Cheap Communications
Written: Dec 31 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Small, lightweight, weather radio channels built-in
Cons: Buttons are a pain to work with if wearing gloves, need manual to set features!
The Bottom Line: Simple FRS radio, includes a lot of features, can be hard to change settings. Used as a "set and forget" radio, it's perfect for most family applications.
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| caradoc's Full Review: Motorola Talkabout® T6220 (14 Channels) Two W... |
For a week every year, and a couple of weekends, I stick a radio on my belt and an earphone in my ear, and dress funny.
As a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism, I spend some time every year wearing medieval-style clothing. During those camping weekends, I teach classes in knife and axe throwing, fire with flint and steel, and I spend my nights on the watch, making sure that our camps remain safe from fires and people who shouldn't be there.
For several years, I've carried a Motorola Talkabout 250. It's a fairly old model by now (I've had mine for a little over four years) and doesn't have a lot of the features offered by the T6220.
When I started hunting for a new radio, I made a list of features that I wanted, and then started comparing that list to the available radios on the market.
1) Built-in NOAA Weather Radio.
The Motorola T6220 not only has the ability to listen to the NOAA weather stations, but will also pick up and listen to the broadcast "weather alert." This means that if a storm warning goes off while I'm listening to someone else, I'll hear it anyway. The weather stations come in nice and clear from all of the locations I've tried so far in Arizona.
2) A "scan" function.
When we go out to large SCA events, it's nice to know which channels will be available to use. The "scan" function on the older Talkabout 250 did not allow one to check for the presence of people using various CTCSS "squelch" or "privacy" codes. The T6220 will not only scan the channels, but will display which channel and CTCSS codes are in use as people broadcast on them. This will let you choose a relatively unused channel.
3) The ability to turn off those godawful "call tones" and "roger tones."
Very little annoys me as much as the FRS users with the damned beeping radios. They beep when they hit "call." They beep when they release the "talk" button. They beep when their batteries are low. JUST SAY NO TO THE BEEP!
4) An accessory jack that would let me use an earbud or a headset.
When we're out doing "historical" stuff, it's always been a pet peeve of mine that some people leave the radio out and visible, and use the "open speaker" that lets everyone within fifteen feet know that they're using a radio. With a headset, it hides those "modernities" that we're supposedly trying to get away from.
5) A "lock" feature to keep the settings from changing.
It's always nice to be able to set the radio up and hand it to someone who then cannot accidentally change the settings without really working at it. The T6220 can be easily locked to prevent accidental frequency changes, but this also locks the volume control, which can be a pain.
The drawback to the T6220 is that the buttons are fairly small, and are amazingly hard to work with while wearing gloves. Setting some of the features (like figuring out how to turn off the "call tones" and the "roger tones) requires a peek in the manual. Fortunately, once those features are "set," the radio will "remember" them even through a quick battery change.
One nice thing about the buttons being hard to press is that it's nearly impossible to "accidentally" press the "call tone" button, so you won't be flooding your friends with obnoxious beeping noises all the time.
The belt clip is pretty useless, but the lanyard hole is far better than previous versions of the Talkabouts. I hang the radio on a piece of shoestring under my shirt, and it's invisible but ready to work.
The backlighting for the radio display is red. This is nice, since I'm usually up on the night watch - red doesn't affect night vision as much as other colors (like green, to which the eye is most sensitive).
Three AA alkaline batteries will work for about two days with light usage - about an hour or so of talk time daily, and about 15 minutes of NOAA monitoring, with the radio left on 24 hours a day.
Overall, I've been very pleased with the T6220. It's small enough to hide, yet has all of the features I was looking for.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
caradoc
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 - Top 500 |
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Member: John Groseclose
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Reviews written: 182
Trusted by: 133 members
About Me:
System admin, technology addict, knife thrower, and dog "caregiver."
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