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5stars
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121 reviews
Great little radio
Awesome radio. Far better reception than my old Magnavox DX-2999. Uses a lithium 18650 battery. No chance of corrosion like AA batteries. Very portable and the wealth of features like bandwidth filtering and separate fine tuning knob make it an outstanding radio. Only wish it had an external am antenna jack.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
Tecon shortwave
I bought this to replace a terrible Grundig I got at Radio Shack which was off by a whole Mhz on the tuning dial. In addition, the third SW band started pointing back to AM. Grundig used to be a great radio but their brand was bought and slapped on some cheap crap.
The Tecson, on the other hand, is really a great radio. The dial is accurate both for knob tuning and direct frequency entry. It has SSB as well for browing the HAm bands. There is a supplied external shortwave antenna as well as a rechargeable battery.
All in all my favorite radio ever.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
Great Value and Feature Rich
This very sensitive radio receives AM, FM, Long Wave, and Shortwave broadcasts. Although it is easy to operate, it has a huge array of features.
The Tecsun PL-880 is the best and most expensive of the small Tecsun radios.
By using a better 450mW audio amplifier and an improved 3 watt mylar speaker, the PL-880 has the best sound of these radios. High frequencies are crisp and clear, low frequencies are audible, and the midrange is exceptionally clear. FM Stereo is available through the headphone jack.
The unit is powered by a 5V USB port or a rechargeable, replaceable 18650 lithium battery. This is a huge deal. With heavy use, the factory-supplied 2000mAh battery lasts me about 15 days. When it does discharge, I can just recharge it in the radio, or swap it out with another inexpensive, long lasting 18650 battery. I just swapped out my 2000mAh 18650 with a 5000mAh 18650. I'm curious as to how long this battery lasts!
Because of the long-lasting battery, the back-light of the display can be turned on indefinitely. Alternatively, you can choose to have it only stay on for a few seconds (after you touch a knob or button), or just turn it completely off. A long press on "5" when the radio is off, toggles the lights behavior. Likewise, you can use a switch on the side.
Tuning for all bands is easily accomplished with separate main tuning and fine tuning knobs. This is a great arrangement, far better than the auto switching tuning speed of the PL-660. In addition, you can scan to the next/previous station with a long press to the SCAN button. Direction of scan depends on whether you were last manually tuning up or down.
There are 100-250 memories per page per band (FM, AM, LW, SW, SSB), and there are 25 pages (0-24). Since many stations are only available for a limited time, I use each page (0-23) to group broadcasts available at that hour. An auto sort function will sort memories by band and frequencies, eliminating duplicates. Auto Tuning Storage (ATS) will automatically find and remember all stations available for a single band, or search all bands.
Single Side Band (SSB) is where the ham broadcaster uses only half (lower or upper) the channel that he would otherwise use. This allows more broadcasters in the same vicinity but sounds garbled without the proper decoder. This radio will allow you to understand them by choosing either the upper or lower side band (USB/LSB). You can then fine tune the broadcast with the fine tuning knob and reduce noise by choosing the best of 5 alternative band widths especially chosen for SSB mode. Typically, the Lower Side Band is used below 10MHz and the Upper Side Band is used above 10MHz.
Many other convenience features include a sleep timer, an alarm clock, 8 band widths, direct keypad entry, simple tone control, line-out for recording, a headphone jack, an internal ferrite bar AM antenna, and an external antenna jack.
In addition to the many features listed in the "Operation Manual", techies are delighted to find many more hidden features like Synchronous Detection, Dynamic Noise Reduction, Muting Threshold, Line Output Level, Calibration of SSB, Antenna Source, Firmware Version Display and date, "up" time, and charge time. Accessories include an Operation Manual, a lithium rechargeable battery, a long wire external antenna, a wall charger, and a very nice leatherette case. The knobs turn very smoothly with a nice damped motion and ergonomic placement.
SOME DRAWBACKS:
o Ideally, you would have a variable RF gain control to adjust radio sensitivity to the strength of the station. Instead, this radio has 3 position switch for Local, Normal, or DX reception.
o The sync detector is poor, hardly ever improving the reception.
o If you sort the memories, you lose the mode (e.g. USB/LSB).
o You must send the radio to Kaito to get a free firmware update; you cannot do it yourself.
o The frequencies and mode are memorized, but you cannot add text.
o FM sounds great in mono or stereo, but there is no RDS (Radio Data Service), or HD radio.
o Unlike more expensive radios, you cannot control this radio with your computer.
Just tuning randomly may not be rewarding. Get a phone app for Short Wave Listening or use your browser to find Shortwave Listening guides. Get away from electrical interference like your computer or USB charger. Try the long-wire antenna outside. Search for particular stations on their own frequencies and recommended times.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
Review of texsun 880 receiver.
I would refer the readers to my recent review of Grundig Yatchboy 400 PE where three yb 400 were compared to my new TEXSUN 880.
The YB 400 and the TEXSUN 880 were equal and EXCELENT in receiving broadcast AM FM stereo, and in short wave AM signals.
HOWEVER,on ham radio SSB signals when using only the telescoping antenna all three Grundig Yatchboy 400 had nuch weaker sensivity and could not pick up over 1/2 of the signals that were clearly understandable on the TEXSUN 880.
While the 3 yb 400 and theTEXUN 880 were equal in almost all uses the Texsun 880 is by far the stronger receiver for ham SSB reception.
I rate the TEXSUN 880 AS. 5/5.
John Jaggars II
WA5TEV Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: kaito-electroni...
good radio if you do not need the sync feature
The sync feature is useless as it is, but the radio nonetheless is a very good buy. The sound of the speaker is incredible for a radio of this size, and the main reason why I bought it. Also has a very good AM and FM reception for a radio of its size. Just hope it will get updated with sync.
update: My unit failed, AM medium wave reception is now impossible on the radio after less than 1 month.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
This is a very good product.
As a avid shortwave radio collector and also as a "Ham", I have compared the PL-880 performance with other similar portable receivers. With all things considered, the most outstanding feature I like is the ease in tuning SSB signals. Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
superb product
This is a superb product that met all my expectations. It stands up to and supports the excellent reviews received. Has smooth dial operation and the "super fine tuning" makes tuning SW side band a breeze. For SW reception, suggest using a long wire antenna for improved reception. User manual pretty good, but must be read CLOSELY numerous times to pick up the subtleties. Well designed and quality constructed.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
Nice radio, average reception.
Hi,
I found this to be a very nice radio. However, if you are expecting this to have better than average abilities to get DX stations, forget that. It's average.
I like everything else about it though.
It was worth the money I paid at $159, but the price went up $30 to $189,and I wouldn't have bought it at the higher price. Too bad about the price increase.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: kaito-electroni...
great radio
Lots of extras came packed with it like a spare battery, world map and case.
I cant tell the difference when the tone control is either on or off and there's very few SW stations nowadays but apart from that its got a fantastic sound.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: anon-co
Fun radio I will keep it
The radio works very nice , but the tuning both fine and regular and volume knobs seem to have tight spots as you rotate them, not smooth. If this were worse I would return it. Otherwise the radio is a joy to operate and listen to. The AGC could be a little faster, tends to distort the beginnings of words, my old Yacht Boy 400 never did that.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes • Condition: new • Sold by: kaito-electroni...