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Short wave radio
Can anyone recommend a reliable and effecive short wave radio ? Will be doing an overland trip from Tunisia down to SA and would like to get daily radio updates from either CNN or the BBC.
Heard the Sony SW7600 isn't a bad bet. Tks Garren |
I've used the Sony radio as well as the branded equivalent commissioned by Dixons in the UK (30 quid or so). In Africa the World service comes out clear as a bell on both and is especially clear in the Sahara. Reception in Africa is much much clearer than in Europe. Some countries transmit the world service on FM as well.
Richard |
Hi,
Sony shortwaves are very reliable - a relatively cheap and good one is the ICF-SW11. I also use the ICF-7600G which is excellent. The Grundig "Yacht Boy" range is also supposed to be good. An excellent alternative that is now reasonably priced is the "WorldSpace" range of digital recievers. We have a Sony DSB-WS1000 which is the size of a large portable cassette tape player. It will run off 4.5V DC or batteries and gives crystal clear stereo sound. It will pick up the BBC World Service, CNN, other news channels and a number of music channels which are all free to air. There will also be a number of subscription services offered, I think that some are currently available in Kenya. You can use it right through Africa, Asia and most of South and Central America and the USA. The rest of the world is not yet covered by the WorldSpace satellites. There area couple of advantages to having a shortwave. The Worldspace receiver can only get one "channel". So for example if you have a short wave radio, you can listen to BBC world service broadcasting to Africa, South Asia etc., Wolrdspace will only give you the Africa broadcast. Also, the shortwave will give you access to other English language broadcasts eg. from Germany and the Netherlands, which will give you a different angle on the same news event. Cheers, Andy [This message has been edited by Andyk (edited 01 June 2001).] |
The Roberts Radios are fantastic - I carry this one
Roberts Radio : R9962 which came with a decent carry case and a BBC World Service frequency guide (incidentally if you want one of these drop me a PM). and as you can see from this page Roberts Radio : World Radio they've got a wide range of options of World Radios - they cover the whole SW frequency range as well as LW, MW and FM. Clear beautiful sound and one set of batteries did me an hour every morning and two each evening for three weeks and it's still happy as larry. m |
Yes a shortwave radio is great! Its like a book which never ends.....I never travel without one...
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I should also have pointed you in the direction of this too
BBC World Service - Radio Schedules & Frequencies m |
I've got one of these:
http://www.ecodigital.co.uk/estore/i...adio-photo.jpg A Freeplay Summit. Possibly a bit expensive, but you'll never have to buy batteries again, a minute's winding really does give you an hour of listening. FM/AM/SW/LW, digital tuning which seems to work fine, 30 presets which is useful if you have Matt's guide, and of course it's oh so green, greener than Leonardo de Caprio in a Prius in fact. |
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m |
Radios
I also use a wind -up ... no leaking batteries / flat batteries and free power :-) ...
cheers Matt |
It is a great bit of kit like you say, and if you're an avid devourer of radio both home and abroad I'd thoroughly recommend it. Sure at home you could use the mains to power a radio, but there's nothing I like better than being sat in the garden, one quick wind and it's ready.
I reckon it's paid for itself already in my house. |
Wow Roberts have quite a selection don't they will have to look harder.
My last radio (FM/AM only) was a wind up but given I am carry a charger anyway for camera, head torch etc it made no difference and annoyed me that it would only last 10mins - guess it was a cheap version! paul ps. Just enjoying the show, Alexlebrit :-) |
another vote for Roberts, ive been using this digital R876 for a few years - nice and compact, excellent speaker and lots of great features, also comes with a mains adaptor - so its handy in the kitchen at home in between trips....
Roberts Radio : R876 its a bit pricey compared to the sonys - but i managed to find a nearly new one on Eblag for £50 Later Gipper |
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Is this a windup? |
Being a radio ham I have a little bit of experience in radio related topics. I own one of these little things and can vouch for it's reliability and excellent coverage -
Amazon.co.uk: Sony ICF-SW100E Super Compact World Band Receiver: Electronics & Photo The Sony ICF SW100E has been around a while and has many fans throughout the world. It's not much larger than a packet of cigarettes. |
Features you need
Greetings Garren
Being a news junkie I've also taken a short wave radio with me when ever I've travelled overseas over the last 20 years although with the internet the need for it has been reduced. I don't know what's on the market these days, I have an old Sony ICF-SW1 but I would highly recommend that whatever you get it has the following features 1) Digital tuning with auto scanning feature- You press a button and it will scan through the channels until it finds a signal. This works much better that having to manually tune through a band. 2) Push button memories to store the stations you do find 3) A DX/Local switch to be able to reduce the receiver sensitivity so the channel scanning doesn't only picks up strong signals and not noise 4) The receivers usually have a clock built in. Ideally it should have the ability have two time zones programmed into it. One for local time so you can use it as an alarm clock and the other time zone to be set to UTC (GMT) which is what broadcasters use for there programming schedule. I wish my ICF had that feature but apart from that it works very well. Good Luck Ian J |
Oh forgot to add, the Freeplay I've got also has a solar panel, which is nice for those sunny days you can't be bothered to wind it up, a little wind up wire antenna which improves things on shortwave and an AC adaptor to charge it, with a nice range of plug adaptors, so it should plug in almost anywhere. If I could throw add anything to it it'd be a 12V cigarette lighter charger, but really that's just being lazy.
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I've found that any digital scanning radio eats batteries. If possible I stick to manual tuning.
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Good point - cheers for letting me know :-)
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SW Radio
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You won't hear CNN on a shortwave radio. Mostly BBC and religious broadcasters now.
Jim, WW9H |
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