There’s a wealth of digested experience on this particular radio online.
ka7oei has a detailed site which has pages devoted to the following topics:
- Repeater coverage analysis using the FT-817 and GPS
- About the RF Power Amplifier
- The NiCd/NiMH page
- “Customizing” the FT-817
- FT-817 Correspondence
- The FT-817’s ‘Soft Calibration’ Menu
- The FT-817’s Schematics
- Quirks of the FT-817
- The Receiver
- VSWR/Reflected power metering on the FT-817
- A Detailed circuit description of the FT-817
- Current Consumption of the FT-817
- Optimizing the power consumption of the FT-817 when using battery power and a switching supply
- Operating the FT-817 from Lithium-Ion (Li-Ion) cells
- Operating the FT-817 from other types of cells
- CAT ™ Interface Programming with the FT-817
- FT-817 Bugs, Manual Errata and Omissions, and Birdies…
- FT-817 Radio modifications
Other FT-817 related sites include:
- OZ9AEC has an FT-817 page
- Yaesu’s own web page about the FT-817
- K6XX’s FT-817 pages
- The Yahoo FT-817 E-group which also hosts the useful FAQ page
- The “Ham Radio Deluxe” page
- FT-817 FCC Type-Acceptance Documents
One of G4ILO’s ‘Radio topics’ pages is devoted to the FT-817. His document points to 817-Mem, a program to manage memories on the radio.
