What FT-817 owners wanted was something different, yet the same - size, weight, features, etc. Yaesu instead added a few more years to the life of the FT-817 ecosystem with the very slightly redesigned FT-818 that was *almost* exactly the same as the FT-817, except the TCXO was now included, an additional watt of RF output, and higher-capacity batteries... and what did the user base do? They complained - the new finals use perceptibly more power, the battery life is shorter at full-power, and my 15 year-old FT-817 already has a TCXO! Why would I buy one to replace my trusty 15 year-old radio?
Lost on them was the reality of what Yaesu did - they put out (essentially) the same radio to give FT-817 owners one last chance to buy an FT-817 radio with a 3 year warranty, and the community said they wanted something different - and now the community is saying "we don't like this new field radio, it's not an FT-817 replacement, it has the wrong shape, it doesn't have this, they left that out, was-waa-waa!"
Yaesu has produced a very interesting new radio - a dual-receiver, 'shack in a box' rig with a lot of the latest features, and people complain about the shape?
Wow.
If NOTHING ELSE, the new field radio should appeal to all those so-called FT-1634 owners who strapped two FT-817s together to have a great satellite radio. (but of course, they complain they can't hang tge new radio around their neck!)
/soapbox
Ken, N2VIP
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On Sep 5, 2024, at 21:27, Rudi via groups.io <wa2nub@...> wrote:
This rumor of a new 817 updated replacement has been going around for a decade or more. Thats why the ft818 was such a disappointment, it didn't look like the 'dream' replacement at all.
Wa2nub
