On the way back from Vegas Thursday, we stopped by AES.  They hooked up the FT-950 for a brief evaluation.

Since my FT-990 is down, I've finally convinced myself that a new radio was needed in the shack.  After reading the many reviews on the 950 and joining the Yahoo Group for this radio, I've decided that it should be a good fit and give me better performance to work some new ones.

My brief evaluation at the AES store was my first time actually touching the radio.  It's about the same size as the 990 and will fit well in the shack.  The display is beautiful and easy to read and understand.  Since I'm sure the radio has been played with a lot, I should have reset it back to factory defaults.  I checked it on a tribander pointed at New York.  The bands were not in very good shape.  My first reaction is how quite this radio is.  Signals jump out at you.  I heard a VK long path on 15 meters and several domestic QSO's on 20 both CW and SSB.  The controls are laid out different than I'm used to the 990.  I did not a mic for key to transmit with.  This short evaluation was a good experience and will lead the way to more evaluation soon.

It's now a matter of having the cash to purchase.