About the CCRANE Radio quality discussion here...
I have been an active Radio enthusiast for many years, beginning about
1980. I purchased items from CCRANE when I was a younger, smaller
company, when Bob Crane was actively running
the company. In fact, I spoke to Bob several times over the phone. He
was a true radio enthusiast. In fact, I had a hand in
Bob's decision to engineer and design a killer AM\FM\TV\WX radio.
The main goal was a high quality AM radio geared for people who
listen mainly to talk and sports radio.

The first result was the rather ugly looking CCRANE RADIO. Bob made
one mistake, a big one I think. He had Sangean radio of
Taiwan make the CCRANE. Bob was the top reseller of Sangean
radios in American. He made several trips to the offices and
plant in Taiwan and he seemed quite taken by Sangean. I do
not know why. He was a radio expert and he had excellent
engineers working with him. He had to know the serious down
sides of Sangean, which remain today.

I can say this. CCRANE is not the company it was under Bob
CCRANE. I miss him and our periodic conversations. I have
had NO conversations with whomever took over CCRANE
and stopped buying from CCRANE shortly after Bob was gone.
It did not take long for the company to fall into hype and
slick salesmanship. It is my opinion that CCRANE today does
something the founder never did, namely like off the name.

To Bob's credit Sangean offer a high quality product. The huge
downside is Sangean practices post 1950s American planned
(engineered) internal product self-destruction. I owned all their
flagship SW radios of the 90s. NOT ONE lasted longer than
a couple years. I bought three units of the 808ATS and gave them away
as gifts to some business associates. All three
were dead within three years, within the same month. The
cause was exactly the same. A built-in mother board weakness
cut off audio. Everything worked. Just no audio output!

The CCRANE Radio and CCRANE PLUS are Sangean made.
They self-destruct within about 4 years. Same problems in
them all, the led display fails so you cannot read frequencies.
I have two I keep working by dedicating them. Each one
remains permanently on a particular AM and a particular FM
frequency. The buttons on top self-destruct, which kills
some functions totally.

I bought the classics, Grundig 700 and Sony 2010 about when
I bought the first CCRANE RADIOs. I sold them this year, after
many years of use for twice what I paid for them. All of my
Sangeans are long dead and trashed. I had 6 flagship Sangeans. All
were useless within three to four years.

People try to buy my small Grundigs from me, YB400, YB305, etc. When
Radio Shack was still a great name in radio and other electrnic items,
Tandy and Realistic engineers dictated
specs to companies that made their radios for them, which is
was old Radio Shack, Realistic, and Tandy items are in
demand today. If you want a good Sangean, buy a used
one with one of the Radio Shack brands on them. Radio
Shack did not tolerate Sangean planned self-destruction
nonsense in radios with a Radio Shack Brand on it.

The two newer CCRANE shortwave radios, the CCRANE
Pocket SW Radio ($49) and the CCRANE Shortwave Radio
($149) are not Sangean. They are respectively the Redsun
RP2100 & the Redsun RP300, both excellent buys directly
from China. The main seller on eBay (with 100% positive
Feedback) charges $29 for the RP300 and $59 for the
RP2100. Universal Radio also sells the Redsun 2100
rebranded by Kaito as the Kaito KA2100 for $99.

CCRANE hypes its radios and it over prices them. The
2100 is an excellent portable shortwave radio, especially for a mere
$99. Universal is also a much better company than
CCRANE. Universal is a straight shooter. The family that owns and runs
Universal has not gone over to the dark side of
business. At CCRANE, you get salesmen and all that brings.
You will even get order takers who are very ignorant and
rude. At Universal you can still get polite people who know
their products.

--Bruised