John

      • John – that may be true with this model and this version of firmware … But I still recommend reading ANY radio and saving that initial file (they’re small files) and naming them in some conventional manner (like FT60-UNIT4-032315a.xxx) – just in case … (grin)

  5. But Motorola (and others) allow you to import, copy/paste, etc so you’re not typing in all of the channel information fresh on each radio.

  6. Glad you noted that 5/10 Khz increment bug on sw. Will they announce when that is fixed? That would drive me nuts. Direct entry is great, but I still like to flip around for that element of random discovery. Do you think they’ll wait for more bug reports to upgrade the firmware?

  7. Is it weird to anyone else that when you select a PL decode frequency, you still have to change the receive type to PL decode for it to work? I’ve never seen that on any other radio.

  8. The CRT device has fewer features than the DATE device.
    Also, there is this other software where some features are missing.
    Perhaps the Beata version ???
    Would prefer Anytone device. (If you like it a firmware update available).
    is supposed to work …..

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