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I've been a license holder for many years but never purchased a radio to play around with. Long story short, I got my license for the purpose of high power rocketry tracking. Anyway.....

I was surfing and came across the BaoFeng UV-5R dual band radio for <50 on Ebay.
I quick search yielded some results that looked promising. And I also found that an updated version is just hitting the streets, BaoFeng UV-5R+ PLUS

Anyone have any experience or advice on this radio?

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I don't have any experience with this radio but I thought this review was fairly comprehensive than most. http://w0hc.com/2012/04/baofeng-uv-5r/

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"I was installing un-programmed radios"

I imagine that BaoFeng is on-par with Wouxun. Members here have been happy with the Wouxuns (except the one that refuses to buy it simply because of its country of origin).

Me thinks there are more than one...

I have a Baofeng UV-3 Mark II (I think. There are about four different versions) It wasn't very expensive and it is a little quirky. As if there still are a lot of bugs in the software. It is an SDR and, as a non-essential communication device, it works fine.

As for a use, I could see carrying two of these in the car or backpack to make short distance calls between myself and a friend. Of course, the friend needs a ham ticket. If your closest circle of friends has no ham but you, perhaps an FRS or GMRSS would be a better choice. The Baofeng will operate fine on those freqs but... that would be illegal. ;)

MURS is still an option.

Except, a HAM rig is not legal on MURS

Well I ordered one up on Sat. Got the tracking # today. Hopefully have it by the end of the week.

We have a couple of HAM stations setup at my fire dept. Seem to recall they are a small Radiohack base. I looked at the log book and I seem to recall that it had been a long time since anyone actually used them. Maybe I'll fire one up this Wen evening and test it out.

I read an interesting thread on here today. Bunch of you guys were discussing the use of "Open" repeaters. And where open does not always mean open. The repeater in question was used by a SAR group. I guess I will find out soon enough which ones are really open and which ones are not. Preparing for the verbal beating......

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He should be banned.

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I think those 2 repeaters are "open" for SAR. I did a call once on the 5.11 machine up on SnoqPass years ago and got a reply but it seemed short and to the point.

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"I was installing un-programmed radios"

At way less than half the Wouxun I ordered one from Amazon to see how they compare.

Although I got mine off of Ebay, the tracking info indicates the shipping was processed via Amazon.
This is the auction.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/BaoFeng-UV-5R-PLUS-USB-Cable-Kit-136-174-400-480-MHz-Ham-Two-way-Radio-/170912073078?pt=2_Way_Radios_FRS&hash=item27cb274576

I found this 3rd party programming software and read some promising info about it. Like most 3rd party software, it's usually better than what the OEM offers/bundles.
http://chirp.danplanet.com/projects/chirp/wiki/Home

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Happened to me once (not on a radio). Someone was using the Prime subscription to run an eBay store. That's against the Prime TOS now.

Ahh. I bet ya that is exactly what is going on here too.

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I guess I should have does this prior to making a purchase. Just checked the feedback history for the Ebay seller nicheone and found this posted today.
We'll see where mine really ships from.

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