There is a word in China called "a penny," is that the goods are basically equal to his price, we can't buy a GTR in 2000 or Euro.
Tesla does not exactly stand out for quality in construction ...; And don't you wonder that Apple has all its production in China? I have a Xiegu X5105 and a uSDR and they have given me good QSO's of up to 1,500 km.
I received a model similar to the one reviewed as a Christmas present. It had a single mode switch and no plastic bumpers on the ends. The microphone included was marked "Motorola". Others have been very happy with this or similar iterations, but mine has already been sent back. The receiver was scratchy and full of "pops", the rotary encoder felt like turning a boat paddle in a bucket of rocks, it refused to speak to flrig, hamradio deluxe, omnirig, or dx commander, the sidetone volume was barely audible, and output was 5 watts and not the 10 as advertised. Also, modes were LSB, USB, and CW and nothing else. Several of the menu selections were absent, notably sidetone pitch and sidetone volume. I never bothered to check SSB operation.
Hi...I recently purchased the Chinese knock-off of the usDX rig which is sold on eBAY and shipped from the US called usDR+. I have read complaints about this little rig. I received mine in a few days and after playing with the settings for awhile I now have it working just great. Sensitive receiver and it now puts out about 7 watts on SSB. Out of the box the settings are incorrect. It does not come with a manual but I found a video on YOUTUBE of an operator in Europe that explained the correct settings and they work. This past Saturday I made contacts all over the U.S. from South Texas. A great little portable QRP rig for under $200. 73 from TX Rick W2ACY
this is an interesting question... first of all, buying and using one of these sub $150 rigs is an exercise in the management of low expectations... you won't get any documentation, you won't get pinouts, you may or may not get promised features... i bought primarily for the use of play and experimentation; mainly for listening on the bands, although using a vintage Miracle Whip i was able to communicate w/an op on the other side of the state from my patio out back.. the best source of info is the source: https://github.com/threeme3/usdx pe1nnz was good enough to do summary writeups of what could be accomplished using basic designs... that said, features are enabled or disabled depending on who edits, compiles, and flashes your rig.. it is a crapshoot... so buy with a guaranteed return if you are worried... my rig was touted as having ts480 CAT control... it doesn't the backlight on/off toggle function does not work rig came with r1.02v, not the lastest firmware however, power can be dialed down to QRPp levels, tweaked up to 10W on a number of bands, the CW decoder works very well, a simple 2n2222 circuit keys the rig via flrig or other logging software, a simple CW msg can be programmed, SWL listening is best OK using LSB even though AM mode is available, and there is PWR/SWR display output for help checking antenna resonance plus, if you drop the rig six feet off the back of your pickup's tailgate onto concrete you're only out a dinner date with the XYL again, i didn't expect much with mine, but was surprised at the possibilities... you can tweak receive and voice transit audio to some degree... other have opened up the rig and reprogrammed with newer firmware if only the clone makers were truthful and included documentation, these rigs would be even more popular.. i look at mine as an experimental toy that provides some utility... otherwise i much prefer my tx-500 for /p
This radio was not designed in Japan, nor China, only manufactured there. It was designed and built first as a kit by Guido PENN1Z and later updated quite a bit with assistance from Manuel DL2MAN. It is an SDR radio, built around the ATmega284 (don't quote me on that designation, but it is a standard, every-day ordinary Arduino chip). The firmware is programmed in C using the arduino IDE. There is a lot of controversy around this radio, because the Chinese rightfully assumed that they might use the attribution only licensed design and build and sell the radio on the internet. This pissed off especially DL2MAN, who felt they were getting rich off his back (if you don't mean 'Open Source' don't license it 'Open Source'). In any case, neither the radio nor the firmware belong to DL2MAN. Firmware version ~1.04 for this radio makes it a piece of junk. Using the instructions below, you can upgrade it to 4.0+ and seriously improve the performance of the device. Side note: The Chinese 'engineers' didn't snap to the fact that one of the filters can do double duty, so this is actually a 9 band radio. Upgrade your firmware with an arduino uno, these instructions: https://www.microcontrollertips.com/programming-avr-microcontrollers-arduinos-arduino-isp/ , and the WhiteButton.ino file from this github repository: https://github.com/GW8RDI/uSDXOpen Then you will find this is a quite capable ultralightweight QRP rig. It delivers, but you gotta be more than an operator of appliances get your money's worth from it. Don't be so quick to piss on what you don't know about and clearly don't understand.
I just ordered the updated (tr)uSDR from the links provided by DL2MAN on his web site. I bought from newdiytech.com, a Chinese company. As DL2MAN has been heard to say, you cant get parts anywhere but China and anyway, its about ethics not ethnicity. DL2MAN didn't create the radio. It is a project with a long and storied history, of which the Chinese are only a chapter. see https://github.com/GW8RDI/uSDXOpen for the synopsis.
Huh? You do realize that I was saying the same thing, right? That it's almost impossible to buy something NOT made in China? I think you read me wrong.
I didn't. I think you didn't read my comment. I said it's almost impossible to buy something not made there.
