As a rule of thumb, everything Japanese is expensive but rock-solid. Chinese stuff is hit or miss, don’t buy if you are not willing to put in some research. So, great beginner radio.

Of course it does(*).

(*): assuming you mean “works” in the sense of “turns on, lets me use it just fine, does everything that does not require an active cell connection”

My phone does that just fine. It’s a Samsung limitation. All it does is create an access point and forward traffic via its default route.

Sorry, I don’t talk to liars.

Ah sorry. I thought you were here on lemmy for an open discussion and polite, good-faith arguments, not just trolling and name-calling. My bad.

You lie, and say that there’s no end-to-end encryption when there is

That is not what I said. Please take a deep breath, maybe go outside for a minute, and read my reply again.

1. No end-to-end encryption by default, you have to explicitly start a secret chat. That means that instead of it all being encrypted noise, secret chats stand out.
2. Servers are not open source (last time I checked). Why not? Seriously, why not?
3. Admittedly, not much of an issue any more, but in the beginning they had horrible security (so did WhatsApp until Facebook threw some competent engineers at the problem)

No, but I’m curious on how it works. Keep writing your findings :)

I don’t see the frequencies going away internationally, and so much equipment is already out. Plus, antagonizing a bunch of creative engineers who take their hobby way too serious is a great idea for all kinds of mischief to happen.

I had some luck with a 1/4 - 3/4 coax line balun on UHF, but it was (obviously) very narrowband. I was scared to do a toroid on 70cm because the internet said it would be bad, maybe I should try again

Not too many, with today’s stupid websites. Plus a bunch of large tools, IDEs, Ghidra, a few containers… it adds up :(

Good for you, I have 32g and if I do too many things at once, the oom killer will stalk my tabs

Ufl sucks. No mechanical lock.

If you are on a budget (which I guess you are): Get a cheap NanoVNA or similar device. <50€ straight from China. Or get a used SWR meter / antenna analyzer from the usual places (fellow hams, internet, flea markets). It will save you so much trouble, and it is really handy to have one. If you don’t, you can still do it the old-school way of receiving a known signal and simply looking at the outcome. But for that you need a known signal (or generate one). A friend with a radio, for example. Or a broadcast station. Or some local activity.

I built a mag-loop out of tinfoil and duct tape to try out an idea once, because that was faster than getting CST Studio to accept it. It works, because of course it does, but be warned that contact resistances are a bitch.

You do realize that this hobby consists of nerds and pensioners, who sometimes spend thousands on being able to talk to other nerds?

If anything, you might need to politely stop people from over-sharing all the cool stuff they made… :D

As always, the answer is “it depends” :D

Feel free to PM me or ask in a new post

10W at 2m, 70cm and 10m. Except for the 10m, which I have never heard anyone use (*), that fits pretty well with the idea of giving high school kids an aliexpress handheld to get them into STEM.

The ugly part is, you need to do the same regulatory and legal questionnaire that you need to do for the larger licenses.

“N Lizenz” in Germany, for reference

(*) I just remembered that 10m is basically CB, but Ham. So if you find/inherit an old CB radio and want to experiment, it might be a really cheap way into the hobby.

My country just introduced a super-beginners license that can be done with basic high school physics. Of course, severe limitations, basically, a “Baofeng license”. Still great idea.

The fuck? It seems I have been lucky. Most people here follow the “don’t argue politics” advice.

Check out a local club. Literally, check it out. If it is full of arrogant assholes twice your age, leave. If they are cool but you don’t fit in, ask them for advice. There are so many retired radio operators who are doing it to stay “in it”, or retired engineers who finally have time and so on. Most of them are very happy to info-dump about their hobby.