I think sometimes the reason I use this Puxing hand held to cross band repeat is because many yeas ago I was using my fairly new Kenwood TM 721 mobile regularly to crossband repeat with a friend on simplex, and I guess I was just to lazy to sit in the radio room and rag chew for a long time, so I'd go out to the living room and sit back in my easy chair and chat away. Well, one day we were rag chewing, and our QSO suddenly just stopped, and I smelled something burning. I went to investigate, and found that my fairly new Kenwood TM 721 was smoking, it had overheated and shut down.
I took it to the local Amateur shop and the tech checked it out and called me up to come look at the inside of it once he had it on the bench. The man board had a hole in it the size of a half dollar, it had burnt it black and crisp like fried bacon. He shipped it back to Kenwood and they would not fix it, so when it came back this tech reparied it for me by hand, he hand soldered in the components that were burned and the radio worked good again, and I later sold it.
So I think thats one reason why I use this Puxing as a mini repeater to my local repeater, it works well, and gets me in the repeater good and solid, and I keep my transmissions short. I use one way cross banding, I transmit on the repeaters input and I listen on my Wouxun, or my Baofeng to the repeater output so it's easy on the transmitting radio, and when I identify my station it's legal as I'm only transmitting one way, that is into the repeater. So basically I guess I'm just getting a little lazier as I get older, and like to use my easy chair or sit outside in the summer and rag chew. But at the same time I have the peace of mind that I'm not going to smoke a new $400 mobile radio.
This Puxing is a nice little unit, I like it, and I like the features it has. All 5 of the Chinese hand held units I have work very well, they just vary a little in features, and so far from all the on air audio reports I have gotten the Puxing PX UV973 is the loudest of them all and thats without the speaker mic, if I use the speaker mic I got from the 409shop it's even louder which is good. My Baofeng UV 5R is the weakest one as far as transmit audio ,thats why I bought the speaker mic, it works well with the UV 5R Baofeng.
If you like to hear a voice when you use your hand held, then the Puxing is great for that also. It has a male voice that sounds really natural and it tells you exactly what function you have selected. The receive audio is amazing on this Puxing as well, it almost sounds like it has a little "reverb" to it, and has a nice punch sound to it as well, I really like the receive audio on it.
Another thing I enjoy is the 3 color display, you can pick from Orange, Blue, or Purple, like many other hand helds, but my Baofeng UV B5 has one color, it's dull gray and dim, and I really dont like it at all. Also if I need the light to see my display on the Puxing there are 2 tiny buttons on the side below the PTT key, and if you hit either of them the display lights up for about 8 seconds so I think thats nice too.
Each radio has it's own up's and down's and I think we all have our favorites, and I think for the most part these Chinese HT's have their place, they are inexpensive, if you're a new ham just getting started on a tight budget they are great to get you on the air, I wish they had these back in the mid 80's when I had to buy my $400 dual band hand held, I would have saved a lot of money. Also if you're a veteran ham like me, and you want something that gets you on the repeaters and you won't mind much if you drop or lose it or it gets stolen, thats another aspect of owning one.
I've been licensed since 1977, and have used a fair amount of both HF gear, and VHF/UHF gear and these new HT's have a lot of good to be said for them.
I almost forgot for those of you who like to have the 2.5 khz steps, the Puxing PX-UV973 software will program those, it has an option to use the 2.5 khz steps. I checked the box that says 2.5 steps on the software, and now whenever I turn the VFO on the radio the frequency moves by 2.5 khz steps, and thats well worth the price of this Puxing radio, none of the others I have will do it other than my Wouxun with came with 2.5 steps.
