FTRestore

FTRestore

The other evening, I decided it’d be a good idea to update my FT-991 with the latest firmware.
Aside from this being a good idea generally, to keep up with the latest and greatest improvements to the FT-991, I’m a hopeless early adopter, and I like to try new things. I wonder when they’re going to release some sort of upgrade to make the FT-991 like the FT-991A, with realtime spectrum scope, etc? I’ve seen a hardware upgrade for the FT-991 which adds the features of the FT-991A and it’s in the UK. Not sure if this is the official upgrade, but it sounds like it might be.  It’s >$500.  I don’t think that’s worth it at all, but some people just have to have a real time spectrograph!

Anyway, I follow the instructions on flashing the main firmware, and there is a step in the instructions which reads:

11. Press and hold the [POWER] key while pressing the [F(M-LIST)] key on the transceiver’s main panel, turning on the transceiver’s power (Reset procedure)

In my mind, I only read as far as “turning on the transceiver’s power…” as I was actually performing this step, and I inadvertently caused a factory reset on my radio. That’s my settings, my channel memories, and my tuner memories, all gone. Nice move!

In order to prevent this from happening again, because it will, I started looking into programs to backup and restore my channels, settings, etc, and I found a free utility called FTRestore.

Created by VK2BYI, FTRestore (link here) is a utility to backup, restore and edit your settings and channel memory information in the Yaesu FTDX1200, FTDX3000 and FT-991/FT-991A model radios. It’s not overly complicated, and it saves and loads information in Microsoft Excel files, so if you’re an Excel nut (like I am) you can just whiz through your settings and memories in Excel, load it back into FTRestore, and upload it to your radio.

Overall, it’s just what I was looking for, and I’d recommend it to anyone for backup and restore of your settings if you have one of the above radios. Especially if you like to live fast and loose with your technology and not read the instructions thoroughly before flashing and resetting!

AD5GG

AD5GG works in the real world as an RF design engineer. Occasionally, he posts articles on this very site. Sometimes they're even worth reading. Please feel free to comment on posts using the comment system at the end of each post, and use the discussion forum.