Hi David, As a perspective ham you should become familiar with the concept of an "Elmer." An "Elmer" is a mentor to help you learn about the hobby and to help you navigate through such things as finding your first radio, antenna, etc. A good place to find an "Elmer" is at a local amateur radio club.
Looking for radios as a new ham without the help of an "Elmer" is a minefield. As someone else mentioned this list is focused on "D-STAR" a digital form of communication for both voice and data. Most of us on this list would encourage you to buy a radio that can do "D-STAR" is upgradeable to "D-STAR" (it's cheaper, in the long run to buy the radio with the "D-STAR" capability already installed). Most of us believe Digital is the future, however, these radios also do traditional analog FM so you can bridge the old technology and the new. "D-STAR" radios are more expensive than traditional analog FM, so you need to look at your budget and what you want to do with amateur radio. If you have an idea of what you want to do and the budget you have to work with, I'm sure a local "Elmer" would be glad to help you pick out a radio, or you can let us know and perhaps we can send you the right direction. -- John D. Hays K7VE [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
