I've never had the Futaba 7 channel radio. But, have had the Hitec Eclipse (sold it) and have a Futaba 9C now. I sure as heck don't need this many channels but, the reason I got the 9C was primarily because it has an infinite # of model memories by using memory campaqs. The 9C has 8 memory locations built in. Add a 16k campaq and you increase the total memory to 14. Which is alot of planes. But you can also use a 56k memory campaq and really bump it up. Its nice having all these memory locations because re-trimming plane when you change models is a real PITA especially if you have mixes that you have to re-do.
The Eclipse holds 7 model memories. It was a good radio and never gave any problems. Also with the Eclipse, it uses a module in the back for the channels. Essentially, you can use any brand of rx, any channel xtal and the Eclipse will conform because you can select the shift and the channel.

Dave...