XIEGU X6100 - SDR portable HF transceiver (review)

[Applause] hello my dear friends this is paul oscar mike zero echo tango and welcome to my new video about a completely new sdr transceiver i am a big fan of the zygo x5105 and you have seen many my videos with this transceiver often when i'm portable or i'm trying a new antennas and it's a great transceiver i can say it's the one of the best receiver in the market in in this in this class when we are talking about the qrp portable transceivers this transceiver is a standalone transceiver it has all the features inside or internal so you don't need any cables wires accessories around this transceiver so uh i i'm talking about the main features like an internal battery internal automatic tuner it has a internal microphone internal ptt button and large display and the other features like noise reduction and so on all these things are inside this box so therefore i was so happy when the zygo company announced arrival of the new model of these ultra portable transceivers it's the saigou x 6100 and in this video i would like to show you how the x6100 actually works how it looks like and of course i would like to compare the both radios how they looks differences and the new features what these sdr technology uh includes in this new 6 100 so let's get started and we'll see [Music] okay so the new zygo x6100 comes with this beautiful black box and here on the side we can find the main features of this radio and here we can see the display four inch display quad-core cpu inside this radio noise reduction feature swr scanner or the some say swr analyzer but actually it is not an analyzer uh voice recorder and the voice call is also included in this radio we can see the spectrum scope also auto charging system and it has a slot for an external micro sd card in here we can see kind of connections of this uh transceiver we have here the y5 and bluetooth but in my version inside this radio it is not included yet but i believe that in the next firmware updates it will be included also the bluetooth or wi-fi connection we can see that this radio includes the usb type c connections which is great feature because we don't need any special extra data cable and this usbc cable is included here in the box so let me open the box and let's see what is inside what is a very good thing that the zygo started with the printed manuals this manual is uh completely written in english and it's actually the version number one so of course with the new firmware upcomings this manual will be old and i will need to look for the new one so it's nicely written also many pictures you can see here and on the on the page number 33 you can find the information about the radio you can see these parameters and specifications of this transceiver and also you can find here the packaging list to be sure that nothing is missing in your package okay here we can see the warranty card and the quality card here then we have an internal part of this box as you can see here we can notice this empty space i don't know for what purpose is this empty space it looks like for something so i asked to seller but he didn't know also for what purpose is this free space here okay here on the bottom you can see the transceiver itself it's covered in this foil protecting foil and here we can see this x 100 transceiver yeah it's looks really really amazing and it's smaller than the x5105 i will see i will show you it a little bit later okay and here on the side of the box you can see the cable for the hand mic also power cable also the same as the x5105 this is the type c a data cable for connection between the computer and transceiver and the hand mic body it's the pretty the same hand mic as the x5105 has all right and here in this small box is one interesting thing that this transceiver comes with the charger finally because the x5105 it doesn't have the charger this one has the charger but what is really interesting on this charger is that is a 5 volt charger as you can see here a 5 volt and 2 000 milliamp charger is included in the package i presume that this radio has some kind of booster inside circuitry because it charged with the 5 volts and usually charging systems or charging adapters comes with 12 volts or 13.8 so maybe some kind of booster inside i don't know yet all right that's all to get the boxes empty and now let's look closer on the radio itself all right so let's look closer to this uh zygo x6100 as you can see that is completely black body of this radio and is made of a metallic shield which is great and also good for cooling and you can see this structure i presume that is for a cooling of this radio it doesn't have any fun or something so just this kind of body cooling here okay and on the back side of this radio we have the legs this is really good feature and the same legs are used on the x-5105 just a slightly different in a design because this is machined inside to the body also it has a click and pretty the same here with the 6100 it has a click as you can see it is not machined into the body of the transceiver okay and the top side of this transceiver includes these buttons the heart buttons and here is the fast dialing or tuning dialing agc automatic gain control vfo a memory display the internal automatic tuner this is the attenuator and preamp a b vfo and here on this side we can see three separate mode buttons which is and the new on this transceiver because the x5105 includes just the one button here and we can select the bond just with this one button here we can see three buttons for ssb cw and am fm here behind we can see two uh bond buttons and this is the bond stack stack buttons the ptt button or push to talc and internal microphone here right next to the tuning knob so this is the function buttons and the purpose of these buttons depends on the menu selected in the firmware here on the left side we can see the general menu button applications the key button messaging or the voice message here we have the digital noise filter or something and digital filter this is a variable filter for receiving the knob is bigger than the x5105 you can see that this is flat much more flat than this one that means this uh x5105 is maybe a little bit better if you carry this transceiver inside some pocket this is a little bit wider because of this knob but also under the knob we can see here the foam protect this radio against the dust so i have just a slight feeling that this knob is touching the body of this transceiver but it is not true it is just due to this foam and i think that after some time it will be fine all right and the protection foil on the screen yeah this is this is my most favorite thing on the new transceiver to do something like that [Music] oh yeah this is satisfaction all right so here we can see a beautiful screen four inch screen here on the left side you can see the b and c connector the same as was used here on the 5105 the iq output dc power cord a power socket and on the right side you can see the host usbc and this connector is for connection with the computer this is the slot for the microsd card speakerphone keyboard and accessories connection and the mic and the warranty label is right here okay so let me turn on the transceiver so let's check firstly the zygo x5105 total weight is 908 grams and now the zygo x 6 100 845 grams so this radio is 50 grams lighter then the x5105 now the size of the radio so the x5105 i just measured the body of the radio it's 17 centimeters 6 100 is 18 centimeters and one centimeter bigger and the height the x5105 is 9.5 centimeter high the x6100 is 8.9 centimeter high yeah there is the little difference and the depth on this bot radios almost five no 4.5 centimeters here we have almost 5 centimeters okay so the depth is almost the same we need to count with these buttons you can see that there are buttons here and the knobs and here they are not so the x5105 is is flattered much more than the 6100 now let me show you how long it takes to turn on this new x6100 transceiver i need to push this button for about four seconds to turn on this radio and now it's turning on yeah and now it is turning on so now let me show you how it how long it takes on the 5105 and it's done so the main difference between both radios is an internal operating system in this sdr transceiver this is traditional super radio so the booting of this radio takes a much shorter time than this one the menu system in this radio automatically detect the microphone type so when you're using an external mic just connect and the radio knows that microphone has been connected so you will be able to transmit with this mic if you disconnect the mic it will detect that it have to use an internal mic here next of this tuning knob for now i connect my magnetic lube antenna but there is not really good conditions here not many signals here on on this location but i would like to show you how the swr scanner works on this new radio compared to the x5105 radio okay so we need to go to the up to the applications and now select this swr scan this screen is not a touch screen so for all these features you need to use this function button so here we can see the graph and here we can select the speed this is the slowest speed but if we will use faster and 4. and five number five is the fastest speed of the scanner and now i can compare this thing with the x5105 yeah slightly different okay so this radio has a general menu here so here down on the bottom of the screen you can see the radio settings number one number two and a display setting and a system setting so the radio setting you can see this features in the menu and moving between these feature you have to use this knob it's the multifunctional knob to adjust the feature you select it and the other thing if you need to uh select one of this feature right here to this uh this icon just go to some other feature let's say microphone gain and push this button here and you see that these microphone gain now is here in this icon and by rotate rotating this multifunctional knob you can select the values if you would like to here have the power go back select the tx power and again push this button you have here and you can adjust the power yeah it's very simple and very useful in the radio setting too we can find just a few features like the clarifier for receiving for transmitting i think this is displayed and something about the iq go back and the display setting [Applause] here we can play with the spectrum scope with the waterfall and the backlight like here so just select the feature you want and then we can use this knob or you can just push this button here close and minus right go back and the system setting here we can set the time just by pushing this knob button here to ok icon and exit so going back again system info here you can find the firmware version this is mine 1.1 and firmware update i will show you later how to upgrade this radio which is very very easy all right and um the one more feature is uh the audio message so you can record your audio and transmit it if you are somewhere in the menu just press the general menu here and then press the message now you can see the voice down there so by pressing the voice you will see this screen it is waiting for recording this is the idol right here so by pressing this record button and talking to your microphone you will record your voice your cq so let me show you hello cq hello cq this is oscar mike zero echo tango and press this stop button okay the play button will not work on this firmware version so just go to exit and now go to the application or you can tune your transmitting frequency let's say 200 okay go to the app select the voice call and here you can see recorded the message it's six seconds long hello this is oscar zero echo tango and again hello this is oscar mike zero echo tango all right so pretty pretty nice uh feature and it's very useful when you're tired calling cq and this is cool you can eat you can drink and your radio still uh transmitting on this frequency and keep the frequency occupied with my current firmware i cannot go down with tuning to 1 hertz or 10 hertz i have just the two options 100 hertz and 1 kilohertz and how to do the switch you can just push the fst button here and watch here this is one kilohertz this is 100 hertz if you wish to use uh an internal tuner in this radio just use this button here the atu by push and hold this button for a few seconds the atu will be turn it on and will tune your antenna [Applause] [Music] yeah there is no need to tune the antenna because i am precisely on the band on the frequency but i can go a little bit to the side much further [Music] yeah that's how it works this radio has also the cw decoder and it has also the rtty decoder and bpsk recorder i will show you how it looks like go to the app menu and select the modem so here we can see the bpsk mode and by pressing this button you can select the rtty and the cw mode here in this window it should appear the cw decoded signal but in this moment i don't have any cw signal also here you can see the rate or the speed which you can select by this knob here on the left it's a words per minute okay so there is also one more thing what i would like to say uh the charging system of this radio as you can see that this transceiver has included this power adapter charger which is a 5 volt charger so to use this charger you need to do something in the menu because if the charging is turned off in the menu the radio will not charge with this charger as you can see here i'll connect this and the led is not blinking which means that the battery is not charging in this case so what what we have to do turn on the radio and go to the menu radio setting 1 so here the radio setting 1 and select the charger as you can see in this case is the charger of select on and go out from the menu turn the radio off and see the led yeah it is blinking that's fine so your 5v charger is now currently working and charging the battery inside the radio for the upgrade you have to use a micro sd card in my case i will use a small micro sd card this is 4 gigabyte you don't need much bigger the sd card and put the sd card into the computer slot and go to the website radioditty.com and you will find the link down in the video description find these new x6100 here and click on the icon get the software right here and download save it to your computer let's say on desktop the file has been downloaded you have to right click here on this file and you have to unpack this file to the same folder so here is unpack this file open the file and you will see the sd tool you can see also the manual how to do that and the log so open the sd tool first and install the rufus 3.10 [Music] there is also a newer version a 3.17 i think so i recommend to find a rufus 3.17 and download it all right so here you can see this this window here you can select your [Music] sd card in my case it is the four gigabyte sd card and push the select button here in the select button you have to go to the file where is the project where is the software downloaded in my case it was in the zygoo here and open the image right here so select this image here all right image is here and now do the start press the start and wait about maybe one or two minutes when the process ends then push the close and in this moment your sd card will be ready for uh update of your transceiver and now when your sd card has been prepared for an upgrade remove it from the computer and remove also the micro sd card from the adapter in my case the second thing is be sure that your transceiver is turn it off and the other thing is be sure that your transceiver is connected to the power source or to your battery charger and be sure that the charging is turned on in the menu of your transceiver now just put the sd card contacts facing to you into the slot here on the right side of this transceiver push it and now we can just turn on the transceiver and waiting what will happen the upgrade process should start automatically okay this is the upgrade process and down on the bottom of the screen you can see the process whole process takes maybe a few seconds and here is the countdown to reboot all right so this radio rebooted or just shut down and now we can remove the micro sd card from the slot don't forget to remove it because the upgrade process after next boot your transceiver will be back again and the process will repeat all right so now we normally start the radio a long press of the power button all right now go to the system setting and with this multifunctional knob go to the firmware upgrade press the multifunction knob here we can see the file the upgrade file and push the upgrade button here of course the charger have to be connected to the radio otherwise the firmware update will not work so push the upgrade and we can see erasing flash and whole process of an upgrade it is also very fast and it's done just push the correct quit button exit button and i recommend of course reboot your transceiver again so okay and your transceiver should start normally so in this case your transceiver is updated and you can repeat this process after the next upgrade again all right so now let me look closer at the power consumption of this transceiver so i have here the power supply set on 14 volts but actually it is not at 14 volts it is a 13.8 and the transceiver is set charger off so i should measure the current driving just the transceiver not the battery so let me connect and see okay so here you can see that the current is 330 320 milliamps on 14 volts or 13.8 this is the power consumption on the volume 9 i can go up with the volume to maximum 50 points all right so as you can see that the maximum volume is 360 amps i can go up with the backlight all right this is the maximum backlight and you can see 420 milliamps maximum volume maximum backlight okay and and now i will try turn on the charger in the setting here so charger is on so you can see 920 milliamps 930 milliamps this is the charger on and the maximum backlight and also the maximum volume so we have 960 milliamps with charging battery maximum backlight maximum volume [Applause] okay so we have very poor day you can see is about one degree plus and very foggy it's cold something like a rain i have here under the roof my magnetic a little antenna so i would like i would like to uh connect this antenna to the zygou x 6 100. i see that many stations are crawling on 20 meters right now i think also 17 was open so there is a good chance to test this little transceiver okay here is the station from oscar hotel so let's try to contact you soon [Music] tango qrp station only the qp station okay this is oscar mexico zero echo tango qrp oscar mike zero echo tango [Applause] qrp is oscar city charlie tango hotel hey good afternoon thank you for coming back to michael turn it by antenna towards north pleasure to you for the second time we had a contact on the 2nd of january 2021 so nice to meet you again after one year my name is peter thank you romeo peterson oscar oscar zulu 8 charlie tango hotel this is oscar mike zero echo tango qrp yes peter very nice to meet you again my name is paul that is correct and i'm running only 5 watts into the magnetic lube antenna magnetic lube antenna 5 watts and small sdr transceiver the zygo x6100 could you give me please your signal report you're five and nine here with me in slovakia over and yourself stop we are over the east tiana radio works absolutely fine you know five and five five and six in the pace quickly that's good today a wet and dull day with temperatures about plus two degrees christmas was beautiful white but unfortunately the snow has come by now so what is left is the traditional grey and white white picture father grim working traditions briefly paul turn now into your direction after mike's cereal echo tango hosts a roger roger peter 100 copy thank you so much for the very nice report five five to five six i'm running only five watts from the very new transceiver so i'm i am very curious what is my audio what is my audio please on the other side and uh congratulations to your very nice working conditions i wish to have a 200 watts right now no i'm running just the qrp and testing this new sdr transceiver back to you peter tango over today thank you once again for the report and as far as your audio is concerned it's absolutely fine it's natural it's natural and easy to understand um if i were to change anything to modify anything but i'm not sure it would i would add if i could a bit more high to your audio this might increase the readability especially under difficult conditions yes qsl full understand thank you so much for this information so uh you would edit more bass on no more high frequencies in the audio okay very good to know thank you so much uh by the way i'm recording this contact so i will add you into my new uh youtube video so you can find my youtube channel on my qrz.com peter all right thank you so much again for this all informations i wish you a very good day 73 and happy new year 2022 peter this is oscar mike zero echo tango sorry i don't have paper so i don't have your cosine written back to you [Applause] here's why the over is in use thank you paul it was a pleasure with you and finally recording i wish you the best luck happy new year and hopefully i'll catch you soon again oscar light series okay peter 100 thank you seven threes bye bye wow that was pretty with this little transceiver i lock it i have the 5105 here [Applause] and peter told me that i need more high frequencies into the audio and this is my antenna [Applause] i turn it the antenna towards north northwest denmark is this way so going back to the radio and i will try to make few more contacts right so let me turn across the bond what is here [Applause] this is [Applause] canada mexico radio mike block charlie mike radio calling security act security executive pacific leaving shortfall [Applause] i think it was an italian station [Applause] i think the propagations are open to the uk right now [Applause] [Applause] roger roger you're a five by seven five by seven i'm running justify what's over qsl you're a five by seven five by seven five by seven over all right he gave me five five he was a five and seven with me he's running flora fauna [Applause] [Music] november yankee calling cq and standing by for a call oscar mexico zero echo tango qrp [Applause] i repeat my call sign oscar mike zero echo tango oscar mike zero echo tango qrp zero hotel tango roger the suffix echo tango the suffix ecuador tango on your signal as well roger roger roger you're five and nine five and nine plus five and nine five and nine plus over five by nine and thank you for the call and have a nice afternoon november yankee happy new year the new zygo is beautiful radio i'm so happy with it i hope you enjoyed this video and if you have some questions please leave a comment thank you guys for watching and i wish you happy new year and 73s [Applause] you

Channel: OM0ET

Views: 273,699

Keywords: X6100, xiegu, review, SDR, allmode, allband, shortwave, transceiver, radioditty

Id: FewRpOB7SMI

Length: 53min 16sec (3196 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 30 2021