Even though the radio was announced just a few days ago the buzz and spin on the internet is at hurricane levels. The responses are either that Icom knocked it out of the park with this radio, or that Icom blew a golden opportunity because of some missing feature(s) or design elements.
This is all based just on speculation and the little information that was released at the Tokyo Hamfest, but we can do some informed speculation based on what we already know, and we can do that because Icom has wisely based this new radio on the proven SDR technology in the hugely popular IC-7300 (which I own and use almost daily).
If we simply take in the known features we get a sense of where this radio is heading:
- HF, 6 meters, 2 meter & 70 cm
- Proven SDR technology
- D-STAR
- Large touchscreen user interface
- Max 10 watts output w/ external battery
- Wideband receive from 1 mhz all the way up to 148 mhz
- Built in GPS and Bluetooth
There are a few things we have to infer given Icom's recent past history with HF radios:
- Sound card interface (every Icom HF rig introduced since the venerable IC-7200 has had a built-in sound card interface so we have to assume this one will, too). If Icom has included a sound card for digial modes that makes this radio a sure winner
- This radio will not enjoy any industry standard protective rating - it's not ruggedized or water resistant. OK, maybe a basic IPX5 rating, which means you can sneeze on it lightly and it'll keep working, but anything heavier... nope
What we do know for sure is that this radio will not have a built-in tuner. While I'm OK with that, I do think it's a serious hiccup on Icom's part. C'mon Icom, if CommRadio can shoehorn a very capable internal tuner into their smaller and lighter CTX-10 then you can do it with this radio. Yes, of course LDG will be right along with a battery powered IC-705 specific tuner, but an internal one is still something very desirable in a portable rig. And spare me the "just use a resonant antenna" crap. This is the real world, and the real world is full of non-resonant or 'almost-but-not-quite-resonant' antennas, and a tuner provides frequency agility and can make portable operation so much more enjoyable.
A few things I saw in the Icom product brochure that caught my eye include:
- The UHF/VHF antenna looks like it has a 6 meter coil. This radio could re-invigorate the concept of 6 meter manpack portable operations. If the antenna is not 6 meter capable I anticipate a lot of folks buying the excellent Yaesu 6 meter antenna that comes with the FT-818
- The use of pre-existing lithium-ion battery packs designed for use with the Icom ID-51 handheld. While I don't think the standard battery pack is any great shakes when it comes to capacity, what it does mean is that it'll be easy for third party manufacturers to design larger capacity snap-in battery packs
- The included microphone is not just a mic, but a speaker mic. Hooray! This is critical for portable mobile operations. The HFPack guys must be in a tizzy over this, because they have to Rube Goldberg an RX audio setup for their commercial radios to work in their manpack setups. I wonder how long it will take for someone to develop an interface cable for the standard US military H-250 handset? I'm guessing about a week
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| Imagine a MILSPEC H-206 handset (seen here connected to a pair of PRC-77 radios) hooked up to the new IC-705 |
Who is this radio really aimed at? Well first, guys like me who love operating portable. To me hauling a radio to the woods is one of the more enjoyable pastimes in ham radio. And the term 'guys like me' also includes folks who like to do Parks On The Air (POTA), Summits On The Air (SOTA), Islands On The Air (IOTA), and folks who like to do manpack mobile HF (the aforementioned HFPack crowd). There's a huge ready made market for this radio, and if it's a success it'll just draw more operators to these activities.
But this radio is also Icom's shot across the bow of their competitors in this market space, particularly Elecraft, Yaesu and the rising tide of Chinese manufacturers who are coming on strong with offerings like the Xiegu X5105 and the G90. Elecraft and Yaesu in particular have to be sitting up and taking notice. This radio is aimed squarely at the Elecraft KX3, and the IC-705 will certainly give that radio a run for the money, particularly if Icom can bring it in at a low enough cost (below $1,000 street price).
Yaesu has been resting on its laurels in the portable radio world for decades. Its FT-818 and FT-857 designs are ancient by comparison, and Yaesu muffed the design of the FT-891 so badly (discussed in an earlier blog post) that it had to slash the street pricing drastically to get over the bad press. The FT-891 doesn't reflect just a bad design, but also a missed opportunity. The FT-891 was designed specifically to NOT impact sales of the older FT-857 or the new FT-991. As a result Yaesu ended up with a radio full of compromises, not innovative features. Here's hoping the Icom IC-705 forces Yaesu off of their rear ends so that next year at the Tokyo Hamfest we'll be talking about Yaesu's new innovative HF/50/2 meter/70 cm offering.
Regardless, it looks like Icom is about to hit it out of the ballpark with the IC-705. Let the drooling begin.
W8BYH out
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