Tag Archives: Icom IC-705

Radio Waves: Dave Moves, IC-705 delay, High Speed Telegraphy Meet, and WWI Biplane Wireless

Radio Waves: Stories Making Waves in the World of Radio

Because I keep my ear to the waves, as well as receive many tips from others who do the same, I find myself privy to radio-related stories that might interest SWLing Post readers. To that end: Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributors Dave Zantow (N9EWO), Paul Evans (W4/VP9KF), and Mike Hangen (K8RAT) for the following tips:

Dave’s Radio Receiver Page Moves Again (N9EWO)

With all of the strange happenings and excessive “Pop-Up” issues on Angelfire (even more so of late), we have finally decided to move off of that web host and made the move to QSL.NET.

So “Dave’s Radio Receiver Page” new URL is :

https://www.qsl.net/n9ewo/

Please, for anyone who have web pages that have my web page linked (with the now old URL), I would appreciate the correction. Hopefully this will be the last time I will need to move the page.[…]

Please Note : Are still a few pages that still need to be transferred, but I expect to have that completed over the weekend. This has been quite a bit of work recoding all (again).

Icom IC-705 availability delayed due to Coronavirus

Paul Evans notes that Martin Lynch and Sons (ML&S) has just updated the product page for the IC-705 with the following note: “RRP £1199.95 incl 20% VAT. Estimated delivery now July 2020 due to major component shortage.”

Icom America retailers (Universal Radio, Ham Radio Outlet, Gigaparts, etc.) have not published an estimate for availability.

QRQPoint – The meeting place for high speed telegraphy enthusiasts in Europe (Southgate ARC)

Dear OM and all CW lovers,
I will you proudly inform, that our website http://www.qrqpoint.com is now online.

The idea of this meeting place for CW enthusiasts was born by me and the webmaster, Fabian, DJ1YFK, brought it very nice to the web. Thank you Fabian!

Everybody is very kindly invited to be there QRV.

The frequency is 3567 khz. To make a sked or just to say Hello we have a little Shoutbox on the site.

I hope to see you there!

Kindest regards,

Olaf, DL1OP

In World War I, British Biplanes Had Wireless Phones in the Cockpit (IEEE Spectrum)

Pilots on reconnaissance missions could immediately call in their findings

As soon as the first humans went up in hot air balloons in the late 1700s, military strategists saw the tantalizing possibilities of aerial reconnaissance. Imagine being able to spot enemy movements and artillery from on high—even better if you could instantly communicate those findings to colleagues on the ground. But the technology of the day didn’t offer an elegant way to do that.

By the early 20th century, all of the necessary elements were in place to finally make aerial reconnaissance a reality: the telegraph, the telephone, and the airplane. The challenge was bringing them together. Wireless enthusiasts faced reluctant government bureaucrats, who were parsimonious in funding an unproven technology.

[…]One early attempt involved wireless telegraphy—sending telegraph signals by radio. Its main drawback was size. The battery pack and transmitter weighed up to 45 kilograms and took up an entire seat on a plane, sometimes overflowing into the pilot’s area. The wire antenna trailed behind the plane and had to be reeled in before landing. There was no room for a dedicated radio operator, and so the pilot would have to do everything: observe the enemy, consult the map, and tap out coordinates in Morse code, all while flying the plane under enemy fire.

Despite the complicated setup, some pioneers managed to make it work.[…]

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Icom IC-705 delivery has been delayed

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Paul Evans, who writes:

As you’d expect, Icom has formally delayed the delivery schedule of the IC-705.

Here’s the announcement from Icom Japan: https://www.icom.co.jp/news/4720/

The following is a machine translation of the announcement:

“Thank you very much for your patronage of ICOM products.

We have received reservations from a large number of customers about the IC-705, a 10W walkie-talkie with HF~430MHz all-mode, which was scheduled to be released in late March 2020. Some of the parts involved in the production of the product are delayed due to the new coronavirus issue, and production has been delayed due to this.

We apologize for any inconvenience caused to all of you who are looking forward to our products.

As for the delivery of the product, because it is a situation in which the arrival schedule of the part does not stand now, I will guide it separately as soon as it turns out.

We will take a while to deliver it, but we will do our best to deliver it as soon as possible, so please understand us.”

Thanks for sharing this, Paul. No doubt, delays are due to the affects of Covid-19 on both manufacturing in Japan and throughout the IC-705 supply chain.

For updates, bookmark the tag IC-705.

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Icom IC-705 price and availability

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Note: We will update this post as pricing information is confirmed by retailers.

Many thanks to several SWLing Post readers who have been carefully tracking the price of the Icom IC-705 transceiver which is expected to start shipping around the second quarter of 2020.

Pricing in Japan: 124,800 yen

Paul Evans notes that the price in Japan, according to this Icom Japan press release [PDF], is 124,800 yen + tax. That’s roughly $1150-1200 USD.

Pricing in UK: £1200.

In addition, ML&S have recently posted updated details from Icom UK and have noted that they “anticipate a price of around £1200 (£1000.00 excluding VAT).” To put that in perspective, the IC-7300 is currently being offered for the same price and it’s been on the market a while now.

This could mean that after the IC-705 has been on the market for a while, discounts could place it well below that of the IC-7300. Of course, if history is an indicator, early adopters will likely pay the top price.

Pricing in US: [TBD]

No confirmation yet from US retailers, but at this point, I would bet we could see pricing around $999 USD. That would be a competitive starting point. Of course, once we have confirmation from retailers we’ll update this with actual figures.

Other regional pricing

We will update this post with pricing and availability once we confirm details. Please comment with any tips!

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Could the Icom IC-705 be a shortwave listener’s Holy Grail receiver?

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I just published an announcement about the new Icom IC-705 portable transceiver, but omitted an important question for SWLing Post readers:

How well could the IC-705 serve shortwave listeners and DXers?

Keeping in mind that the IC-705 is not yet in production, we can only go by the features and few specifications Icom has revealed so far.

Since the IC-705 is a general coverage receiver with a frequency range from 0.5 to 148 MHz, it covers all of the shortwave bands and more.

We also know the IC-705 is based on the same direct-sampling architecture as the excellent IC-7300 (click here for our review), thus I expect the IC-705 will sport a capable receiver.

Icom’s other direct-sampling radios have excellent sensitivity and selectivity, so I assume the IC-705 could as well. I would also hope that, like the IC-7300, the AM bandwidth could be widened for full-fidelity AM audio–this has been one of the few criticisms I’ve had using the Elecraft KX3 and KX2 for shortwave listening.

The IC-705 sports other features that could make it an outstanding package for for DXers:

It has built-in audio recording to a MicroSD card. (Woo hoo!)
It has a useful, full-color, configurable spectrum and waterfall display
It uses the same BP-272 Li-ion Battery pack as the ID-51 and ID-31 series handy talkies. In receive-only, I would expect long battery-powered listening sessions. Of course, you can also plug in an external 13.8 V battery to increase off-grid listening time.
It’s incredibly portable and lightweight

In short, the IC-705 has all of the makings of a fully self-contained shortwave listening station–a grab-and-go DXpedition-grade rig. The IC-705 even has an (optional) custom Icom backpack!

The Icom LC-192 backpack (Source: Universal Radio)

Let’s just hope the IC-705 performs as well as its larger siblings and that its price is competitive.

Again, I plan to review the IC-705 once it’s released and in production. Both pricing and shipping are yet to be announced. Follow the tag IC-705 for updates.

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The new Icom IC-705 QRP portable, backpackable transceiver

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This weekend at Tokyo’s Ham Fair 2019, Icom announced an innovative transceiver to their line-up: the Icom IC-705 QRP transceiver.

The IC-705 introduces several industry firsts for a backpack portable radio:

It uses the same BP-272 Li-ion Battery pack as the ID-51 and ID-31 series D-Star handy talkies. To my knowledge, this is the only HF transceiver that uses battery packs that can be swapped so easily in the field–like one would swap an HT battery pack
It has a general coverage receiver that spans a whopping 0.5 to 148 MHz
It sports a full color, touch screen with spectrum and waterfall displays
It includes the D-Star digital voice mode
A GPS receiver
Bluetooth connectivity
A MicroSD card slot for memory storage, screen captures and recordings

All of this appears to be included, not add-on options.

The only IC-705 omission, in my opinion, is an internal ATU (antenna tuner). Something I would have expected, but not a deal-breaker for those of us who could really benefit from the amount of features this radio offers.

Side and back panel view noting ports and connections.

There is no word yet on pricing or availability, but you can count on us to post these details once they’re available. If you would like to follow updates, bookmark the tag: IC-705

We will also review on the Icom IC-705 as soon as it’s available.

Video from Amateur Logic/Ham College

Ray Novak (N9JA) with Icom America did a live video interview with Amateur Logic/Ham College TV yesterday. The video includes a full announcement in English from the Icom Booth:

Click here to view on YouTube.

IC-705 Pre-Release brochure

Many thanks to Ray Novak for snapping a few photos of the pre-release brochure:

Update: click here to download the full IC-705 brochure. Hat tip to Dave Zantow!

A surprise from one of the “Big Three”

The “Big Three” transceiver manufactures–Icom, Yaesu and Kenwood–have not shown a lot of interest in backpackable QRP radios over the past two decades.

By “backpackable” I mean QRP transceivers specifically designed for portable use in the field–radios that typically have built-in battery options, internal ATUs, and designed to be lightweight shack-in-a-box units.

Yaesu introduced the FT-817 almost twenty years ago and it lives on today (with modest upgrades) as the FT-818. Kenwood has no portable/backpackable HF QRP radio at this point.

I bet the IC-705 is being introduced today because Icom sees a strong market among field-portable operators who enjoy travel and outdoor radio activities like SOTA (Summits On The Air) and POTA (Parks On The Air). In addition, many ham radio operators live in neighborhoods that are either plagued with radio interference (RFI) or don’t allow antennas to be installed outdoors. Portable radios liberate ham radio ops from their shacks and allow them to set up a station far away from noise or home owner’s associations.

Looking forward…

Again, I’ll be in touch with Icom about the IC-705 and will share updates here when they’re available. I’m looking forward to evaluation this rig when it hits the market!