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- Verified Buyer
This is a fantastic little radio. I am very impressed with its performance. I own approximately 50 radios of all kinds, tube, old transistor, shortwave, modern/digital, you name it. So, I know what I am talking about. This one does the job. It receives firmly with high sensitivity and locks in the stations on all bands.In the FM band, it receives all strong stations in the urban area that other, much more sophisticated radios do with its own small whip antenna about 8 inches long. I did not try the difficult to get stations, since I don't listen to them. There is no hiss, no static, no weakening of the reception when you move around.In the AM band, I tested it in the evening, and the dial was full of all kind of stations, local and long range. It can be difficult to understand where the radio it is tuned to in the tiny dial until the radio stations announce themselves. For instance, the WSM, Nashville, TN 450 miles away was heard like it was next door. Other stations from New York, Boston, Chicago, around 700+ miles away were heard loud and clear, much better than in other much more expensive receivers. I am not sure how it can perform so well with it supposedly tiny ferrite antenna. (I did not take in apart to look inside). The size of the radio is like a cigarette pack.NOAA band, a bonus, two NOAA channels were heard loud and clear, better than in the Radioshack "Crystal Controlled" dedicated NOAA radio.The sound quality was decent for the small (around 2 inch diameter) speaker size. It does not sound tiny at all. Much better sound quality comes from the headphones jack, which makes listening a pleasure.From how it tunes to the stations, it gives me the impression that it is a DSP radio, even though it is not advertised as such. It locks in the stations and kind of jumps to the next one without much static in between, like when the FM AFC is engaged in the old analogue radios. DSP makes all stations with a signal level above a given threshold to be heard with the same strength, which is mostly good, but it makes difficult identifying them from the tiny dial. This explains the exceptional performance of this radio for the size and the price ($20). There is no drift when the stations are tuned in.The only cons I have is the tiny dial that I mentioned above. But hey, what do you expect from an analogue looking radio of the size of a cigarette pack in that price range? It is supposed to be an emergency and funny/gadget radio that you can take anywhere, hiking, biking, walking around and enjoying your life. And you can have the weather condition notices at your fingertips.Very highly recommended.
