TIDRADIO TD-H6 10Watt Ham Radio Handheld Upgraded from UV-5R Dual Band Walkie Talkies with Extra 2200mAh Battery, Programming Cable, Speaker Mic and TD-771 Antenna

This is you basic Chinese radio, Baofeng manufactured and tweaked by Tidradio! That being said, I didn’t expect a lot. I got the package with the extra battery and hand mic. Great price point. Power is what they claim, but not optimum output on 2m or 70cm. But you can rely on 7 to 9 true watts output on both UHF and VHF. SO I AM VERY PLEASED. I get great audio report and hit repeaters 30 miles away from my recliner in my house. As a mobile, it works even better with a Nagoya Magmount. It’s a great little unit and will be my emergency backup or my loaner. I have two other radios I use (HT’s) for my mobile and base that are both a better brand, but this radio compares well to them. It does receive a little more interference on receive. Anyway, it a great radio and with great power, and worth every penny. It programs well with chirp and also from my iPhone and the new Bluetooth programmer and software. So programming is a breeze, once you pass the learning curve. I definitely recommend this radio.

This radio works perfectly for most of your basic communications such as day at the crowded malls with family/kids, camping, road trip, hiking, working, concert, etc.I got this mainly for airsoft where communications is very important. Before I got this H6 model, I already have bought the Tidradio H8 model and that was stellar in its own rights!Back to airsoft, I decided to get this so I could run dual radios so I could communicate with at least 4 different person for tactical planning and team assessment.This package comes with plenty extras to enable you to try out at least 3 different styles of mic/comm that suit your prefer way of transmitting your voice and receiving your transmission.Another great plus is this comes with an extended antenna to reach farther distance and also a programming cable to customize your radio for many extra frequency and privacy settings you may need to as your skill advance in radio usage.This radio is highly recommended!

Seems to be a fairly decent unit especially in relation to cost. Only reason for lower rating was 1 poorly written manual by that I mean not very explanatory on manual programming and 2 manual is to small print for people with eyesight problems. I really like the fact they give you two batteries and an extra high gain antenna. THe one minor thing taht I have found is the little brass spanner nut that holds the SMA connector has worked loose with me once. It would be nice if they had included a little wrench to tighten it with.I use this little radio a lot for mobile connected to a Comet SBB15 antenna and it does a really nice job. The audio quality of this little radio is quite surprising. It would also be nice if there was a car/cigarette lighter power adapter for replacing the battery with for mobile use. However I do keep my second battery charge all the time and when to battery on the unit is getting low I carry it with me. It is not very heavy and fits nicely in your pocket.I also have the Baofeng UV5R. The TD H6 is Far and Away the best audio and the best recieve.One of the things I like is the fact when you program it with CHIRP it copies all the information from the frequencies / repeaters you have selected and you do not need to put them all in one at the time. However I would love it if there were a way to keep all the Vhf channels and UHF channels together instead of mixing them all up.At this edit I have had this radio now about two years and still use it regularly. It is a solid little radio and I would recommend it for any beginning operator and seasoned hams would also like it.

Performance and feature-set are similar to other comparable “high power” handhelds in the same price range. And the “value” of this bundle is excellent, with all of the additional items that are included such as a higher gain antenna, extra battery, and 12V cables for charging.For me, this radio fills the niche of an “extra kit” to have in the car. The limitations on programming make it a less than ideal option for a professional environment, but it would be a very interesting option for first-time radio buyers, who want something higher powered and more complete than “just a radio” (especially because of the included accessories and driver-less programming cable).Benefits of this radio and bundle:The TD-H6 sold through this Amazon product entry comes with a substantial number of accessories. Among these are a spare battery, programming cable, shoulder mic, a 12V automotive accessory adapter for the charging dock, and an extra (TD-771) antenna.The radio uses Kenwood external mic and SMA M antenna connectors, which are compatible with virtually all accessories designed for comparably priced handhelds.I want to call out the included programming cable specifically. This programming cable works with CHIRP and does not require installing any additional drivers. Unlike prolific-type programming cables, this one actually detects as an RS-232 com port in Windows 10 straight away. I tested it with one of my other radios to ensure that it works, and it does. This is now my favorite programming cable.I do not use the orange alarm button as an alarm, but I do appreciate that it is recessed, making it less likely to be pressed accidentally. The clip uses the same metal backing and thick plastic clip that is common of other radios in this price range.The manufacturer supplies programming instructions for both CHIRP and their own software. Both pieces of software appear to have the same feature set. The manufacturer supplied software can also set the TX frequency ranges from four options: 136-174/400-520, 140-149/430-439, 136-260/400-520, and 144-146/430-432.Drawbacks of this radio:The keypad is less comfortable to use in-menu than some other popular radios in this price range. The 4-way direction pad is more awkward to use than dedicated up/down buttons, especially since the menu seems to only accept up/down inputs.The side up/down buttons on the side do not function as up and down arrows. Rather, they operate as two separate functions: up enables the commercial FM radio (for listening to music), short press down changes the TX power, and long press down is channel monitor. These should have been labeled A and B as found on other similar radios. These buttons are not programmable, nor is the orange alarm button.The volume knob feels good and tight through the first 80% of the volume, then gets loose in the top 20% of the range. This doesn’t hamper its use, but distracts from the otherwise good build quality.While the display is very bright and easy to read when the backlight is on… the narrower font and text size make this display slightly more challenging to read at other times.It appears to be impossible to set a channel to rx-only using the duplex=off or duplex=split 000.0000 setting. (Tested using CHIRP and the manufacturer supplied programming software.)This radio does not have the ability to “lock out” the menus and prevent the user from modifying settings. Some (but not all) other radios in this price range do have this feature.Performance:The radio seems to perform (to my ear) with nearly identical performance to a comparable “high power” radio of another brand, using stock antennas for both. This is 10W, the other is 8W. I have used it on both VHF and UHF under the following conditions, and have gotten essentially the same performance from both radios: 1) in a suburb, 2) from about a mile away HT to HT, hitting small mobile repeaters in the field, and 3) a larger metro-area repeater further away. Reports were that the radios sounded practically the same.The performance of both this radio and the other comparably priced high power radio, are an improvement over smaller 1-3W radios, given the same antenna configuration. The higher wattage yields some additional range in cases where light obstructions may otherwise interfere with communication.However, the thing that REALLY improves performance is having access to a larger and higher quality antenna. Improving the antenna counts for much more than a few extra watts. While I generally make use of the stock antenna (because it’s small and simple, easier to carry and wave around in my hand), having access to a larger antenna (such as the TD-771 included in this bundle) is especially helpful. Because my needs do not require the extra antenna sensitivity, I have not spent much time with the TD-771 antenna (which appears to compete directly with the RH-771 and NA-771). If you are interested in antenna performance, you can research online for that information specifically.Company SupportTIDRADIO has extremely responsive customer support. I reached out to them about a question regarding this device, and I got an excellent response that same day. Because of this, I am upgrading this review to five stars.

Radio seems good, just opened box and found NO Programming Cable! so why 3 stars. Yes I looked under the Tray the unit is in. but NO Programming Cable .. not a good start!Ok down to 1 Star, nothing seems to be working on this unit, when I get it to TX Simplex There is a Clicking being transmitted ... with the parts not all here, and this issue.. Asked for my money back