SYTYCD

So I admit it. I like So You Think You Can Dance. I've never had much interest in dancing, but this show has been very entertaining and I have been amazed by the athleticism of the dancers. Last week the episode included a mom who was trying to balance her family and her dream of dancing. That alone was a touching story, but then her little girl got on stage and was dancing. It was so cute, I thought I might have to give up my man card for liking it so much. The episode also included this guy doing what he called "exorcist style." I thought it was going to be really weird, but it turned out to be very powerful. You don't see it in the video, but the dancer himself was humbled and moved to tears by the response from the judges and the crowd.

I didn't need to worry about my man card as this week's episode included this young lady demonstrating aerial pole dancing. (Unfortunately, not in the video.) She is clearly a very talented dancer.

Note: I was going to embed the videos, but the Fox embed code is very lame. For one, it auto-plays. Boo. Also, I embedded two videos, but it just plays the same video in both boxes. I never understand why people want to make things overly complex. Don't they want me to share the content and promote their show?

TYT TH-9800: Dual/Quad Band Mobile

I'm finally getting around to doing a real post about the TYT TH-9800.

First, I do not see it listed on the TYT website.

The KC2RA site posted some info about the TH-9800 when they did the review of Chinese mobiles.

Kight Radio does have it listed, but labels the radio as a dual band mobile. It hints at a surprise and suggests reviewing the spec sheet where the frequency ranges are 28.000 - 29.700, 50.000 - 54.000, 144.000 - 148.000, 430.000 - 450.000. Also, on the 25 MAY 2012 update from Kight Radio, they report the TH-9800 will also have "AM Reecieve on the Aircraft band."

Andrews Communications Systems has the TH-9800 listed on their site with an expected price of less than $499 AUD/$485 USD. Given a price in that ballpark and the quad band capabilities, this would not appear to be a direct competitor to the KG-UV920R. This picture on the Andrews site doesn't look anything like the others below.

This post on the TYT-USA Yahoo Group mentions a unit at Dayton. Martyn (K4TEC) gives a little more detail:

"Re the Quad Band mobile transceiver, this is still under development, a dummy rig was seen at Dayton, Sam (from TYT China) let one float around, this will be an exciting rig and a good price but it is not going to be available until very late in the year if at all this year."

From the 21 MAY 2012 update, Kight Radio also talks about a unit that they had, but it was the dual band. They do specifically mention that the TH-9800 should ship in October. Image from Kight Radio:

Earlier in the month, Nate pointed out in the comments that there could be some photoshop action going on in the TYT TH-9800 Dual/Quad band - a Yaesu FT-8800R screen? It doesn't mean the radio is fake by any stretch as I can image the marketing designer grabbing something convenient to complete the image.

For what might be the single band versions of these radios, there is already Type 90 acceptance by the FCC (ID: X24-MOBILE-V). Again back to the pictures, nothing matches so I don't know what to expect. This is the picture that is linked to the TH-9800VHF documents on the FCC site.

I've copied the features list from Sparky's blog here. He mentions a price of $375 - $450 USD and says it will be available "Winter 2012." I'm not sure of his source, so I am leaning towards Kight's price and date, since he talks about going to China and seeing the various manufacturers and sellers.

Features:

• Outstanding 0.2uV sensitivity across 10m/6m/2m/70cm bands

• Brilliant crossmodulation, intermodulation rejection and strong signal performance – similar to commercial radios!

• Commercial quality and commercial performance, too!

• 256 memory channels

• DTMF mic included!

• Digital FM broadcast band radio

• High/low output power levels

• Reverse frequency selection

• Dual (V/U) squelch set levels

• Dual repeater offsets selectable

• Multi-function scanning

• Repeater offset selectable

• Keypad lock function

• Channel name editing

• CTCSS/DCS encode/decode

• Dual Band/Dual Receive: (Full Duplex)

• Cross Band Repeat

• TX Power: 5-50 Watts

• Memories: 256

• Antenna Connection: Two SO (UHF)

For the quad-bander, two antenna connections makes a lot more sense.

Given the lessons of the KG-UV920R, I'm not going to hold my breath for this one either.

Revisions

I've not been tracking the TYT TH-UVF1, but I did notice that people are now getting a TH-UVF1A. I wish all the manufacturers would make it that easy to identify the newer revisions of their radios.

Chinese Radio - Ham Users Group

Kight Radio has started a web forum for Chinese Radios at http://www.chinaradiousers.com/. You never know if these things will take off. The Yahoo Groups have a lot of traction, but these radios are so popular I think there is plenty of room for more ways to discuss the crush of ham radios that are making their way out of China.

How To Make Money Blogging

An interesting read that says monetizing your site isn't the hard part any more. There are plenty of off-the-shelf solutions. All you need is 100 million active users. I'm no Uncle, so I'm a little short of that number.

Big Apple Says Bye to Big Gulp

Just like guns laws don't prevent criminals from getting guns, banning large, sugary drinks won't keep obese people from drinking lots of calories. I say let's just ban everything, but water.

Welcome to the nanny state.

RT Systems Advanced Radio Programming Software

I know it comes with a cable, but $50 is expensive when you could just use CHIRP to cover the basic programming functions.

Powerwerx New Item: RT Systems Advanced Radio Programming Software for KG-UV3D. Many improvements over the factory software! bit.ly/JCB6Sn Fri, May 25 17:22:20 from web

Powerwerx New Item: RT Systems Advanced Radio Programming Software for KG-UV6X. Many improvements over the factory software! bit.ly/KRq6j8 Sun, May 27 17:50:05 from web

TYT TH-UVF9: Unboxing

Water

The article is spread out over a hundred pages to boost their hit count, so I will save you the trouble of reading The Worst Drinks for Your Body:

Drink water.

Business 3.0

The goal used to be to "cut out the middleman." Now the middleman is a requirement.