zero_'s Full Review: Cobra Electronics microTALK LI5600-2dx (14 Channel...
FRS radios. Walkie-talkies with multiple channels, longer ranges, and better sound. What's not to like? Price. What are you going to do about it?
Try these on for size.
I've done the FRS radio spiel before. FRS's work like the toy walkie-talkies of old, but they commonly have effective ranges up to a mile and a half. They've got multiple channels to talk on, akin to CB radios, so you can have at least a small degree of privacy if other people are yakking it up in the immediate area.
The Cobra Microtalk1's are, despite their silly name, not too shabby. They're budget FRS radios, meaning in this case that they don't support the full range of FRS channels and don't do any fancypants digital subchannel encoding. The Microtalks only support two channels, intuitively labeled "A" and "B". The A channel is FRS channel 8, for those of us with additional radios, but channel B must be between bands. I can't get my Motorolas or other Cobras to hear that channel.
In either event, the Microtalks obviously are made for light-duty work. For what you pay, though, what do you expect? They blow the usual kiddie walkie-talkies out of the water in terms of range and quality, but I've found that they aren't quite up to snuff compared with the high dollar FRS big boys.
Just about every FRS radio comes with the claim "up to two mile range" stamped somewhere on the box in big fat letters. Notice the use of "up to" in that claim. While FRS radios certainly can get two mile transmit ranges, they can generally only do it when both the sending and receiving radios are within line-of-sight and there are no radio wave sapping materials in between here and there (buildings, metalwork, and so on). In more common talking environments (buildings, woods, foxholes, and bunkers) your range will be hampered somewhat.
The Microtalks don't seem to have the sheer power of more expensive radios. I can get mine to talk about one mile, but I've never gotten to two miles. One and a half is certainly doable, but you need the previously mentioned perfect conditions for it to happen. The Microtalks can certainly hear radios outside their range, though, so if you've got other people in your posse with more powerful radios you'll be able to listen from the limits of their two mile range.
On the physical design level I quite like the Microtalks. They're compact, for starters, and the rubberized antenna folds up behind the radio. If you discount the fact that they're purple, they're not too shabby. The controls are simple enough: One knob for power and volume, one button to press while you talk, and one button to send an annoying ringtone to other people on the channel. There's a squelch-kill button that lets the pure and unfiltered rays shine in as long as you hold it if the auto-squelch is having trouble picking up someone's weak signal. There's a little switch on the side the changes channels, and that's about it.
Lucky for you, the Microtalks have headphone and mike jacks on the top under a protective rubber flap. Also lucky for you, the jacks are standard and you don't need to buy a special headset. Any standard 1/8" jack pair of headphones will handle the output, and any standard micro jack microphone will handle the input.
The only things I don't like about the Microtalks are twofold: One, there is a very bright and annoying color changing LED that indicates the radio's power and transmit status. This is well and good, but as I said it's very bright and distracting in the dark. The second is the annoying triad of notes the radio plays as maximum volume whenever you release the press-to-talk button. It gets old quick.
There are more powerful radios out there, but for casual use and for playing around with, the Microtalks' price really can't be beat. If all you need in your radio is moderate range and two channels in a compact form, then go nuts.
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