Phil
If you get the software for ICOM from N4PY  let me know how you like it.

John  KC2QJB


-----Original Message-----
From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Phil Scovell
Sent: Tuesday, August 25, 2015 7:45 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Icom 7000 and speech

Frank,

I have been running the Icom 7000 since November of 2008.  I was having some
neurological problems at the time and about the time I started learning how
to run the rig, I ended up in the hospital having neck surgery.  It took a
lot of courage to go back and start from the bottom up with the radio and
with nothing more than a MS Word copy of the manual to help.  The Icom 7000
is not a blind friendly radio in my opinion.  You access 90 percent of
everything by entering menus when pressing a button.  Lot of things beep and
double beep when pressed so that helps but the speech is restricted to
frequencies, channels preprogrammed, the modes available, and signal
strength.  In short, a blind guy better have a pretty good memory or take a
lot of notes.  However, recently I found Icom software by N4PY that appears
to be worth the 75 dollars.  I have talked with him personally and he has
given me a list of hot keys he has built in to the control software.  I have
not gotten it yet but it is next on my list.  The Icom 7000 receiver turned
me on big time.  I have been a ham since age 14 in April of 1966 so I have
run tube rigs all the way up the line to these fancy computerized radios. 
Frankly, I would buy, for a blind ham, one of the Kenwoods like even the
TS590 you hear guys talking about on here.  I don't think the Icom 7000 is
made any longer.  I worked 36 states and 3 countries the first year I had
this rig on 6 meters.  I enjoy the 2 meter band on it as well and for an old
CW operator, I have never fiddled with a better receiver for the money.  I
wish this rig would have been available a long time ago because the learning
curved wouldn't have been so bad if I were younger.  I also bought the QSY
ER and I can almost control all of what I use on the radio from the separate
keypad but microphone gain and other such things are hard to get to because
they are in menus, or submenus, and you have to press different buttons to
get to those settings, speech doesn't work in the menu settings, and I'm no
kid any more.  If you can get a use 7000 for like 500 or 600 dollars and
then buy the QSY ER from, I forget the guy who makes them, and if you want
to interface using the N4PY control software, you will have a ball.  I'm
mostly a CW operator so the phone settings and adjustments don't bother me
so much but a guy or gal does like to know their radio.  Go with whatever
you can get the most help with while learning.  If you like CW, so much the
better, and in that case, consider some of the Ten Tec rigs.  Kenwood seems
to have a corner on the market, though, for the blind ham.

Phil.
K0NX