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If you're interested in playing with radio, HAM equipment/bands aren't even the easiest/cheapest/most fun. You can buy breakout boards for all sorts of protoco

If you're interested in playing with radio, HAM equipment/bands aren't even the easiest/cheapest/most fun. You can buy breakout boards for all sorts of protocols and such (most in 2.4Ghz) on Adafruit et. al. for a few bucks, and hook them up and play with them with a RPi, Arduino, etc. to you heart's content. Without a license. Basic HAM gear is, for the most part, expensive (with the exception of cheap VHF hand helds), limited, big, heavy, bulky, and/or typically nowhere near cutting edge.

sliken 5y ago
Dunno, depends on your interest. Sure you can pay $1000s on a nice rig, but you can also build a small radio that fits in a altoids tin for a few $10s. 40M CW radio (bare board): $12.69: https://www.amazon.com/Qianson-Shortwave-Transmitter-7-023-7-026MHz-Transceiver/dp/B01KA4KRKI https://www.amazon.com/Qianson-Shortwave-Transmitter-7-023-7... Here's a kit that does 80m, 60m, 40m, 30m, or 20m for $40: https://kc9on.com/product/foxx-3-cw-transceiver/ https://kc9on.com/product/foxx-3-cw-transceiver/ Here's an easy kit for $55 that can do 5W (quite capable for digital modes) for 80, 60, 40, 30, 20 or 17m bands. https://qrp-labs.com/qcxp.html https://qrp-labs.com/qcxp.html Or pay a bit more and get one that can run on 4 bands for $80 ($60 if you want to make your own case): https://qrp-labs.com/qdx.html https://qrp-labs.com/qdx.html Or if you want a 2M 50 watt FM radio, alinco has one for $170.00, designed to sit on a desk or mount in a car: https://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-008739 https://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-008739 The above are far from the cheapest, and smallest. There's quite a few solutions under $100 and smaller than a deck of cards, just depends on what you want. Personally I wouldn't consider any of those particular expensive, big, heavy, or bulky.
tcmart14 5y ago
Yes and no. But the broad implications are an issue. I've been a licensed ham for over a decade and dropping money on a nice HF radio and antenna is something I have not had the luxury of. Luckily now there are things like QrpLab kits and the Bitx, which do make it way more affordable, but they also require time, patience and willing to learn at least a little electronics. Which comes back around that for quiet a few people, cost is a barrier. I know plenty of people who would love to play with antennas, but have no interest in soldering components and they are not in a position to drop $700 bucks on a yeasu.
gorgoiler 5y ago
Amateur radio is a different beast. A full license permits 400 Watts! Not that you need it if you are building an Adafruit weather station for your garden. That is to say — and and I say this with the utmost respect to my fellow license holders — actually doing something useful with the spectrum. A lot of amateur radio culture is more about building your own equipment from scratch and then trying not to cook / kill yourself with it. It’s like an open access drag strip for home made muscle cars, as opposed to testing your hand built recumbent bike on the public streets.
- sparker72678 5y ago
  Totally agree! Which is why I have a hard time with the arguments about why amateur radio is so important/needed. We’ve reserved all this spectrum so that some people can exercise their muscle car hobby. Is that worth it? Maybe. But it’d be nice if the conversation was at least grounded in reality.
  - sliken 5y ago
    Well the trick is, amateur radio is hard. If you want a community to help when there's a storm, earthquake, hurricane, power grid failure, large fire, etc you need them to practice regularly. Ideally with no external funding. Hams are often civic minded, so they will help out in bike races, horse races, and similar events ... especially if they are out of reach of cell towers, which is quite common even in central california. So if you want something to fall back on when the local cell tower and internet provider is down, you need to have something the community finds worth while to participate in when there's not an emergency. So it might seem like a useless hobby when there's internet and no emergency, but that's just the training for them to have the needed skills in an emergency.
goodpoint 5y ago
No, you can buy a baofeng handheld for 20 euros.
- sparker72678 5y ago
  > with the exception of cheap VHF hand helds

sliken 5y ago

Dunno, depends on your interest. Sure you can pay $1000s on a nice rig, but you can also build a small radio that fits in a altoids tin for a few $10s. 40M CW radio (bare board): $12.69: https://www.amazon.com/Qianson-Shortwave-Transmitter-7-023-7-026MHz-Transceiver/dp/B01KA4KRKI https://www.amazon.com/Qianson-Shortwave-Transmitter-7-023-7... Here's a kit that does 80m, 60m, 40m, 30m, or 20m for $40: https://kc9on.com/product/foxx-3-cw-transceiver/ https://kc9on.com/product/foxx-3-cw-transceiver/ Here's an easy kit for $55 that can do 5W (quite capable for digital modes) for 80, 60, 40, 30, 20 or 17m bands. https://qrp-labs.com/qcxp.html https://qrp-labs.com/qcxp.html Or pay a bit more and get one that can run on 4 bands for $80 ($60 if you want to make your own case): https://qrp-labs.com/qdx.html https://qrp-labs.com/qdx.html Or if you want a 2M 50 watt FM radio, alinco has one for $170.00, designed to sit on a desk or mount in a car: https://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-008739 https://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-008739 The above are far from the cheapest, and smallest. There's quite a few solutions under $100 and smaller than a deck of cards, just depends on what you want. Personally I wouldn't consider any of those particular expensive, big, heavy, or bulky.

tcmart14 5y ago

Yes and no. But the broad implications are an issue. I've been a licensed ham for over a decade and dropping money on a nice HF radio and antenna is something I have not had the luxury of. Luckily now there are things like QrpLab kits and the Bitx, which do make it way more affordable, but they also require time, patience and willing to learn at least a little electronics. Which comes back around that for quiet a few people, cost is a barrier. I know plenty of people who would love to play with antennas, but have no interest in soldering components and they are not in a position to drop $700 bucks on a yeasu.

gorgoiler 5y ago

Amateur radio is a different beast. A full license permits 400 Watts! Not that you need it if you are building an Adafruit weather station for your garden. That is to say — and and I say this with the utmost respect to my fellow license holders — actually doing something useful with the spectrum. A lot of amateur radio culture is more about building your own equipment from scratch and then trying not to cook / kill yourself with it. It’s like an open access drag strip for home made muscle cars, as opposed to testing your hand built recumbent bike on the public streets.

sparker72678 5y ago
Totally agree! Which is why I have a hard time with the arguments about why amateur radio is so important/needed. We’ve reserved all this spectrum so that some people can exercise their muscle car hobby. Is that worth it? Maybe. But it’d be nice if the conversation was at least grounded in reality.
- sliken 5y ago
  Well the trick is, amateur radio is hard. If you want a community to help when there's a storm, earthquake, hurricane, power grid failure, large fire, etc you need them to practice regularly. Ideally with no external funding. Hams are often civic minded, so they will help out in bike races, horse races, and similar events ... especially if they are out of reach of cell towers, which is quite common even in central california. So if you want something to fall back on when the local cell tower and internet provider is down, you need to have something the community finds worth while to participate in when there's not an emergency. So it might seem like a useless hobby when there's internet and no emergency, but that's just the training for them to have the needed skills in an emergency.

goodpoint 5y ago

No, you can buy a baofeng handheld for 20 euros.

sparker72678 5y ago
> with the exception of cheap VHF hand helds