Ken ) writes:
I have a Grundig YB400 for BCB and shortwave listening while away from
home.

I have seen claims that the Superadio I is an extraordinary BCB
receiver. Is the difference between the performance of the YB400 and
the Superadio I significant enough to justify lugging a second radio?

Ken KC2JDY

I think the suggestion about the Superradio is due to many not having
experience with anything better, and there's then an almost knee-jerk reaction
everytime someone asks "what's a good AM/FM broadcast radio".

The Superradio is a fairly traditional single conversion receiver with
a 455KHz IF for AM. I gather they don't even use a ceramic filter in
the AM IF. It can't be all that great. The big thing is that it has
a decent speaker for a portable, and a longer loopstick which may or
may not help reception. It's analog tuned.

The YB400 is double conversion, has digital tuning, and the circuitry intended
for good shortwave reception is used in the AM broadcast band. It has
two IF bandwidths, and it's pretty likely that the ceramic filters used
will provide better skirt selectivity for AM broadcast band reception.

In other words, if you have the better receiver the Superradio likely
won't add anything. And if you have nothing, the reason the Superradio
gets mentioned is because it's not as expensive as something better, and
many stop at the SUperradio.

I am tempted by the YB400 this week, immediately for the AM broadcast
band coverage. I could make use of the better selectivity. I use a
Delco digitally tuned car radio as my bedside radio, and it is a pretty
decent radio. If it used a 455KHz IF instead of a 450KHz IF, I'd pull
a ceramic filter from a CB set to get better selectivity, so I could
once again receive WBZ (I lost being able to receive it some years back
when a local 1040KHz station started up; the selectivity on the Delco
is good, but not good enough for this case).

Michael