<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"></head><body ><div>Re: Yaesu programming</div><div><br></div><div>My experience with the FT-897D is that the engineering is poor. I never used chirp with the rig. It would simply die after a few months, sent it to them to repair and it kept going dead a few months after each repair. I use it now for a book-end. The lesson I learned is to not purchase any Yaesu gear. The techs fix symptoms - not the cause</div><div><br></div><div>Chirp works well. The trick is getting a good cable and the correct drivers for the cable. The other point is to read the rig's memory to ascertain that everything shows signs of working properly before attempting to write to the rig.</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><div style="font-size:75%;color:#575757">Sent via the Samsung GALAXY S®4, an AT&T 4G LTE smartphone</div></div><br><br><br>-------- Original message --------<br>From: chirp_users-request@intrepid.danplanet.com <br>Date: 10/17/2013 6:25 PM (GMT-06:00) <br>To: chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com <br>Subject: chirp_users Digest, Vol 58, Issue 30 <br> <br><br>Send chirp_users mailing list submissions to<br> chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com<br><br>To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit<br> http://intrepid.danplanet.com/mailman/listinfo/chirp_users<br>or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to<br> chirp_users-request@intrepid.danplanet.com<br><br>You can reach the person managing the list at<br> chirp_users-owner@intrepid.danplanet.com<br><br>When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific<br>than "Re: Contents of chirp_users digest..."<br><br><br>Today's Topics:<br><br> 1. Re: Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends<br> RT Systems products (Charles Stillman)<br> 2. Re: Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends<br> RT Systems products (Charles Stillman)<br> 3. Re: Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends<br> RT Systems products (Allan R. Batteiger)<br> 4. Re: Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends<br> RT Systems products (Milton Hywatt)<br> 5. Re: Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends<br> RT Systems products (Dan Smith)<br> 6. Maxtrac, Radius, GM300 (Alex KG4TRV)<br> 7. Re: Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends<br> RT Systems products (Charles Stillman)<br><br><br>----------------------------------------------------------------------<br><br>Message: 1<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 15:18:30 -0700<br>From: Charles Stillman <datademon@aol.com><br>Subject: Re: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against<br> Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br>To: Discussion of CHIRP <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID: <9E61F840-C5A6-4A1B-84E8-C6739B1D3868@aol.com><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii<br><br>I figured it would be all over the web if there were serious problems. I have no reason to doubt Tim's sincerity. Perhaps, someone involved with development could approach him to get more information about the supposed problems. I know if I had a problem, I'd be on this forum in a heartbeat.<br><br>I'll be demoing Chirp at our next HAM meeting here in Seattle so need to do my due diligence about what I'm recommending!<br><br>Charlie Stillman<br>KC1S<br><br>------------------------------<br><br>Message: 2<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 15:23:33 -0700<br>From: Charles Stillman <datademon@aol.com><br>Subject: Re: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against<br> Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br>To: Discussion of CHIRP <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID: <A88043C6-29B1-4FB1-B499-923C2CEB17C3@aol.com><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii<br><br>I'm just speculating here as to what (if any) problems people might have reported to Yaesu. It certainly is possible to do damage with an inappropriate cable for example. Some people are quite willing to try the "blue smoke test" prior to reading the manual!<br><br>Charlie KC1S<br><br><br>On Oct 17, 2013, at 3:09 PM, Tom Hayward <esarfl@gmail.com> wrote:<br><br>> On Thu, Oct 17, 2013 at 3:05 PM, Tom Hayward <esarfl@gmail.com> wrote:<br>>> On Thu, Oct 17, 2013 at 3:02 PM, Charles Stillman <datademon@aol.com> wrote:<br>>>> Tim at Yaesu tech support says that Chirp "burns out" EEPROMS on Yaesu radios. He says that results in the radios locking up. It was not clear whether he was saying that the EEPROM was destroyed or just programmed into a state that the radio would no longer work. I'm guessing that this might have been a problem during Chirp development and is no longer the case. 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? Sorry if this has been discussed before.<br>>> <br>>> No radios have EVER been permanently damaged during Chirp development.<br>>> I bet he has absolutely zero evidence to support his claims.<br>> <br>> By the way, if you use a program like portmon to monitor the data<br>> Chirp sends to the radio, you'll find it sends exactly the same thing<br>> as RT Systems software or a clone from an identical model radio.<br>> <br>> Tom KD7LXL<br>> _______________________________________________<br>> chirp_users mailing list<br>> chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com<br>> http://intrepid.danplanet.com/mailman/listinfo/chirp_users<br><br><br><br>------------------------------<br><br>Message: 3<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 17:24:32 -0500<br>From: "Allan R. Batteiger" <arb@rtsi.com><br>Subject: Re: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against<br> Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br>To: Discussion of CHIRP <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID: <526063A0.5070609@rtsi.com><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"<br><br>This is news to me I have been programming Yaesu Radios for several <br>years using Chirp and never had a problem with any of the Radios. I <br>have programmed a number of different types of Yaesu, ICOM, Kenwood, etc <br>and the only time I have had a problem is if I did not read the radio first.<br><br>Allan R. Batteiger<br><br><br>On 10/17/2013 5:18 PM, Charles Stillman wrote:<br>> I figured it would be all over the web if there were serious problems. I have no reason to doubt Tim's sincerity. Perhaps, someone involved with development could approach him to get more information about the supposed problems. I know if I had a problem, I'd be on this forum in a heartbeat.<br>><br>> I'll be demoing Chirp at our next HAM meeting here in Seattle so need to do my due diligence about what I'm recommending!<br>><br>> Charlie Stillman<br>> KC1S<br>> _______________________________________________<br>> chirp_users mailing list<br>> chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com<br>> http://intrepid.danplanet.com/mailman/listinfo/chirp_users<br><br>-------------- next part --------------<br>A non-text attachment was scrubbed...<br>Name: arb.vcf<br>Type: text/x-vcard<br>Size: 257 bytes<br>Desc: not available<br>Url : http://intrepid.danplanet.com/pipermail/chirp_users/attachments/20131017/205da64c/attachment-0001.vcf <br><br>------------------------------<br><br>Message: 4<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 15:35:16 -0700 (PDT)<br>From: Milton Hywatt <mhywattt@yahoo.com><br>Subject: Re: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against<br> Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br>To: Discussion of CHIRP <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID:<br> <1382049316.15884.YahooMailNeo@web124506.mail.ne1.yahoo.com><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"<br><br>Kickbacks from RTS sales to Yaesu? I've programmed my VX5, FT60, and FT8900 plenty of times <br>with chirp, no problems. And like someone else suggested if there was a problem it will be all over<br>the internet. <br><br><br><br><br>________________________________<br> From: Charles Stillman <datademon@aol.com><br>To: chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com <br>Sent: Thursday, October 17, 2013 6:02 PM<br>Subject: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br> <br><br>Tim at Yaesu tech support says that Chirp "burns out" EEPROMS on Yaesu radios. He says that results in the radios locking up. It was not clear whether he was saying that the EEPROM was destroyed or just programmed into a state that the radio would no longer work. I'm guessing that this might have been a problem during Chirp development and is no longer the case. 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? Sorry if this has been discussed before.<br><br>Tim assures me that he makes no money by recommending RT Systems stuff.<br><br>I sure appreciate the universality of Chirp.... support of multiple computing platforms (Mac in particular!), multiple radios! The value is huge since what holds back many beginners is the difficulty of programming in the channels!<br>_______________________________________________<br>chirp_users mailing list<br>chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com<br>http://intrepid.danplanet.com/mailman/listinfo/chirp_users<br>-------------- next part --------------<br>An HTML attachment was scrubbed...<br>URL: http://intrepid.danplanet.com/pipermail/chirp_users/attachments/20131017/628a75f6/attachment-0001.html <br><br>------------------------------<br><br>Message: 5<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 15:42:22 -0700<br>From: Dan Smith <dsmith@danplanet.com><br>Subject: Re: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against<br> Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br>To: Discussion of CHIRP <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID: <526067CE.5080507@danplanet.com><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"<br><br>> Tim at Yaesu tech support says that Chirp "burns out" EEPROMS on <br>> Yaesu radios.<br><br>Heh, interesting. As Tom says, CHIRP sends exactly the same content to<br>the radio as does a clone or programing operation from RTSystems. The<br>way almost all Yaesu radios are designed, you write the whole image<br>every time (can't get away with doing anything less, actually). So, the<br>exact same number of bytes are written to the radio, in the same order,<br>as using either other tool.<br><br>The radios themselves write to the eeprom every single time you turn the<br>VFO knob a single click in either direction. Think about how many writes<br>that turns into for a trip up and down the band looking for a contact.<br><br>IMHO, before CHIRP, keeping all my radios up to date was a lot harder<br>and a lot less fun. I definitely program my radios more now, but I'm<br>still a few orders of magnitude away from doing it often enough to be<br>wearing out the eeprom doing it :)<br><br>> I see that there are several steps involved in programming the Yaesu<br>> radios with Chirp. Does failure to follow the steps precisely create<br>> a risk to the usability of the radio?<br><br>No. If the radio was at risk for permanent failure due to a failure to<br>follow the instructions for programming that would be -- a pretty sorry<br>design for a radio :)<br><br>> Tim assures me that he makes no money by recommending RT Systems <br>> stuff.<br><br>That seems kinda silly. Unlike the other manufacturers that actually<br>provide software for their radios, Yaesu relies on RTSystems to provide<br>a product that lets people program their radios. If RTSystems went out<br>of business tomorrow, Yaesu owners would have no commercial way to<br>program their radio(s) from their computer. So, call me crazy, but<br>there's definitely a dependent relationship there :)<br><br>> I sure appreciate the universality of Chirp....<br><br>Be sure to tell them! If Yaesu wanted to engage and tell me how sending<br>the same data over the same cable to the radio is "burning out eeproms"<br>I'd be happy to address it. Further, if users all let know Yaesu that<br>they would buy more radios if Yaesu would contribute hardware for<br>development work, we could certainly improve the level of support we<br>have for those radios.<br><br>Vote with your wallet! :)<br><br>-- <br>Dan Smith<br>www.danplanet.com<br>KK7DS<br><br>-------------- next part --------------<br>A non-text attachment was scrubbed...<br>Name: signature.asc<br>Type: application/pgp-signature<br>Size: 490 bytes<br>Desc: OpenPGP digital signature<br>Url : http://intrepid.danplanet.com/pipermail/chirp_users/attachments/20131017/a249c8ec/attachment-0001.bin <br><br>------------------------------<br><br>Message: 6<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 18:49:28 -0400<br>From: Alex KG4TRV <kg4trv@hotmail.com><br>Subject: [chirp_users] Maxtrac, Radius, GM300<br>To: "chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com"<br> <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID: <COL125-W15A0AD51B9E485386ABB9B87050@phx.gbl><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"<br><br>There is one thing to get this motorolas to work properly has a repeater: reduce the power to 1/4 of a watt up to 5 watts and use it to drive an amplifier. then you have a 100% duty repeater. I can offer a loaner and something else.<br> <br>Alex/KG4TRV<br> <br>-------------- next part --------------<br>An HTML attachment was scrubbed...<br>URL: http://intrepid.danplanet.com/pipermail/chirp_users/attachments/20131017/32cb1361/attachment-0001.html <br><br>------------------------------<br><br>Message: 7<br>Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 16:25:34 -0700<br>From: Charles Stillman <datademon@aol.com><br>Subject: Re: [chirp_users] Tim at Yaesu Tech Support warns against<br> Chirp, recommends RT Systems products<br>To: Discussion of CHIRP <chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com><br>Message-ID: <D53BCFF2-86AE-4C84-97A8-8DE25C27C686@aol.com><br>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1<br><br>Thanks for the reassurances!<br><br>And I did vote twice with my wallet {grin}. I not only bought 2 Icom handhelds a few years back, but I also sent a contribution to Chirp earlier today! Thanks for making our radio lives better!!<br><br>Charlie Stillman<br>KC1S<br><br><br>On Oct 17, 2013, at 3:42 PM, Dan Smith <dsmith@danplanet.com> wrote:<br><br>>> Tim at Yaesu tech support says that Chirp "burns out" EEPROMS on <br>>> Yaesu radios.<br>> <br>> Heh, interesting. As Tom says, CHIRP sends exactly the same content to<br>> the radio as does a clone or programing operation from RTSystems. The<br>> way almost all Yaesu radios are designed, you write the whole image<br>> every time (can't get away with doing anything less, actually). So, the<br>> exact same number of bytes are written to the radio, in the same order,<br>> as using either other tool.<br>> <br>> The radios themselves write to the eeprom every single time you turn the<br>> VFO knob a single click in either direction. Think about how many writes<br>> that turns into for a trip up and down the band looking for a contact.<br>> <br>> IMHO, before CHIRP, keeping all my radios up to date was a lot harder<br>> and a lot less fun. I definitely program my radios more now, but I'm<br>> still a few orders of magnitude away from doing it often enough to be<br>> wearing out the eeprom doing it :)<br>> <br>>> I see that there are several steps involved in programming the Yaesu<br>>> radios with Chirp. Does failure to follow the steps precisely create<br>>> a risk to the usability of the radio?<br>> <br>> No. If the radio was at risk for permanent failure due to a failure to<br>> follow the instructions for programming that would be -- a pretty sorry<br>> design for a radio :)<br>> <br>>> Tim assures me that he makes no money by recommending RT Systems <br>>> stuff.<br>> <br>> That seems kinda silly. Unlike the other manufacturers that actually<br>> provide software for their radios, Yaesu relies on RTSystems to provide<br>> a product that lets people program their radios. If RTSystems went out<br>> of business tomorrow, Yaesu owners would have no commercial way to<br>> program their radio(s) from their computer. So, call me crazy, but<br>> there's definitely a dependent relationship there :)<br>> <br>>> I sure appreciate the universality of Chirp....<br>> <br>> Be sure to tell them! If Yaesu wanted to engage and tell me how sending<br>> the same data over the same cable to the radio is "burning out eeproms"<br>> I'd be happy to address it. Further, if users all let know Yaesu that<br>> they would buy more radios if Yaesu would contribute hardware for<br>> development work, we could certainly improve the level of support we<br>> have for those radios.<br>> <br>> Vote with your wallet! :)<br>> <br>> -- <br>> Dan Smith<br>> www.danplanet.com<br>> KK7DS<br>> <br>> _______________________________________________<br>> chirp_users mailing list<br>> chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com<br>> http://intrepid.danplanet.com/mailman/listinfo/chirp_users<br><br><br><br>------------------------------<br><br>_______________________________________________<br>chirp_users mailing list<br>chirp_users@intrepid.danplanet.com<br>http://intrepid.danplanet.com/mailman/listinfo/chirp_users<br><br><br>End of chirp_users Digest, Vol 58, Issue 30<br>*******************************************<br></body>