AnyTone AT-D878UV Plus Handheld Radio DMR/Analog Dual Band with Bluetooth PTT

I used to use Motorola products professionally (CP200, HT750, etc) and they are absolutely bulletproof radios, so i have a little snobby chip on my shoulder because most other radios are not on the same level. I always have been biased that lots of Amateur radio equipment out there look more like toys and do not look/feel rugged. I have owned several Amateur HT's over the years (Kenwood TH-F6A, Yaesu FT-25), and the best analog HT i have ever owned is the Yaesu FT-25 but it is very basic, but easy to use. My TH-F6A had a teeny speaker that was tinny. The speaker mic that paired with it also looked like a toy.I was very choosey when going with my first DMR radio and I chose this. I wanted a solid performer that did not look like a toy. I do not like the other inexpensive made radios because documentation and quality seem to be an issue at times (plus they look awful). The thing that sold me on this radio is the support behind the product. Bridgecom videos and resources are well prepared and not full of spelling or grammatical errors. If I had the budget and the means to have a motorola DMR radio that I could easily program and modify, I would get that but they do not make it easy at all to own and maintain. This was about as a good of a substitute that I could find.Pro's:-solid build that is about 70% close to a Motorola level quality and feel.-Keypad and channel selector knob feel solid.-Stock antenna looks just like a Motorola whip and works well for a stock whip (but a little cheap feeling compared to a real Motorola whip).-Fantastic Support and documentation.-Very good speaker output- I was expecting tinny audio from the little holes but it exceeded my expectations in both analog and DMR mode.-Solid feeling battery and charger- Battery life - ~ 2 days standby happens on the regular (99%/1% duty cycle, i dont tx much)-Speaker mic port is a standard (non proprietary port). I wish there was a way to make the Motorola speaker mic work though (they are solid as a rock).So-so things:- belt clip is a little cheap feeling and something I will probably need to replace down the road.- Programming software and process in general is buggy (prepare to take hours to perfect your code plug and settings at minimum)- All speaker mic's provided by Anytone look like toys (look cheap) - A TYT speaker mic works for me just fine and looks much better.-Transmit power seems decent in DMR mode, i am not so impressed on Analog. I use the radio to monitor my local police channel (analog 450 Mhz), and also listen to DMR repeaters in town. The analog audio is about a 250ms delay in transmit and receive when i do a side by side with my FT-25. It is fine, I guess.- On screen menu is somewhat clunky and not very well laid out. It does have some weird grammar sometimes.Con's:-volume knob has about 10 volume levels and has a stair step effect that can be a little dramatic on the quiet end. I wish there was more of a linear volume level (15-20 steps or truly variable).-Analog audio clipping on receive for my local NOAA channels (DFW, TX). Every 10 seconds or so, it acts like the squelch activates for about a quarter second due to a low signal but even connected to a external antenna causes this. The audio seems to be overmodulating on the NOAA side and perhaps the receiver gets a little overwhelmed. I cant really explain this further but it is not an issue on my other HT's.- Microphone onboard seems a little weak in picking up audio, despite changing gain. I have to speak a little louder to get good audio in Analog and DMR mode (the word I am looking for is faint). The background noise filter of the microphone and radio is not as good as a Motorola.-APRS is a pain to configure (this is my first radio with APRS on board; i had a TM-D710A but it required an external GPS but that was not hard to set up compared to this radio).In conclusion, It is about 70% a Motorola build in quality and design and it's a solid radio with some minor flaws. I have owned this for 6 months now. I would not dream of returning it unless something major went wrong, but overall I have been very happy.KD5PHB

I purchased the D878UV as a gift to myself for passing my Technician license. I have a few years of experience with amateur radio, but only from the listening/learning side of things. Like many people, I originally started out with a UV-5R probably ~7 years ago now as a way to listen to what's going on in my area. Eventually I just kind of forgot about it all until this year when I came across a YT video on DMR and I was immediately interested. Within a couple of weeks I had my license and the AnyTone radio.First things first, DMR radios are not as "point-and-shoot" as your average analog rig. A lot of what you know about programming analog radios does not carry over into the DMR world. You don't just fire up CHIRP, punch in a frequency and PL tone and move on with your day. It would be helpful to research DMR as much as you can before attempting to start programming it. All in all, it took a solid Saturday afternoon of reading forums and watching videos before I felt that I had a solid grasp on how to make my own codeplug. By time evening rolled around, I was set up with all my local DMR repeaters and talkgroups in the area and was off to the races.The software/programming honestly is not complicated, it's just different. Some of the CPS is poorly documented. In one of Bridgecom's "university" videos the guy even says "we don't know what this does exactly." So, in other words, be prepared to tinker and do research on your own. I'm not going to dock a star here because at the price and the fact that it's a Chinese radio, I'm not expecting perfection. Regardless, there is nothing that is required to get up and running on DMR that *isn't* documented. Everything you absolutely need is all there.As for the radio itself, the construction is stellar for a Chinese rig and it feels substantially built. The knobs have nice detents and the screen is bright and easy to read. The radio is LOUD. Honestly in some cases too loud. You can adjust the volume scale in the CPS software, but that's an awkward way of doing it I think. Features like dual slot digital monitoring (promiscuous mode) are welcome additions and makes finding new contacts easy. People I've talked to say I sound clear and crisp. I can't speak to APRS as I don't use that feature, but Bluetooth works as expected. Battery life is excellent, and I have no problem using it with my Pi-Star hotspot.All in all, the D878UV is a solid amateur DMR radio with the features you'd want. Is a Motorola radio nicer? Yes, probably, but you'll be paying 3-4x as much and it won't have stuff you want that makes amateur operation easier (such as the aforementioned digital monitor). Plus, good luck with the programming software. At this price point, with the updated firmware and fixes, it's hard to find a lot of fault in this radio.73.

I have a couple of Baofengs and decided to upgrade. This thing is loaded with features like APRS, DMR, DPRS, GPS, Bluetooth. Pretty awesome little bundle and works great. Programming took a bit getting used to but best I can tell, it's more of a DMR thing than the Anytone.I found the "bridgecom university" useful for a couple of specific things. Frankly, it seemed like they could organize things a bit better like starting in the order of what you'd do with the radio first and getting progressively more advanced from there but some of the early videos are very specific and somewhat advanced. I found myself jumping over some of the early videos of very specific things to get to what I'd call more beginner items, then coming back later. Still, I look at the videos as more of a bonus and they defintely have some value & help you get going. I still have more videos to watch but got far enough through the series to have my radio programmed including GPS, APRS, and the like.Overall, very happy with the radio. I have a Pi Star to provide a gatway and this little radio works great on it. Very happy with the purchase.