[chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends RT Systems products

[Dan Smith]

> Tim at Yaesu tech support says that Chirp "burns out" EEPROMS on 
> Yaesu radios.

Heh, interesting. As Tom says, CHIRP sends exactly the same content to
the radio as does a clone or programing operation from RTSystems. The
way almost all Yaesu radios are designed, you write the whole image
every time (can't get away with doing anything less, actually). So, the
exact same number of bytes are written to the radio, in the same order,
as using either other tool.

The radios themselves write to the eeprom every single time you turn the
VFO knob a single click in either direction. Think about how many writes
that turns into for a trip up and down the band looking for a contact.

IMHO, before CHIRP, keeping all my radios up to date was a lot harder
and a lot less fun. I definitely program my radios more now, but I'm
still a few orders of magnitude away from doing it often enough to be
wearing out the eeprom doing it :)

> I see that there are several steps involved in programming the Yaesu
> radios with Chirp. Does failure to follow the steps precisely create
> a risk to the usability of the radio?

No. If the radio was at risk for permanent failure due to a failure to
follow the instructions for programming that would be -- a pretty sorry
design for a radio :)

> Tim assures me that he makes no money by recommending RT Systems 
> stuff.

That seems kinda silly. Unlike the other manufacturers that actually
provide software for their radios, Yaesu relies on RTSystems to provide
a product that lets people program their radios. If RTSystems went out
of business tomorrow, Yaesu owners would have no commercial way to
program their radio(s) from their computer. So, call me crazy, but
there's definitely a dependent relationship there :)

> I sure appreciate the universality of Chirp....

Be sure to tell them! If Yaesu wanted to engage and tell me how sending
the same data over the same cable to the radio is "burning out eeproms"
I'd be happy to address it. Further, if users all let know Yaesu that
they would buy more radios if Yaesu would contribute hardware for
development work, we could certainly improve the level of support we
have for those radios.

Vote with your wallet! :)

-- 
Dan Smith
www.danplanet.com
KK7DS

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