How to start a amateur radio station:
Depending on your cash flow there is a lot of stuff for sale. But don't buy the most expensive if you don't know how it works or if you don't know what you need.
As example: depending on your license you might not be allowed to use an HF transceiver, ... but an HF rig can be used with transverters to work on 6m, 2m, 70cm and even higher bands.
I started off with an Yaesu FT-480R which is a 144 MHz rig with SSB, CW and FM. On the SSB band you can work fine DX when there are propagations like Es or Aurora and even via Meteor Scatter. For more experienced operators maybe some EME (Earth-Moon-Earth) or Sattelite contacts.
Behind the FT-480R i built transverters for 50 MHz (6 meters), and 430 MHz (70cm band).
With only 7 watts on 50 MHz I worked about 70% of all my contacts on this band and even DX to the USA, Canada, South Africa and South America. So yes .... i am also a QRP (low power) user.
What antenna do i use ?
Check out the antenna page (click in the left kolom).
For local contacts a vertical antenna will do fine on 2 meters and 70cm. Working via repeaters goes verry well. If you want to cover greater distances and want to work DX (far away stations) you will need a Yagi antenna (also called beam). A Yagi is a antenna with a dipole as radiating element to wich a reflector (back side) and several directors (elements in front of a dipole) are added. A good DX antenna is about 3 wave lengths long. So for 145 MHz which is the 2 meter band ..... (one wave length is 2 mtrs) the Yagi would be 2 x 3 = 6 meters long.
The Yagi I use is 7,5 meters long by Cue Dee and has 15 elements in total. Other options are to use shorter antenna's like 7 or 10 elements and then stacking them. Stacking is putting two or more antenna's parallel. This would give a theoretical gain of 3db (in practise about 2,5 dB).
Just to give you more feeling: 3dB is just half an S-point extra on your receiver. Or regarding to transmitted power .... if you have 50 Watts RF power and go to 100 Watts you have added 3dB, this should give you half an S-point extra at the receiving station side. Half an S-point is not much but in critical situations it can lift your signal just above the noise limit.
On EME (earth-moon-earth) every dB counts. A connector gives a loss ofabout 0,1 dB and if you use a coaxial relais and a preamp you have additional losses on each connector you use.
Also consider the type of coaxial cable you use. Up to 30 MHz for 100 Watts RG-58U will do fine. If you use higher RF power you should use RG8 / RG-213 or on higher bands low-loss coax cable like Aircom, Aircell or even better 1/2 inch or 7/8 inch Cellwave.
Many commercial antenna's are for sale like Tonna F9FT and Cue Dee like I use. Better is to build your own and use the designs of DK7ZB, these designs are optimised for the working frequency and perform much better !
On HF bands a simple half wave dipole does the job. More info is also to be found on the antenna page. Also the use of a Yagi is good for DX but on HF they are big and heavy. It's also best to put them up high but most people don't have the room to put them up. Neighbours also tend to complain about antennas as they don't like looking at them form their house.
There are many designs on the internet but to start off I advise to construct a simple half wave dipole made of simple wire as described on the antenna page.
Yes, dillemas all the way in this hobby, not to mention chance on interferance on radio and stereo equipment in the neighbourhood.