User manual can be downloaded here if you are interested.

Picked one up last week to look and see if it was a good radio to recommend in between the cheaper CS-700's and the Motorolas.

I am impressed.

It has a nice color display, seems solidly built, works well.

Audio quality is good, impressively good. I can usually tell when someone is on a CS radio because the audio is a bit "tinny"- when I started using this radio I didn't tell anyone to see if they commented- nobody noticed. A local ham who is very, very into DMR and actually was on the design team for the Mototrbo trunking didn't believe I was on it until he saw it the audio was so close to the XPR-7550 I was using. Audio output is great, and it has the kind of loud audio you expect in a commercial/public safety rig.

The color display works well and is nicely laid out.

The programming software is laid out very similar to the Motorola CPS, but a bit clunkier. Works well enough however- and guess what.... its FREE! You can download it here.

The radio uses the Motorola programming cables and speaker mics- this is a huge plus in my eyes. It means cables are easy to get and that you can get quality speaker mics and audio accessories.

It works just as well on analog freqs.

On DMR it doesn't support text messaging between it and Motorolas, but it works with CS radios (Motos are a little wonky with texting to other brands). It does do radio check and direct call with all brands.

One huge plus- these us a regular SMA antenna connector. Motorola did that with the XPR-6550, but with the 7550 went to a funky screw in all hot old school connector that means you can''t use an external antenna, or any aftermarket one.  With the DP770 you can

All in all, with these selling at $355 on Amazon right now in this price range its a much better value than paying $300-350 for a used Motorola XPR-6550. And you guys know what a diehard Moto fan I am so what it takes for me to say that.

Does it bring a lot more to the table than the CS-700? Its better made, has a much better and easier to read display, better audio out and and uses Moto accessories. Is it worth that $150 extra it commands over the CS-700? I think so. I think this is great entry into DMR for those who are interested.

2000mah. I haven't seen a case yet.

The SC Hearts network is linked to the NC-PRN unless they put it into emergency mode, so we can chat once you are on.

You are probably in coverage for the one on Bearwallow Mountain in Hendersonville.

Not bad. Moto announced the end of the 6550 soon, support will go another 3-4 years. But with the end of sales distributors will be pushing upgrades and a lot more will end up on the market.

After a few weeks of ownership, some further notes-

If you have a Motorola the drivers for the CPS will not play well with the Kirisun drivers using the same adapter. You can program one or the other, but not both with one computer.

Battery life is on par with my 6550 with a 4 year old battery, not nearly as good as my 7550 with a fresh battery. Nothing else anyone sells come close to the quality of Motorola Impress batteries.

Aside from the lack of Bluetooth (that I am really getting spoiled having in the Motorola XPR 7550) and the one channel/volume knob it is not functionally very different for any of my uses than the 7550. I am sure it is not as rugged, but it is not a cheap Baofeng either.

I will say that I would not recommend it for any kind of public safety/life critical use because of the single knob. It is volume, and when you push it down it becomes channel. But it is set up so that a temporary tap down changes it to be the channel selector, you don't have to hold it down and twist, so when you are reaching down under stress or with gloves it would be very easy to push down momentarily and you are changing channel instead of volume. That is the one big thing I do not like about this radio so far.

OK one more update. I was wrong about the driver issue with having Moto software on the same computer- its that the Kirisun doesn't like using a real Motorola cable, or the other way around. The "Kirisun" cable (really a Moto knockoff) works fine with my Kirisun and Moto stuff, but the OEM Moto cable will not work with the Kirisun.