Baofeng BF888S - Discussion, Review, and Thoughts
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 2 พ.ค. 2020
- What is potentially the most inexpensive radio to get you into amateur radio, What is the BF888s and is it a good radio for you? Does it pass FCC compliance? Who would I recommend it to? Find out now!
- วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
I got a 6 pack of these on Amazon for 52 USD, because a buddy told me it was a great deal. While waiting for them to arrive I got the ball rolling on GMRS licensing and also ordered a programming cable. Thanks for the helpful content!
That's exactly what I did after buying my 6 pack of these as well haha
I have 4 RETEVIS H777 radios which are the same as the Baofeng BF-888S radios and I love them cheap things. I got them for under $9 each and they are FCC Part 90 certified for commercial use. That's the main reason why I got the RETEVIS branded versions. More of a dual-purpose radio rather than just an amateur radio. And 2 watts is the average for these type of radios which is decent enough for most radio users. I know it looks like they are advertising them as a dual-band radio but what is meant by it is they have a VHF version and a UHF version. I have yet to ever see a VHF version though.
Nice review. The 888 is great for what it is.
UHF only, 2W definitely the max.
Absolutely. I had absolutely no expectations for it, but went in open minded and that's exactly what it is, great for what it is. Hopefully I said you're last name correctly in the video also. 73
"Great for what it is". To a certain degree, it depends on what you're trying to do with an 888. I use mine for an AllStar node. It would also be a good choice for cross band repeat. A display for either of those operations is a waste of battery. I use it around the house and on a 5 acre property. With the stock antenna, it covers that area. And my AllStar node is hooked to a dummy load. If your cross banding, there is probably going to be an outdoor antenna. I would think a 1-2 mile range, with a moderate antenna, would not be out of the question. They are small and lightweight, battery life is excellent. I have Icom and Yaesu HT's and the 888 is my first choice, almost every time. I bought a 2 pack for $27.88, 2 radios, 2 chargers, 4 batteries, 2 earphones, 1 programming cable. The best part is that you don't have to worry about trashing them. It's a $14 radio.
A lot of the guys claiming that Baofeng (China) radios are ruining ham radio probably own 6 or more of them.
Just walk around any hamfest!
For what they are, brilliant little radios
Superhet? Maybe not..
Great through review and discussion. I agree about Baofeng's helping further the hobby. I mean they are cheap and will get the job done. I personally don't have a problem with them or anyone using them. I have several myself that I use occasionally. 73 KG5SDE
Very informative, great
I may have skipped it, but if you leave 16 blank, no programmed frequency, it acts as scanner for the other 15 programmed ones
Very interesting, I was unware of this! Thanks!
I agree with you 100% about every thing destroying the hobby, i see it expanding, and if it gets someone into the hobby that is a great thing. If they don't like it then don't use it. And at least welcome the person for the interest.
These are good if you have GMRS license and radio illiterate family you need to hand them to. You do the setup, they literally can't screw it up. These are not the ones you carry, they are the ones you hand to people to use in the way YOU intend them to.
great stocking stuffer radios!
I got one to give to my friend and I use the two variants of the talkie baofeng put out.
There is the bf88A that is frs ready out of the box as well as this one that is far more capable as long as you know what you are doing with a programming cable and chrirp.
great for music festivals and stuff
I must say you sound marvelous. I noticed the box said, "SCRAMBLER"? I don't think so.
I think with the appropriate antenna and frequencies, this radio can do the VHF frequencies. I'm going to attempt it this day.
It cannot be the 888s, it has to be an original 888, based off a few tests I conducted. Let me know how it goes!
@@HAMRADIODUDE didn't work..."bricked" one of two bf888s I have. Live and learn.
I was under the impression that these were walkie talkies and not ham radios
I own one of theese in Germany and im only using it to Listen to other people talking so for that purpose it does good
My school Streches for SOOOOO LONG about 2km to 3km or shorter than that and it works Flawlessly! i don't use it but i am a walkie talkie enthusiast and i asked the guards how good it is how far can it reach how long does it last? and they were in on it too they told me what it is and said that across the whole school you can hear the other guy Loud and clear so i bought myself a pair its still on its way but Ill reply to my own comment with an Honest How good it is Can it really be reliable is it worth the purchase how long can it last with minimal use distance Interferiance and stuff so people that would like a backup review Keep tuned on here
LOL I discovered you can get these to fart if you hit the ptt while changing channels at just the right time. The fart gets transmitted
I can imagine kids finding this out and getting very anoying with it quickly.
I own both the 88A frs legit ones and the 888s variations.
great for gmrs and they work pretty well as long as you know what you are doing.
The 88A is 100% legal for anyone to use license free out of the box so no issues there. The 888s is more of a advanced/pro level radio and you need a license and need to really know what you are doing.
I have a GMRS and getting my ham soon too so glad I picked these up. Right now I use them all on frs and gmr but I am also looking forward to playing on vhf once I have my ham.
I have a change to buy a pair of these for 15 bux...I have one repeater I can reach with this SO, might be a decent deal...
2 for 15 dollars, not bad. I think they were costing me about 8-9 dollars each and have slowly increased to 12 each during the pandemic.
I picked up one of these radios last week for an Allstar node project, and I simply cannot program it. In chirp I get the error message "radio refused to enter programming mode" when I try and read form the radio. Ive tried two different cables ive used to program many other radios that I know work. Ive tried CHIRP, Official software from baofeng BF-480, ZT-V68 and 888S software from Miklor, and using an entirely new computer and ive had no luck. Any ideas?
Couple of ideas, one unlikely to work:. 1. Hold down the flashlight button when turning the radio on (unlikely). 2. Make sure you have an FTDI programming cable. These 888s seem to be picky. If neither of those work and with what you've already tried, you may need to replace the radio. If you are near northern Illinois, I have a cable you can try
@@HAMRADIODUDE Thanks for the suggestions and the offer. Ive tried the flashlight button also, no luck. I know the cables work, but dont know if they're genuine FTDI chips so getting a new cable will probably be my next step, unfortunately im not near Illinois but I appreciate the offer. Thanks anyways.
Keep up the great vids!
@@FPS-WIFI sounds good. The only other trick may be too ensure the volume is all the way up when plugged in to the radio (doubtful)
i read it has to be on ch16 to program it
Make sure the plug is pushed very firmly in
Channel 16, and full volume
You sound Marlvelous....AB0RJ 73
This mic is overloading your voice with low frequencies. Previous was way better to listen.
Thanks.. I agree... I will adjust the lows .... My soundcard made it sound okay, but it sounds bad on the TV . Thanks!
I just checked my mixer, the low tones were way way way off. Thanks again
Hey, I am very new to this and I just purchased a 888s, 4 unit of it and now I am wondering if we can make one radio as the parent which can listen to all channel at once.
Nice question! I think you are asking if you can have any of the radios scan all the frequencies. Although they wont do it at once, they will do it in order. Ch 1, listen...Ch 2, listen, etc. Once it gets to the last channel, it will start over. From the BF888s manual or radioddity, I'm not sure - baofengtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/BF888s_Manual.pdf :
SCANNING
Scanning is used for hands off monitoring of your favorite frequencies. When the
transceiver options are set to SCAN (via software), setting the channel selector to
channel 16 directs the radio to scan the selected channels from 1-15.
1. Transceiver stops scanning when a signal is detected and continues when signal is
gone.
2. If there are less than 2 channels, it cannot scan. (Go figure)
3. On channel 16, Press and Hold the PTT and MONI buttons while switching ON the
transceiver to turn the Scanning ON or OFF.
4. If FM radio function is activated, Radio cannot scan.
@@HAMRADIODUDE What does it mean it can scan via software ?
How do download chirp on a Samsung galaxy A 6 lite tablet. To program the radio. Or is that not possible?
Hey there, I assume the Samsung gallery runs on an Android operating system. If it does, it's not possible..
Using the Baofeng software an option exists to turn off the TX timeout feature. Does that allow the radio to transmit for an indefinite amount of time? I will be using the low power mod and transmitting continuous data, so I need to disable timeout.
I think if you turn of the TOT or tx timeout feature, you will be able to key up as long as you want, if you are on simplex. If you are on a repeater, the repeater may have a timeout. Unfortunately, I cannot confirm this as I no longer have the radio, but all my other radios which have the TOT disabled, can run until i unkey. Best wishes!
"they were all overpriced" amazon one is 20.60$ with 33$ shipping
Didn’t understand what he’s talking about 🤷🏼♂️
Hi question, how far this can reach thank you stay safe all.
It depends on obstructions between you and the other stations. Realistically, a couple of miles Max without a repeater and I'm an area with obstructions. I'm a clear are,
A with line if site, it could be way further
12:30 -10dBm is 100mW ?! I tough that 0dBM is referred to 1mW so 100mW must be +20dBm... Btw: 2nd harmonics seems to be at -55db down which looks good.
oops, -10dBm is 100uW. I have a new video coming out soon correcting most of my mistakes with the analyzer. Thanks for pointing it out!
It’s some useful information, though I think this video could have been covered in 5 minutes.
Thanks. I've been working on getting my videos down to 6-8 minutes. Hopefully I can do that consistently in the future
Why wouldn't you recommend it over a UV-5R? How about it's illegal to transmit on a UV-5R without a license?
I don’t have a computer am I screwed
No 888s is capable of more than 2.xx watts on high power. Anything over 2.99 Watts is just false advertising.
Glad you mention that
You can get these on ebay for $19.99 a pair. So for $10 a radio you can't beat that. I'm sure most of these are alot more pure on the air than most make them out to be. What I've found in these that suck is the receiver. There a cheap SDR radio. That's the main pit fall of these over a traditional superhet. ham radio. Are these the best radio? Definitely not. Are they worth the money? Definitely so. KC4Q
Sent them back. Wouldn't upload to radio with Boefang cord. Chirp didn't help either and appears to be a known problem. 10/2020
Interesting. Sorry to hear they didn't work out. I've not had that issue. Last week was the most recent set I picked up. What did you end up going with?
@@HAMRADIODUDE Motorola T200. Our 888s are all failing or having glitches within a year, ( we have around 70 ) while our Motorola and Midland are well over 10 years old. Only needed a replacement battery pack.
Damn I just wanted a regular walkie talkie, not a ham radio. I just got two of them in the mail.
Tech exam is easy...Get legal..Use them. You'll enjoy it if you have a repeater nearby.
Just program frs frequencies using chirp
Great radio, but YOUR AUDIO SETUP IS NOT GOOD. you've got some vox option running, no one uses vox in a studio... Sound are cut at the start.. Not good to listen too.
WHY ARE YOU YELLING.
If you turn on developer options, you can browse the memory and manually force VHF frequencies. With a proper antenna, it seems to transmit well too.
th-cam.com/video/ny-oVDfIqdY/w-d-xo.html
Worked on mine.
Thanks for the tip! I'm going to do this and test the harmonics! Again, thanks!
@@HAMRADIODUDE I'll be looking forward to that video :) #Subscribed
@@HAMRADIODUDE Hey man, I decided to make testing this a bit easier on myself. So, I made a copy /usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/chirp/drivers/h777.py (called it bf888s.py) and edited it so I have a BF-888S in my list of radios to download and upload from on chirpw.
Here it is, though, it's experimental, hacked together, and I can't say it won't break your radio to do this: pastebin.com/BbY8MyBt
As per anything, make sure you look at it before you copy it into /usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/chirp/drivers/ so you know I'm not just screwing with you. Then, start up chirp... if chirp doesn't start, delete bf888s.py.
This change basically says "Yeah, this radio has vhf frequencies.
@@iamsemjaza i ordered the BF888 and they sent me the BF888S... Doesn't work. You can program the frequencies, but they don't do anything. I need to find the original BF888... I will, for sure.
Please do not recommending the UV-5R instead of BF-888S as the UV-5R has far worse receiver front-end immunity... I would pay lack of features to have better receiver on my cheap radio have to say. My 2c...
The 888 is really good for its price and it works well