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Yaesu FT-857D pros and cons


Own one Yaesu; I will never buy another. But that is a 2m radio that came recommended. Too many tricky menus and takes too much time to figure all out. Never wanted a HF from them either. Just went with Kenwood and feel no need to look back.

If using it for mobile, they seems to be popular for that. I'm sure it is fine and has its own fan base. Eham likes it. So does QRZ.

Gonna sell that 2m rig and get something that makes simple sense to use, either a basic Icom or Kenwood. Hope that Yaesu doesn't drive you nutz.
 
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Have yet to find out if the display is push button colored like the (awesome) Yaesu FT-450.... (which is on my xmas list).
it seems the 857 will out do the iCOM by drawing less power/current and cleaner RX in mobile situations.
 
They are OK for what they are...

I just think there's to much going on inside them things and not 100% duty cycle.

I have owned Yaesu for more than 35 years ..... The ONLY one I would not recomend is the FT-100d.....

The 857 is fine not much i can say bad about it unless you have bad eyes like me then the small size is as problem.

It is a very good radio not contest grade but you don't need that .....
 

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I love that little rig and my wife runs it mobile so Im sure you can figure it all out. Its a nice fully loaded mobile. You can change the display color to just about any color you desire Hell my wife had it pink for the first year and its now set to blue that matches the panel ;ights in the dash.
 
You didn't mention if you were going to use this mobile or in your shack. If you are looking for a radio for your shack, I would get something else. The FT-450 is nice, or a TS-480 is a nice shack rig for about the same money as the 857.

I have and 857 in my car and like it. Would buy it again.

Pro:
Small
Well built
Easy to use

Con:
Few buttons
99 menu items
Learning curve (you have to invest time with the manual)



The menus will take some getting used to but not much different in this regard than the IC-7000 or the IC-706. These are compact radios and they don't have much room for buttons.

Once you become familiar with how to operate the radio, you can change bands, tune your antenna, and adjust the DSP without taking your eyes off the road.

Good luck.
 
I have one at my country house; Nice fully featured radio for the price, but honestly I wouldn't buy it again.

Pros:
  • Small and well built
  • Covers V/U
  • Affordable
  • Many minor but useful features
Cons:
  • Very poor ergonomics
  • AF only DSP
  • So so receiver performance
  • Bad TX IMD
  • Loose front panel
  • Getting aged (9y)
 
The menues don't bother me. At least they in alphabetical order. The cons I would say are AF only DSP and it suffers from intermod when listening to AM broadcast and longwave bands. It's only a dual conversion receiver too and after my triple conversion, bullet proof, Icom IC-735 it was a disappointment. Not a huge one but nevertheless. It is a fantastic rig for mobile use but there are better for a home station. I also wish the HF/6m antenna port was split so 6m was on a jack by itself. Many antenna switches etc. are not rated for 6m so you have to place a switch after the radio and before any HF only switches, tuners etc. This makes it hard to run a low pass filter. When I hooked my filter up, which has 72 dB rejection above about 35 MHz, I wasn't thinking and I wondered why I could not hear the local 6m repeater. Then I clued in. Not only was the LPF not allowing my RF out it was also not allowing any RX signal back into the radio. I tossed the LPF in the desk.
 
I run the 897D same guts bigger case....I have no problem with menu driven radios.
It is very rugged and has stood up to a lot of abuse.
AF DSP is not as effective is IF
RX is fine for my use if it was a decatated base set up I would have likely went another route.
I get good reports audio wise...over all I am happy with the radio.

73
Jeff
 
Even my Ft 2000 D has almost 150 menu items to set....
Let's face it, modern radio's are a far cry from the radio's i had 35 years back....:D

The 857/897 are fine radio's within the limitations and price they come for.
The FT 100 i have has been overhauled a few years back added the 6 KHz AM filter and never misses a beat since then.

Compared to the 857 it has a better reciever.
One reason i don't want to get rid of it as mobile radio or on our hollidays as quick station set up.

The FT 100 has the same "problem" menu's... we have to get used to it, must be the reason they put in the box that manual thingy :D
 
Pro:
Great Mobile HF rig when run w the ATAS120

CON:
25w AM

I dont have much to complain about this radio. I ran it in my truck w good success for 2 yrs. I put it in my house on a dipole and it did ok. Its my first HF radio so i cant compare it to anything else. So my opinion is its a good starter radio. But, i am in the market for something bigger and better for the house
 
can someone explain why the ft100d is bad? iv been looking into that rig as well.

They are very prone to blow the VHF/UHF finals @ $300 a pair

IF YOU BUY ONE CHECK THE FINALS MAKE SHURE THEY ARE GOOD !!!!!!

My brother and myself both have one mine is on load to a fellow ham his is run mobile every day.
 
Hi All

I have a FT857D for 9 yrs now.
Runs as back-up rig and portable rig.
I have used it quite a bit, never 1 problem with it as last time on 6 mtrs.
I think it was some strange oscilation in the finals or HF detection.

Never used 6 mtrs untill a few weeks ago.
I do not like this band at all.
I never used 70 CM SSB also, same as 6 mtrs do not like the band.

I work both SSB and CW.
I do have 300 Hz narrow CW filter wich works very good but gives audio distortion on RX.
Distortion is easely solved by using DSP on CW.

The RX is a bit noisy but very sensitive.
We have tested the FT857D against a whole lot off other rigs but it is a nice performer on RX.
What we could hear on every other rig we could hear on the FT857D.
Through the years we have tested it against IC7700, IC7200, IC746, IC7400, IC706, IC725, FT920, FT847, FT840, FT1000MP, FT900, FT450, TS130, TS140, TS450, TS2000, TS850, TS480, TS570, TS950, TS940 and many more rigs.
A lot of these rigs sounded better on TX a lot of them sounded better on RX, but we never had the situation that we could copy a station in SSB on one of the other rigs that we couldn't copy on the fT857D.

In CW it kept up a good performance to, but as I am one of the few CW users among my radiofriends, we couldn't test it against whole lot of radios, but it was as good as the FT920 with CW filter and far better as the FT450 , as good as the FT847 with CW filter and as good as the FT900 with CW filter.

TX SSB is not super but with a MD100 mike or the standard MD31 very good readable.
Do not try to do very good super SSB audio with this rig, this is the wrong rig for this.

We have used this rig on really big full size vertical fer 80 mtrs and 2 phased half wave 40 mtr verticls and on 3 phased verticals on 20 mtrs.
A 20 mtr monoband beam 2 x 40 mtrs doublet on 80 mtrs etc.
This rig is a solid performer and with smart use of IPO and ATT it will perform excelent.

It is complete shack in a little box.

73's Jos
 

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