I have a new radio in my collection. It is a Baofeng K61. The Chinese manufacturer really put a lot of effort into this radio and created a nice radio for really cheap money.
The radio is made of durable plastic and the front frame protecting the display is made of metal. It looks really good. On the top of the radio is a large rotary potentiometer that turns the radio on and adjusts the volume. Right next to it is a diode that serves as a portable light source. The antenna connector is a classic Baofeng SMA. There are three buttons on the side, the main button is PTT and right below it are two programmable buttons.
The display is very nice and readable and offers the display of two frequencies at once. The radio is built on a Beken chip. The receiver is not a classic superheterodyne, but built on the SDR principle. The Chinese manufacturer will definitely compete with these radios with branded radios that cost tens of euros more.
The radio menu seems very chaotic to me, but you can live with it. If you learn the numeric presets, you can get to where you need to very quickly through the menu. You will also find several interesting functions in it, such as locking the broadcast or encoding the entire radio.
The keyboard works very well, the buttons are rubber and press very well. The overall design of the radio is robust and holds well in the hand.
When the radio is turned on, it is a little worse, if you connect a gain antenna you will find that the radio suddenly becomes deaf. It is absolutely not resistant to strong signals. But what do we want for the money. There are no filters at the receiver input, so if you move around the hills where there are strong signals, you will not be able to transmit very much.
One thing really bothers me about the radio, and that is the signal strength meter. It’s just a kind of signal bar, it’s not at all the S meter we’re used to with branded radios.
I didn’t try to program the radio via computer like the previous Chinese radios that are programmed via Chirp. I programmed it manually and it didn’t take me long at all.
I use the radio with a shortened antenna. It’s because of the length of the original antenna that doesn’t suit me, with a small antenna the radio is more compact and easier to handle.
Despite that, I really liked this radio, the modulation is pretty clean, the radio has a natural sound. For the money, it’s really worth it.
