Finally picked up a radio, a Yaesu FT-1500M. Teeny tiny little thing, but's either made of gold or lead judging by it's weight!  Previous owner's super cool though (actually didn't want to sell it) and helping me get into this ham stuff.

Now I'm wondering what antenna base type you guys recommend.  When checking at HRO, the salesman was kinda vague and said there wasn't a benefit between the two.  Vagueness scares me, making me believe you really don't know what you're talking about.  Probably not the case, but I'm more comfortable with reassuring and confident answers.

Thanks (again) for the input, Tom.

Diamond makes really nice antenna mounts.  Check out: www.universal-radio.com/catalog/hamantm/diamx.html.  It depends on how you plan on mounting it.  I mounted mine on my roofrack, which is round tubing and the K550KM worked well.  There are plenty of other mounting options.

yep, it's a solid little thing.  At 1st I was skeptical cause the PO was missing the pigtail, but after talking to him, I'm sure it'll work.

googled the model #, and checked reviews, which were pretty high.

Hey Mike, I'm sorry my question is misleading. Apparently there's two types of antenna systems, sorry I can't remember the names.  Would one be NMO?

Hey RP,
I ain't the guy to answer, but here goes:
cb vs ham is like tin can phones vs cellular,
range of cb's is pushed by a max of 5 watts unless running illegally, whereas ham's output is unlimited (I believe) and boosted by repeaters. The radio I just purchased puts out 50 watts, and the PO repeatedly talked with people up by the Canadian border through a repeater. Along with that, there's other options with ham, such as patching into phone lines, working over the internet, and location/tracking systems.

Hey Mike,

Thanks, I'll probably go with the uhf ssystem.  the salesman did say it was more popular.