Hytera TC-320: Mini-Review

David (K7DB) likes the Hytera TC-320:

"On 1/29/2015 you blogged about a TDXOne TD-Q7 UHF radio. 

For some time I've been using another small UHF radio that has delivered flawless performance and is put together very well. It's a Hytera TC-320. (Yep, the same Hytera that makes the DMR radios.) It's FCC Part 90 certificated. 

I purchased it from a U.S. dealer for $92 delivered, and I think it might even be available cheaper (and also quite a bit more expensive -- so shop around). Programming s/w is available from your dealer for free. A special version of software is needed to program 5 kHz deviation -- that can also be provided free by the dealer. 

The dealer actually has a bunch of these radios that he rents out... so you can imagine how much wear and tear they might get being used for short-term events where the users probably couldn't care less about taking care of the radios. In fact, the manufacturer specs claim it will survive a 1.5 meter (about 5 foot) drop, and there is a U.S. warranty and repair facility in Florida. 

These are 16 channel 2-watt radios, so they might not meet everyone's needs... but they are extremely rugged and reliable, and I'm happy with mine. Comes with 1700 mAh battery. Draws about 34 mA on squelched receive, 1000 mA on 2 W transmit, about 500 mA on 0.5 W transmit, and typically 170 to 280 mA on receive (depending on volume). 

The radio has a neat feature (although in practice a use for it won't come up so often for amateurs) where many groups, each with its own subaudible tone, can share a small number of channels. The radio will scan for traffic with the group's tone, and on transmit -- if no channel is being used with that tone -- will go to an unused channel. In essence, this is a simple trunking system. I think this feature would be useful for a commercial community repeater service with lots of groups and a few repeaters. 

Since this is a commercial radio, most dealers include programming in their quoted price. For amateurs, it's best to tell the dealer he can skip the programming, and ask him to throw in a programming cable instead."