I'd strongly suggest spending the extra money up front and getting the 880. In your area near San Jose, there are several D-STAR systems listed in the Dstarusers.org repeater directory, most of which have a 70cm repeater in addition to 2m and 23cm, and some that are solely 70cm in California. Some systems may opt to leave the 70cm side connected to a chat reflector, and leave 2m available for local chat, or vice versa. The 880 is a much more current design and more "D-STAR user friendly" than the 2200 in terms of front panel controls and programming.
If you lived in an area with a 2m only system and it was the only one around, then I'd say, "Sure, get the 2200." Here in the Kansas City area, both systems' 70cm repeater is active used 99% of the time; one system downtown has 23cm, but it is seldom used and the other system has 2m capability, but the 2m repeater is not on the air yet. I understand trying to save on cost if it's not necessary, but I think you would be missing out by going with the 2200. 73, Tom, NM0N On Sat, Feb 13, 2010 at 9:23 AM, Don Bowen <don.bo...@earthlink.net> wrote: > > > I am trying to decide between the Icom 2200H or the Icom 880. The 2200 > is a single band and needs the digital board for D-Star. The 880 is a > dual band and comes D-Star ready. The 2200 goes for around $150 and the > digital board is about $200 for a total under $400 while the 880 goes > for around $500. > > My current thoughts are to get the 2200 now and the digital board later > when funds are available. > > Thoughts, comments? > > -- > Don Bowen KI6DIU > http://www.braingarage.com/Dons/Travels/journal/Journal.html > > >
