TECSUNPL880 Portable Digital PLL Dual Conversion AM/FM, Longwave & Shortwave Radio with SSB (Single Side Band) Reception, Color Silver

TLDR: Outstanding Audio Quality, Excellent Top-Notch Performance (sensitivity/selectivity-but with a controversial ssb/sync issue), Ease of Use, Rechargeable Battery Operation, Extreme Performance to Price Ratio, The Best Quality Control of Amazon Offerings.I have been into DXing since I was a kid cuz my dad had also been into radio when he was a kid, building crystal radios, etc. The original single store Radio Shack was in the city where I grew up and a weekend outing with my father to The Radio Shack was always an adventure. As a teen I had a Hallicrafters as a bedside radio.Skip to 1990's. Lived in a high rise with a balcony where I could set up an awesome antenna. Discovered E&B Electronics (now closed), a 20 minute drive from my home that sold top shelf SW,Ham Transceivers, UHF Scanners, but I eventually had to move to a condo with no balcony and had generally lost interest. In my storage closet are a Drake R8, an Icom IC-R7100 (unblocked), an AOR 3000A(unblocked), and an iconic Sony ICF-SW77.For the past 10 years my bedside radio has been a small portable 5 station preset Sony ICF-M410V that I paid $60 for. (It's still available on Amazon but the link is like a paragraph long). It served me well and had good sound from its 3" speaker. It's tuning knob now only goes in one direction so I decided to replace it.I have been studying the top battery operatable AM/FM/SW radios on Amazon for over a month. I must have watched at least 50 comparative videos on YouTube and concluded that the PL880 could not be beat performance wise and sound quality was important to me. (The PL 600 was right up there at the top of the performance scale, but my major use of the radio will be for FM listening and sound quality was of great importance to me.) Along with performance, the single factor that made me ulitamately zero in on this Tecsun PL880 was quality and quality control. Yeah, I'd like to have a Grundig 750 cuz it looks so cool, or a Sangean 909x cuz of it's display (but sub par performance without an outside antennae), or a CC Crane, but looking at all the reviews for those there were just too many peeps who received dead on arrivals or short-lived radios. The Tecsun has almost none that I saw. So when I saw the PL880 being offered for same day delivery yesterday I impulsively pulled the trigger and I am happy I did.This radio excudes the feel of quality. It's audio quality is nothing short of amazing. I keep a Grundig S3250DL on my desk. The Grundig is known for its excellent sound. If you were not doing a side by side comparison, unless you are tone deaf, you would have to admit that the audio quality from the PL880 is outstanding both for voice and music. It also can pump it out at room filling volumes. Side by side, while I can hear a subtle overall difference, the audio that the PL880 puts out is hard to distinguish from that of the Grundig. Kudos to Tecsun!While I am not yet fully familiar with the operation of the 880, 5 minutes after the battery was installed and fully charged I did a scan on the FM/AM/SW bands; 1.) FM Band - I was stunned at the number of stations that I had been missing with my Sony and the excellent radio I have in my car. All crystall clear; 2.) AM was ok but much better than expected.In the building where I live the way it is configured and the materials used to construct it AM is hardly worth the effort, yet the 880 pulled in quite a few stations well that I did not know existed; 3.) SW - Then I said what the hay and attached the included antenna, ran it across a window inside and did a SW scan. I expected nothing, but got 39 hits :-) Some were very strong and clear, but as they were all foreign speaking except one, I have no idea where they were broadcasting from. Looks like my DXng days have been revived.I do agree with those who say that the final top extension of the antenna is extremely thin and fragile. I wil not be extending the antenna its full length because of this . Also, having lived with this radio for a few days now, I find accessing stored channels somewhat cumbersome and anti-intuitive, but I gues that's the price you pay for having THREE THOUSAND storage channels :-)If you can spare the bucks and are looking for an outstanding sounding, battery operated, easily portable, handome looking radio (with the added benefits of SW/LW/Emergency Info. abilities), buy yourself a PL880 -You'll love it. The way I look at it, at my age if I can buy myself a thrill for $169 bucks it's a great deal :-)

I had read quite a bit about Kaito's latest addition to their line of fine, well built and well engineered line of small portable worldband radios. Being an amateur radio enthusiast and long-time shortwave listener myself, I am always looking for something new and exciting to add to my own collection of portable and tabletop receivers so, with that in mind as well as all of the positive feedback for this radio I went ahead and "took the plunge' and ordered one from Amazon.First off, I am an Amazon "Prime" subscriber so my little radio arrived within two days time; always a nice feature especially if you time it's arrival, as I did, to be right before a long, holiday weekend!The radio was sent through a company named "Electonnix". Great packaging, o bumps or bruises to the box or to the radio which was, (of course!), contained inside of the package and which upon visual inspection was in excellent condition.The radio itself is truly a small portable rig in all of the best senses of that definition.Packaged with the radio were the following:1. Ear buds2. USB chord (for recharging the battery)3. A small Lithium battery4.A reel type wire exension antenna5. User ManualThe radio works great, folks! Although the location I live in is not the best for any true long distance reception, this little radio, with the extra wire antenna extended, allowed me to listen to such far off shortwave broadcasters as Radio India, Radio Havanna, Radio Japan and many of the other more well known world band broadcasters as well!The radio does NOT come with a "wall wort",( i.e. an AC charger!) It recharges the battery through the use of a small USB chord that can be plugged into any computer OR connected to the power plug of virtually any cellphone, Ipod or tablet charger!The controls on this radio are pretty straight forward! Nice tunning knob as well as a fine tuning knob located directly beneath of it! The tone of this radio is both rich and pleasant to the ear, unlike so many other of the other small portable radios out there in the marketplace!There are quite a few "hidden features" associated with this radio that I have read about on the various radio sites out there on the internet, (the synchronous detector, the muting feature, firmware version indicator, etc.) To be honest, I haven't gotten around to searching out those features as of yet. I plan on doing that very soon!In conclusion I can only say that, given the price for this little radio, and knowing something about the quality of Kaito built radios I have owned in the past, I do not hesitate to recommend this little gem to anyone out there looking for a well built, smaller portable world ban radio!Happy DXing!