A Front-panel view of the FT-817.

Whether you call it a bug, a "quirk," or an undocumented feature, pretty much everything computer-operated has some aspect of it that is either not intuitive, not as the manual says it is (if the manual says it at all...) or just plain goofy.  The '817 is no exception.

Here is a growing list of things about the '817 that you may have not known.  Some of these are readily obvious (if you read the manual, that is) and other are so obscure, you wonder who had so much time on their hands that they were able to figure it out.

These come from a variety of different sources and where possible, I'll attribute them.

They are in no particular order:  Consider that to be another quirk...
 

• Front and Rear Antenna selection.  This is selected via menu item #7 and different antenna selections may be made for HF, 6 meters, FM Broadcast, Aircraft band, 2 Meters, and UHF.  By default, HF uses the rear connector and all others use the front.
• CTCSS, DCS, NAR (for CW and FM), IPO, ATT, RPT (and offset) values, and dial step size (AM, FM, SSB).  These are stored on a per-band basis (i.e. 160 M, 75 M, 40 M, 30 M, 20 M, 17 M, 15 M, 12 M, 10 M, 6 M, FM-BCB, Air, 2 M, and UHF.)
• The "Auto" setting for the dial backlight only functions when the internal battery is used.  Apparently Yaesu assumes that if you have have power coming in to the radio via the external power connector, you can afford to waste the extra 30 milliamps or so that the backlight consumes.
• Contrary to what the manual might say, the TX power setting applies for all bands.  Different power levels are not stored on different bands!
• The Blinking L3 power level icon.  When, according to the radio, the supply voltage is less than 11.5 volts, the "power level" icon will blink if you set high power.  The radio will still attempt to put out a full 5 watts despite the blinking, but at low voltages there may be insufficient drive for full power.
• Holding down the Home key.  When in FM, pressing and holding down the HOME key will cause the radio to transmit a 1750 Hz tone - often used for "whistle up" on European repeaters.  On CW, this will overlay the receive audio with the precise frequency that the TX CW carrier is offset from zero beat on receive.  On SSB/AM a TX Error will result with the '817 assuming that you are a doofus for trying to "whistle up" a repeater on these modes.
• FM versus FM-N.  FM (on amateur bands) is standard +- 5 KHz deviation - used on most FM repeaters on the VHF/UHF bands throughout the world. This mode occupies about 15 KHz of spectrum and requiring a 20 KHz channel spacing for geographically-adjacent operations.  The FM-N is used on HF (10 Meters and lower frequencies) and it uses +- 2.5 KHz deviation - the same as many newer FM business channels and the so-called FRS ("Family Radio") radios.  This mode uses about 12.5 Khz of spectrum, requiring about 15 KHz channel spacing for geographically-adjacent operations.  Note that, on the '817, different filters are actually used on the receiver - with the narrower one being selected for FM-N.
• The power supplied by the ACC jack is not power-switched.  If you have an accessory that gets its power from the ACC jack on the '817, keep in mind that it will continue to supply power to the jack even when the '817 is off!  For example, if you leave the CT-62 CAT interface cable plugged into the '817, this will pull 20-30 milliamps from the radio's power source - even if you are using internal batteries!
• Don't use the "PSK-U" or "PSK-L" mode for digital modes. For some reason, there is a slight frequency shift (10 Hz) between receive and transmit when those modes are selected for the "DIG" mode. Use USER-L or USER-U instead.  This frequency shift is (ironically) important on a mode like PSK31.  For modes like SSTV and RTTY, 10 Hz is unimportant, but to avoid possible confusion, ALWAYS use the USER-U mode.  Why?  Aside from not having the 10 Hz shift problem, digital modes are generally used on upper sideband on all bands these days - particularly when audio-sourced modulation schemes (such as a sound card) are used.  Using upper sideband also allow the actual carrier frequency to be determined easily simply by adding the dial frequency to the audio modulation frequency.
• There is some CPU noise audible on some frequencies if you use a rubber duck antenna on the front panel.  One of the most obvious of these is around 35.814 MHz.  These are probably the result of timing internal to the CPU's program.  These change and can become more obvious if, for example, a program heavily uses the CAT interface.  The change in CPU useage, coupled with the fact that another cable is attached to the radio that might radiate CPU noise is likely to be at least partly responsible for the "chugging" sound that some people report.  The way to avoid this is to not use the front panel antenna - that is, one that is only inches away from the CPU.
• The "It won't power up with certain subaudible tone frequencies" bug.  Tom, N2YTF brought to my attention the following bug - and my thanks to go him. It may be duplicated as follows:
• Put a working battery inside the FT-817 and supply power from the rear terminal.  Both must be present and connected!
• Select FM on a 2 meter frequency.  (Actually, any ham band will do - but it must be FM.)
• Using the "TON" menu item, turn on both the tone and the tone squelch.  The display will show "TSQ"
• Go into the sub-menu and, from menu item #48, select a tone frequency of 250.3 Hz or higher.  (I think that there is only one tone higher...)  Press and hold the "F" key again to return to the main display.
• Turn the FT-817 OFF.
• Try to turn the FT-817 back on.  If you have replicated this bug, the FT-817 will not power up again unless rear-panel power is removed - that is, with the FT-817 running only on the internal battery.  (Note:  I haven't tried just removing the batteries and powering the radio only from the rear panel. If the tone frequency is changed and/or the Tone+Tone Squelch is disabled, then it will work normally.)
• This "bug" has been verified on Tom's radio (SN: 1K44xxxx) and mine (SN:  1D21xxxx)
• Restored "Default" menu settings are not saved.  Johnathan, G1BAX, of Cornwall, England observed the following:
• Bring up the Main Menu (press and hold the "F" key.)
• Restore the default by pressing the HOME key.
• Exit the menu by pressing and holding the "F" key again.
• Turn the radio off - and back on again.  The "original" setting is back!  (This is easiest to demonstrate if one sets the background from orange to its blue default color.)

Thanks to all that have contributed!

Do you have a quirk to add?  If so, email it to me and I might put it on the list.  (I'm quirky about that...)
 

Work continues - please revisit soon!

Important Notice:  The information contained on this and related pages is believed to be accurate, but no guarantees are expressed or implied.  The information on this and related pages should be considered to be "as-is" and the user is completely responsible for the way this information is used.  If you find information that you believe to be incorrect, missing, or should not be here, please report it (in detail) via email.  Anonymous or vaguely-worded reports will likely be ignored.
 

Go to The KA7OEI FT-817 "Front Page" - This is, well, the "front" page of the '817 pages here...

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