David Mills schrieb:

Hello..
I would like advice for buying a new shortwave radio (price range at or
under 100 $ US). My main interest is to get good reception for stations in
English and French from Canada and western Europe (I live in Northeastern
US).

so here are specific questions:
1) what are the features to look for?

Any decent SW rig had better be a dual conversion design. Virtually all
of them use PLL synthesizers these days. 5 kHz tuning steps would be
sufficient for pure broadcast listening, but in some (interference)
situations 1 kHz steps are useful as well.

is the external attenna jack really
important?

If you live in a region with not so great signal levels on shortwave,
it's recommended.

What makes some radios better than others?

Öh, *that*'s a long story:
Better selectivity (filters) and perhaps filter choice, better
sensitivity, less noisy PLL, wider AGC dynamic range, better strong
signal handling, better sound, presence of SSB and/or synch detection,
more presets, ... Frequency stability is pretty much a non-issue on the
PLL era. (A notable exception are radios with analog tuning and a
digital frequency display, like the Grundig S-350 and some very cheap
rigs.)

2) Can you give me feed back on the Grundig Yacht Boy 300? I have seen it
advertized for 80 dollars through Radioshack.com. Looks interesting..is it
good?

It's a single conversion design that overloads rather easily... Wouldn't
be one of my favorites.

3) I have an old short wave radio right now (10 + years old) and the
reception fades in and out a lot. Is that to be expected on short wave or do
just the older radios do that?

Fading is perfectly normal on shortwave; however, a receiver with better
sensitivity and better AGC can do more against it.

4) any specific reccommendations on a SW radio to buy?

I'd look at a Sangean ATS-606 or Kaito KA-1101 (Universal Radio has
both, for example). If you don't mind a used rig, have a look at Sony's
ICF-SW7600 or maybe even the newer ICF-SW7600G, or the Grundig YB400.
These are positioned a class above the mentioned new models and feature
SSB, partly plus selectable filters (Grundig) or synchronous detection
(SW7600G). The somewhat older SW7600 only tunes in 5 kHz steps, but
features a fine-tuning wheel (+/- 5kHz) even for AM.

Stephan
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