In article , abc@
123.com says...
Hi,

I have wanted to get involved with shortwave for years and would like to get
some recommendations on a mid-range ($200-400) receiver and antenna set-up.
I plan on telescoping mast for shortwave, TV (mostly for uhf PBS stuff), and
FM. The height restriction in our town is 50' but I imagine anything around
30' would produce good results since there are no big hills or trees nearby.
In addition I own a newer 2.8 GHz PC running Windows XP for any
recommendations on how I might incorporate this into the overall set-up.

Being inexperienced I am thinking I should start with simply listening with
a capable mid-range receiver and then after some years time buy into a
transmitter as well. This is all untutored preliminary thinking on my part
and would welcome anyone's ideas as to how a beginner could best get started
on the road to mid-to-high end shortwave/ham listening/broadcasting. I see
this initial step as phase one of a two or three part program that will
extend over a period of five or ten years.

Thank you for your help.

Steve

Note: I will be buying "Passport to World Band Radio" as a way of educating
myself on some of the issues I mentioned




For about $400, you can buy any of the following on the used market
(ebay) without working too hard at it.

ICOM R70a
ICOM R71A
Icom R75 (cutting it close, but you can probably find one for less than
400)
JRC NRD525 (again, cutting it close, but on SSB it's the best of this
bunch). The best ergonomics by a mile. Needs an external speaker, dont
bother with the JRC ones, just use anything available, it will at least
equal the 525's matching speaker. This thing was almost 1200 bucks new.

Yaesu Frg7700 I would put this a notch below any of the above.
Yaesu Frg8800 This one too.



BDK