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 radio is a very good HT ham radio. It seems better made than the average low cost Baofeng. It seems as if it is in fact a Baofeng dm1801 branded by Tidradio. Much better manual than a Baofeng ub5r. The inside of the battery compartment is metal, just like a Motorola. The display is bigger and brighter.It comes with some very good accessories. 2 batteries is a nice touch. The speaker mic is alot better than the one that came with my Baofeng uv5r. The programming cable makes programming easy. The na771 antenna is superior to the stock antenna and really increases range.Hard to believe this is going for $50 . I recommend it.The only issue is extra batteries are hard to find. I had to order some from China.

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.

Overall, this TD-H6 is a very solid feeling radio that works well... once you get the driver situation figured out. After that, the radio works as advertised. And the extra battery and extra items (including the longer whip antenna) make this a worthwhile kit. However, as I mentioned, there are some issues that you should be aware of.First, using the menu to turn off the annoying voice prompts showed me that the poorly written instruction manual doesn't really mention that to access ON/OFF options, you press MENU a second time.Next, the programming cord that touts "no driver needed" is incorrect. The on-board driver is not compatible with the current Windows 10 iteration, so if you follow Tidradio's instructions, you go to the site bit.ly/driverfree... which dead-ends you into a 404 error! So now you are on your own. But here's how to make that lemonade out of the 404 error lemon.Luckily, the 404 error drops you into the FTDI website - and FTDI is the manufacturer of the USB chip. Now you want to click the 'Drivers' tab at the top of the web page. Once the driver page loads, you want to look three lines down for a line that says, "Windows Driver Installer (VCP & D2XX), please click here." So, click there... and it will download a compressed file "CDM21228_setup.zip". Unzip the folder and run the CDM21228_setup.exe file. Windows isn't going to like it, but tell it to run it anyway. This will load the proper driver, and restarting the USB programming cable/programming software should result in a functional USB cable. At least it did for me.As for the software, it's nice that the TIDRADIO software and the CHIRP software both work reasonably well. As usual, they use different terminology for the same features, but a little on-line research goes a long way here.In any event, a little time and patience will result in a working radio at a good price. 5 stars for bang for the buck, - 1 star for poor instructions and driver debacle.

Great product,battery life is great and last a while, size is perfect, great reception and range along with great clarity! Loved the extra battery and fixings that came along with it! Great performance and price!!