"Jay" wrote in message
. ..
You have to realize that all analog radios drift somewhat. Some say the
S-350 drifts more than most, but it is my belief that the main reason for
this is that you can SEE the drift on the digital display. I own several
analog radios (GE SRIII, Zenith Trans-Oceanics (tube and transistor) and
several small portables and find that they ALL drift audibly under some
conditions. Drift seems to be most the higher you go in frequency, so on
the
GE SRIII, I don't notice any drift at the low end of the dial but there is
drift I can hear at the high end of the dial. If I can hear the drift
enough
to have to retune it I can only imagine that, if the radio were equipped
with a digital readout, it would be on the order of 10 to 20 KHz near the
top of the am band.

On shortwave drift is noticeable to an even greater degree. On my
Trans-Oceanics (all well esteemed radios), if I tune to the BBC at 15190
when the set is first tuned in, I can hear the frequency drift during the
first 10 to 15 minutes of operation and when I retune slightly, the signal
comes back in.

The S-350 was designed to give a lot of performance for the money, and I
don't think anyone can deny it surely does. Also, recent production (I
think
the date of manufacture starting around April of 2003) has a small change
to
help minimize drift when the radio is kept plugged into the AC by keeping
one critical IC at operating temperature. I don't use mine plugged in,
though, and I still find the drift is within the first few minutes of
operation. A small amount of drift is normal, and generally I think the
whole drift issue has been blown way out of proportion.

Just my two cent's worth!



I have an S350 and I totally agree with the above assessment. I've been
listening to shortwave since the early 1970's, so, I've used a number of
analogically-tuned radios in my time. People like me who have are generally
not fazed or surprised by a bit of drift like that. It's expected. Since the
350 has both an analog tuner AND a seemingly very accurate digital frequency
readout, the drifting is just more obvious because of it. Retuning was
always expected and even part of the fun in the old days. Just retune it
occasionally when you have to, and enjoy the great performance of this
radio. It's hard to beat for the price. Just as an example, a couple of
summers ago, I returned three Sat-800's because I wasn't satisfied with
them. But, I'm not letting go of this S350. I absolutely love it! I find
digitally-tuned radios boring, and I hate scanning through the bands with
those things.
Pete