TLDR: I got a Hermes Lite 2 and did some POTA hunting with it.
I have been using FT-891 for POTA hunting during the last month. It was solid and the 100 watts output power is very good. However, FT-891 does not come with a builtin sound card. I will have to buy some cables and a USB sound card to use digital modes. Using the builtin sound card of the computer is not recommended because you may accidentally transmit system sound effects (and I heard one today on 14.230 mHz lol).
Lacking the support of digital modes is not the reason why I bought HL2. I was looking for some open source ham radio devices that I can work on. At first I considered HackerRF One, but its output power is too low (about 5 dBm) so it requires a good amplifier to make ham radio operation possible. Someone on reddit (I coundn’t find the post now) recommended Hermes Lite 2, which is also open source and provides 5 watts output. So last month I ordered a HL2 kit, and I received it two weeks ago.
I use Quisk and WSJT-X on Debian to operate HL2. The receiving of HL2 is good, and I think it is a little better than FT-891. I wanted to transmit in SSB but I don’t have time to set up my mic.
Today, I used HL2 to do POTA hunting in FT8 mode. I got the POTA Gold Hunter award. Great!
