Specs & Ratings
Bottom Line
A very affordably priced radio that you can hand to a friend and worry about it making it home safe or not. Great for river or outdoors adventures where a small size and lightweight build are crucial. It's waterproof rated, but we still chuck ours in a ziplock bag.
Pros
- Cheap!
- FRS radio so no license required.
- Surprisingly Loud
- Battery goes for a fair bit of time for outdoor activites.
- Reasonable to Program via Bluetooth and Cell Phone
- We've tested these getting modestly wet, but not fail immersion.
- 2W power in a small package like this really isn't too shabby
- Can supposedly be setup to do ham UHF frequencies?
- The lightest radio we've reviewed
- IP-67 rated and lab tested, but submersion not recommended.
Cons
- They're cheap and basic radios, you can't expect Yaesu or Icom level performance at $14.
- Not field programmable for tones
- Feels like it wouldn't take much of an impact to break.
Who This Is For
Anybody who wants to a lightweight no frills radio for GMRS / FRS based communications, where they don't care if the radio comes back, and they know it can handle a bit of water related exposure without issue.
Testing Notes
We compare all HT radios based on their relevant use in a portable situation. In the case of these small modest power GMRS radios, it's about how they hold up to being shared and used in an active environment.
Detailed Review
Not all radios need to feature a bajillion features and have a ton of power and capabilities, just like an 800hp Jeep with 50 cup holders is a chuckle worthy joke for making a run to the dump. Sometimes what you need is just the right amount, no excess or dead weight or annoying features in your way. This is where we feel the Tidradio TD-M11 establishes it's value. It's dead simple, easy to program, surprisingly robust, and in the context you need to operate it, very capable.
We found ourselves using it whitewater kayaking and coordinating groups of either mixed skills, or in situations where additional communications was useful. We were able to buy a six pack of these radios, program them all to have the same tones, and then we distributed them amongst the various more component folks in any group and then use them to coordinate or communicate in an environment that doesn't always have perfect line of sight nor is it quiet enough to facilitate verbal communication at even modest distances such as 40 yards. From tasks as focused as coordinating when we send folks down a rapid to avoid a pileup of problems, to simpler casual checkins like somebody letting us know they'd gone a bit further down river than the rest of the group and we didn't need to worry about them, these radios let us communicate and coordinate in ways we previously just hoped were okay.
While the radios claim to be waterproof and have documentation of their IP-67 rating, we tried something simple and just put our radios in heavy duty zip lock bags. We were surprised at just how good the speakers still sounded through the zip lock bags, and were generally loud enough that we could hear them through the bag and our PFD (personal flotation device / life jacket for non whitewater folks) all while operating in a whitewater environment. Folks were also quite reasonable to understand through the bag.
We did test the waterproof claims of these radios. Several folks forgot to zip their bags and proceed to either roll their kayaks over causing full submersion. One individual with the radio even had an "out of boat experience" and floated for a while out of their kayak with the radio in the bag open. In all situations the radios continued to operate, so the plastic bags are overkill... but in a situation where comms could become essential at a moments notice, a plastic bag to give your radio an extra layer of capability seems like a few cheap dollars well spent.
One thing we positively love about these radios is that they're compact. Here it is pictured above next to the industry standard Search and Rescue HAM radio, the Yaesu VX-6R. As you can see, the TidRadio TD-M11 body is in theory a bit longer, but with a much shorter antenna.
With a side on view of the VX-6R and TidRadio TD-M11 though, you can see where the TidRadio TD-M11 really shines. It's about the size of a very compact smart phone these days. This for us was awesome, as they fit into small PFD pockets reasonable well, and they also are that much easier to hand to somebody without facing objections. A lot of folks just don't want to deal with a radio in such circumstances, and if you gave them an excuse not to deal with one they'd take it.
Now not every use case for these radios needs to be in an extreme situation. One such situation was we had family visiting in town and we took them to a busy Saturday market. We wanted to be able to coordinate the group should we all get separated, and cell phones were a bit of a nuisance, if you even had service that that many folks all on the some cell towers at once. We distributed the radios amongst our group and then just went about our way through the market. We then coordinated all sorts of fun simple interactions. Somebody found some cool plants for sale, another person found the hottest hot sauce they'd ever tasted, and then finally one person was just over it and went back to the car and didn't want us wondering where they went. For this adventure it was easy for the group.
Our only real gripe with the radio is that you can't lock the channel buttons. That means if I handed the radio to somebody and they accidentally changed the channel, the radio was now effectively useless. While it's a very easy solution for anyone with even 30-40 seconds of explanation, most folks eyes just gloss over as soon as you talk radio... even if it's as simple as "If this doesn't say 15, it won't work, push these buttons to change the number". Some adults just gave up on learning.
Accessories we recommend
As discussed in our article above we put our radio into plastic bags. We tried a bunch of different options, and we've settled on the LokSak 3.9" x 7.5" heavy Duty zip-lock bags. Sure, they're nearly the same cost as a radio for a set of two, but they last. We've stress tested them, and even if water gets in there, the radios can handle it. You'd do well to get these if you're going to use them boating, whether it be whitewater, ocean, inner tubing, whatever situation where immersion is possible, these take a $14 mostly waterproof radio and turn it into a definitely waterproof option, that still works surprisingly well!
Final Verdict
Now we really can't go and give the TidRadio TD-M11 a 10 out of 10. While this radio is a perfect an example of the porridge temperature being just right, it didn't have crystal clear audio, it didn't have massively clear transmission, and I'm sure it doesn't deliver it's full rated power along with four or five other imperfections such as the IP67 rating followed by the manufacturer saying avoid doing anything IP67 ish with the radio.
There's surely more capable or higher quality radios out there... but for the price and the task at hand, sometimes all you need is a radio with only the mission critical details dialed in. In situations where a great radio is just going to make you worry about it getting damaged, or a highly capable radio is just goin to make your teammates eyes gloss over with confusion followed by disinterest... the Tidradio TD-M11 is all that you need, nothing you don't.