With this instrument ,it can help me a lot. When designing the antenna,it will not collide like a blind bamboo.As the old saying goes,if you want to do a good job, you must first sharpen its tools. Have a nice day VR2YKM
the g106 is nothing more than a rehashed g1m with an fm bcb chip added... iow, a pos... had the g1m, x5105, gsoc, etc... sold my xiegu rigs... until xiegu gets serious about putting out a serious qrp rig, i will pass... they produce half-baked hardware with half-a55ed software that is in perpetual beta... sorry, but that is the truth... also dumped its 100W amp, which still has problems (see the latest qst)... the only product in the lineup that musters some respect is the g90, but it is worthless for /p ops as you can't read the display in sunlight
OK, i am going to eat a little crow here...not a lot, just a little... amazon blew out the 106 for $250 several days ago, so i popped for one, knowing full well what i was getting into... despite my hatred for the getting burned on the G1M, i thought i'd take a chance on the 106, especially in light of its recent (May 9, 2023, V1.3) firmware release... ordered the rig, got one with v1.2 installed... updated w/no problem... the rig worked out of the box... after the update i ran it through the bands to check output on its low/mid/high RF settings... results indicated QRPp and QRP output w/a low of 250mW and a high of 7W output... here are my results, as measured into a dummy load at constant carrier into my WM2 (low/mid/high): 80M, 700mW, 3W, 7W 60M, 400mW, 2W, 5W 40M, 500mW, 2W, 5W 30M, 350mW, 1.5W, 4W 20M, 400mW, 2W, 6W 17M, 300mW, 1.5W, 5W 15M, 275mW, 1.25W, 5.5W 12M, 250mW, 1W, 7W 10M, 250mW, 1W, 7W took the rig out for a spin the next day, snagged a nice CW contact on 40M FL->AL (W4ARB - good dude); today, got a CO contact using CW on 20M in poor band condx... since the Xiegu engineers failed to implement SWR or voltage indication in the rig's hardware and firmware, i relied on signal reception as indicated by audio output and bandscope display... i also use portable mag loops almost exclusively for my /p ops; so a patch coard wrapped around the coax by my loop's tuning box, with an LED straddling the clips serves as a tuning indicator, flashing brightly at resonance w/a carrier... this works well with all my QRP rigs... the 106 does not have a headphone jack, so either you must use the speaker, the speaker on its mic, or earbuds/headphones plugged into the speaker mic... and wouldn't you know it, there is only one channel on the plug on the mic, so you need to use a stereo->mono plug adapter... it's no wonder most CW ops ditch the 106 mic and craft an rj9->trs adapter (i have an rj9 cable on order - can find a friggin' one anywhere in local thrift stores - no one uses landline phones anymore, and the ones you do find only use the two center connectors!) as expected, the morons at Xeigu did not implement the ability to copy a 'memory channel' frequency and mode to a VFO... this renders the memory channels only useful for WWV, SWL, and FT8 freqs, in my opinion... but here's a tip: set the BSM menu setting to enable full bands, and you'll be able to use the band up/down buttons to QSY between bands...otherwise you're stuck with having to navigate using the stupid long-press to move the Hz cursor on the freq display (why the fools didn't make this function a press of the VFO knob i'll never know)... this is the same insipid behavior of the G1M firmware anyhow, the rig works... it has AM BCB and WFM BCB receive... and output, from my limited testing ability, seems pretty cleans - have received good reports on CW (i also recorded output using my 705 and watched CW keying on the 705's bandscope)... no pin diodes, so relays are used - don't know how long the rig will last... but i won't shed a tear if i drop the rig on a concrete driveway or off the dock while /p
update: found out the G106 works FB with the MX-P50M amp (use the CE-19, ACC and PTT Con ports)... mid-range power provides 25-30W on the bands... i don't often use an amp, but it can come in handy once in a while... output is clean... so far, quite pleased with the little rig... not as easy or pleasant to use as my TR-45Ls (fat w/zmatch or 'skinny'), but infinitely preferable to my 818 because like a dumba55, i sold off one of my rigs with the Yazoo 500Hz CW filter... the three CW filters in the G106 (500, 250, 50Hz) work great!
Many people are trampling on the Xiegu G106 and say:"Stay away". You compare it with a Yaesu FT-818 and it seems that you are well with the little G106. Now I wonder why?
another update: apparently the v1.3 firmware also ushered in wsjtx support using the Icom 705 radio profile... see the wsjtx digital setup document in the v1.3 firmware archive, which shows a screen shot of the setup... and yes, i now prefer the g106 to my ft-818 due to the g106 three cw filter setting... the 818 is still a good rig but was always hobbled by a lack of cw filters - even more so now as the filters are unobtainable
The Xiegu G106 is not that bad. What do you want for $297 to $319. With the last two firmware updates from Xiegu the little guy is almost a real ham radio. I have 2 of the G106. One for the shack which is only a small room and the other for my small to-go-box to take to the park. I use it with my old MP-1 antenna and a LDG Z817 tuner. I'm only on 10 meters and when things go right with MR. SUN i 'm able to work 10 meters fine.
Hi, I have had the G90 for 6 months and think it is great. I have had the opportunity to buy an unused G106 for about $180 with a car adapter to power it mobile. Looking forward to getting it. Thanks for the report. Alan 2E0EUZ
