Portable shortwave radio's with good FM reception?

[HPatrick]

Hey All,

Does anyone have any opinions / suggestions for a portable shorwave radio with good FM reception. I'm primarily wanting to pull in a public radio station (WNCW 88.7 in Spindale, NC - a great ecclectic music public radio station that you can get online if you wish), but would like to satisfy my curiosity about shortwave radio. I can pull WNCW in with my Tivoli Model One, but want something portable and that also does shortwave.

Locally, I can buy the Grundig G3, G6, and S350 models. Anything else would have to be ordered online.

Thoughts/suggestions/opinions on radio's or shortwave in general?

Thanks,

Patrick

 

[rszappa1]

check out the c crane company...

 

[mechtech2]

FM should be easy. It's the long antenna [aerial] that is necessary for the short wave frequencies.
I'd try it out in the store, like a Radio Shack, and see if your local area works with that particular radio.

 

[Win]

Radio reception is strongly dependent on antenna quality. Most portable radios are very poor performers.

A reasonable selection of portable radios can be found here:

www.rffun.com


A used R. L. Drake SW-8 (no longer in production) is probably the best portable receiver available, and will still perform very well when connected to an external antenna. The Grundig Eton E1-XM is still in production, and was designed for Grundig by Drake.

 

[Torino]

To make a rational decision I suggest you pick up a copy of--Passport to World Band Radio, by Lawrence Magne. A bit pricey but your local library may have a copy. John--Las Vegas.

 

[youdontwannaknow]

Dont know whats in the market currently but about 5+ years ago I narrowed it down to a DX-398 - the Radioshack/Realistic version of the Sangean 909. Performance is pretty good on all bands, with the onboard whip as well as external antenna.
You could go overboard with the choice of a portable radio but dont loose sight of what exactly are you going to do with it when shopping/researching. If you just want to test the waters then any basic Sony, Grundig, Sangean should be just fine.

 

[UncleS2]

There's something new in portable radios- DSP(Digital Signal Processing) chips. Allows excellent sensitivity, along with previously difficult/near impossible levels of selectivity. Radio Shack recently had the Grundig G8(a licensed "Grundig" version of the Tecsun PL-300WT) on sale for $30. It's not that great on SW or AM, but is *Excellent* on FM. Call it Excellent sensitivity, combined with Phenomenal selectivity. It's since been leapfrogged by the Tecsun PL310 and PL380, at least one of these has fixed the AM & SW problems, while both keep the exc+ FM ability. I believe these radios(310 & 380) are, so far, available only by direct order from a Hong Kong/China seller through Ebay. For more info on these radios look up the "Ultralight" DXers forum on the Yahoo forums. Link: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ultralightdx/?yguid=325388120

How good is the G8 on FM? Well, having been curious about it for months, when it was priced at $50 & more- I jumped & bought one when RS offered it for $30 w/free shipping. For tough captures- and I'm in a fringe area, with anything I want to listen to hard to get, with *Many* good portable radios to compare with- it's my best portable FM radio by a *very* substantial margin. A recent new station broacasts with a power of 2,450 watts(NOT 24K watts!)- from ~42 miles away! When conditions are tough, & all the other radios get it in a scatchy, unlistenable mess(if at all)- the G8 picks it up just fine. Not everywhere in the house on those tough days- but in most of the house(brick). Even when the car radio won't pick it up, & is overwhelmed by another station on the same Fq, broadcasting full-power FM from ~135 miles away, the little G8 will still separate it out, & easily nulls out the offender from Dallas with a little rotation.

AM? Not so good- I have a little Eton E100 that easily outperforms it on AM. And SW is no better, about the same as AM(MW) or maybe a little worse.(A big SW problem w/the G8- stations get stepped all over by just about any strong AM signal in your location. Doesn't exist on at least one, maybe both, of the newer models).

If anything portable will help you ge your FM station of choice, it's one of these DSP models. I just searched a bit, & looks like the G8 is back up to $50 everywhere. So maybe investigate the Tecsun models PL-310 & PL-380. Good luck.

 

[JHZR2]

that tecsun pl380 is an exciting radio. can't comment how it will work for the OP, but it is the radio on my shortlist to buy...