[FedCom] WARNING about new ICOM receivers.

[Larry Van Horn, N5FPW]

Hey Fred and all,

Master Fred wrote:
> With most cell phones now being in the 1.9 gig area, should one be 
> concerned with the 800mhz. cell phone
>band.....C'mon, let's get real...the cell band on 800 today is a moot 
>point..

Yes, it is a moot point, but the federal law is the law. Congress is great 
making laws but they never rescind them. ;-)  Hey, if you want to import a 
full coverage AOR, Icom, Yupi etc, by all means go ahead. Hopefully your 
radio won't be one of those that are occassionally seized by Customs.

But what I can't figure out is this fascination with frequency coverage not 
only by listeners, but with manufacturers. None of these wide band radios 
can track a trunk system and can only decode P25 conventional frequencies 
with an optional $300 plus or so add-on. I don't give one hoot about having 
a full coverage unit unless it has the "listening capability." You pay for 
coverage way above 1 GHz, what do you think you are going to hear above 
that? Where are all the intercepts on newsgroups of all that great stuff 
above 1 GHz? What do you expect to hear from 1 GHz to 3 GHz on these new 
Icom radios, coverage you paid for?

Scanner folks have made way to much over this frequency coverage issue. 
Instead WE as a community should be focusing on "listening capability." Lot 
of good that new wideband radio does you if you can't hear anything in all 
that frequency coverage. If a radio doesn't have trunk decoding and digital 
decoding capability I am not going to buy it.

Instead of arguing over an old and very stupid issue such as how high the 
radio goes in frequency coverage or ability to receive 869-891 MHz, why not 
ask Icom, AOR or WinRadio why they aren't offering additional listening 
capability?

To Bob, w0nxn:
Where did you see those freq gaps listed? If you were looking on the Icom 
Japan website then you were not looking at a US version of the radios. There 
are several nuisances of these radios (UK,  France, Japan, US etc). Unless 
you were looking at the US spec, you were not looking at the correct 
information for the unit released here.

I went up to the OET website to see what the FCC  authorized for sale here 
in the US. According to the test reports filed with the FCC, the 2500 series 
covers 495 kHz to 3299.9999 MHz continuous (excluding two cell bands). I 
examined the US version of the 1500 series receiver manual and the freq 
coverage is 10 kHz to 3299.9999 MHz (less cellular). So Bob I think you were 
looking at an overseas version of these two radios. That is why I check the 
FCC OET website for equipment cert. They have to tell the FCC what is in the 
box being sold in the US. ;-)))

73 all and let's get back to our regular Fedcom discussion.

Larry Van Horn
Founding Father Milcom/Fedcom/Trunkcom