SHARK-RF OPENSPOT2

OPENSPOT2 WIRELESS DONGLE

I must admit, I was a little confused by this device's marketing. It appeared (to me at least) to be a dongle similar to my DVAP, but with the bonus of being wireless and standalone. Well it sure is wireless, but it's certainly not standalone!

SHARK-RF videos show it being small and compact enough to "slip into your pocket", making you think it works on its own, requiring nothing else to support it after the initial setup. But the fact is, it needs a power-supply! Why they couldn't incorporate a battery I do not know - especially at this price!!

So there you have it - if you're gonna "slip it in your pocket" be sure to slip a battery and a USB-C lead in there with it. Apart from that little gripe, it's a pretty impressive bit of kit. It's very compact, boots up in seconds and it will work with DMR, DSTAR, C4FM, P25 and more. So you only need to buy the one dongle for all your radios.

In the shack, it's no big deal plugging the dongle into your Mains Adapter (supplied) but outdoors you need to get yourself one of those portable USB Batteries. I've got a 7800mAh rechargeable unit, so it's no big deal, but if you don't already own one, be sure to factor in the cost of purchasing one.

The unit draws a maximum of 150mA so it's not a high-drain device, but if you're going to use it all day (or maybe over a weekend event) then you may want to think about the size of battery you're going to buy.

The OS2 transmits at approximately 20mW which is twice as much as my DVAP dongle. I suspect that it needs to pack that extra little punch because it has no external antenna option. The DVAP on the other hand has an SMA connector to permit the installation of a larger antenna for longer range around the home and garden. I'll do a direct range comparison when I get a minute.

Working from home you would normally use your PC/LapTop to run the software, but outdoors you would need to use your phone or wifi-enabled tablet. The software (which is run through a web-browser such as Chrome) is really quite good. It's pretty intuitive and doesn't bog down your CPU in any way. And I guess the best thing about it running through a web-browser is that it can be operated on virtually any platform.

So, my understanding (at this point) is that you need to carry the Radio, the OpenSpot, the Battery and the Phone or tablet whenever you wish to operate /portable. Your phone would need to have the option to operate as a Wi-Fi HotSpot (most do) and if you're using a tablet instead, then it would have to have a 3G/4G/5G simcard installed with a data-plan.

I don't know enough about it at this point because I've only just bought it, but it seems to me that to 'change rooms' say from CQ-UK to American RagChew you need to use the software. I'd have thought you would be able to do it directly from the radio, but so far I haven't worked out a way to do that on the FT3. I really do need to RTFM I guess :-) 

It's day-one, so I'll continue to experiment and come back with an update.

UPDATE!!!
I've figured out how to change rooms from the FT3 screen now, lol.