Between the late 1970s-mid-1980s - the classic box era - 3 out of 5
portable radio-cassette boxes featured at least SW1 and SW2. Some
had fine as well as regular tuning, and the largest sets had external
antenna posts on the back or side, supplementing the one or two
telescopic masts. Panasonic's and Sony's U.S. lineups of those years,
were most likely to have only the 'mainstream' bands: AM and FM,
for whatever reason. Sanyo, JVC, Golden, Rising, and LaSonic had
shortwaves on nearly their entire lineups, from shoe box sized up to
a suitcase!


What, if any, were your experiences with the world bands on some of
those radios? Overall sensitivity, ease of tuning(not too much overshoot
when turning the knob)? Drifting? etc.

On Wed, 29 Jun 2016, wrote:

Between the late 1970s-mid-1980s - the classic box era - 3 out of 5
portable radio-cassette boxes featured at least SW1 and SW2. Some
had fine as well as regular tuning, and the largest sets had external
antenna posts on the back or side, supplementing the one or two
telescopic masts. Panasonic's and Sony's U.S. lineups of those years,
were most likely to have only the 'mainstream' bands: AM and FM,
for whatever reason. Sanyo, JVC, Golden, Rising, and LaSonic had
shortwaves on nearly their entire lineups, from shoe box sized up to
a suitcase!


What, if any, were your experiences with the world bands on some of
those radios? Overall sensitivity, ease of tuning(not too much overshoot
when turning the knob)? Drifting? etc.

What are you expecting to find?

I remember being somewhere and the boombox had shortwave but I don't
remember if I could hear anything on it.

But before boomboxes, there were plenty of portable radios that included
shortwave to some extent. Not just the Transoceanincs (and the choice of
tubes or transistors) but it just went on. SOme were good, but likely all
limited compared to a "desktop" radio. Some were average or bad, not a
surprise since you could get cheap transistor "desktop" shortwave radios
that were at that level too. I think in many cases, it was something
tacked on without adding too much to the cost. They may have been aimed
at certain markets where shortwave was more common (not the hobbyist
market, but certain parts of the world where shortwave is more common).

I've found a few portable radios with shortwave built in in the past
decade at garage sales, and I'd say none are all that great. They may be
better than my 1971 Hallicrafters S-120A (the one with transistors) but
that's not saying much, you couldn't get a worse receiver.

Most portables with shortwave were not that special. Even the Zenith
Transoceanics were relatively simple ciruitry. BUt it was a different
time, lots of people wanting shortwave just to listen to the BBC or
whatever, probably not identifying as "hobbyist".

The one portable that stands out is the Barlow Wadley XCR-30 (I think it
was) the portable out of SOuth Africa that tuned in 500KHz segments, so
the tuning readout was consistent from band to band, and tuning was easy
since it was very spread out. But that wasn't a low end receiver.



The real leap forward was digital tuning, Sony bringing out the 2001 in
the early eighties. That knocked out a lot of problems, but also it
introduced a more common level of double conversion, so a lot less images.
They were costly enough initially to be decent receivers, and as time
progressed that sort of circuitry and specs became the norm at a much
lower cost.

So now you can get a shortwave portable, nice and small, for under a
hundred dollars that is still a pretty good receiver. No fussing over
where you are tuned, no backlash as you tune, they generally are more
selective than the average portable of decades ago. They will beat the
average boombox with shortwave.

Michael

Michael Black:

I guess my point in bringing it is that, although
the quality of the world band experience on
your typical ghetto blasted likely varied compared
to that on a dedicated receiver, it was one of
many features slowly eliminated from boomboxes
from the late eighties onwards.

The dumbing down continued for three straight
decades, with graphic EQs, shortwave, phono
and aux inputs, external antenna posts, and even
the loss of Bass, Treble, and balance on boxes.


Plus, they transformed from relatively straight-
forward, good looks, into something from outer
space! Common-sense layout of volume, tone,
function selector, bands, playback control, and
external sourcd hookups morphed into weird
symbols and icons on an exterior that resembled
a flying saucer or a Maserati.

On 6/30/16 08:35 , Michael Black wrote:
On Wed, 29 Jun 2016, wrote:

Between the late 1970s-mid-1980s - the classic box era - 3 out of 5
portable radio-cassette boxes featured at least SW1 and SW2. Some
had fine as well as regular tuning, and the largest sets had external
antenna posts on the back or side, supplementing the one or two
telescopic masts. Panasonic's and Sony's U.S. lineups of those years,
were most likely to have only the 'mainstream' bands: AM and FM,
for whatever reason. Sanyo, JVC, Golden, Rising, and LaSonic had
shortwaves on nearly their entire lineups, from shoe box sized up to
a suitcase!


What, if any, were your experiences with the world bands on some of
those radios? Overall sensitivity, ease of tuning(not too much
overshoot
when turning the knob)? Drifting? etc.

What are you expecting to find?

I remember being somewhere and the boombox had shortwave but I don't
remember if I could hear anything on it.

But before boomboxes, there were plenty of portable radios that included
shortwave to some extent. Not just the Transoceanincs (and the choice
of tubes or transistors) but it just went on. SOme were good, but
likely all limited compared to a "desktop" radio. Some were average or
bad, not a surprise since you could get cheap transistor "desktop"
shortwave radios that were at that level too. I think in many cases, it
was something tacked on without adding too much to the cost. They may
have been aimed at certain markets where shortwave was more common (not
the hobbyist market, but certain parts of the world where shortwave is
more common).

I've found a few portable radios with shortwave built in in the past
decade at garage sales, and I'd say none are all that great. They may
be better than my 1971 Hallicrafters S-120A (the one with transistors)
but that's not saying much, you couldn't get a worse receiver.

Most portables with shortwave were not that special. Even the Zenith
Transoceanics were relatively simple ciruitry. BUt it was a different
time, lots of people wanting shortwave just to listen to the BBC or
whatever, probably not identifying as "hobbyist".

The one portable that stands out is the Barlow Wadley XCR-30 (I think it
was) the portable out of SOuth Africa that tuned in 500KHz segments, so
the tuning readout was consistent from band to band, and tuning was easy
since it was very spread out. But that wasn't a low end receiver.



The real leap forward was digital tuning, Sony bringing out the 2001 in
the early eighties. That knocked out a lot of problems, but also it
introduced a more common level of double conversion, so a lot less
images. They were costly enough initially to be decent receivers, and as
time progressed that sort of circuitry and specs became the norm at a
much lower cost.

So now you can get a shortwave portable, nice and small, for under a
hundred dollars that is still a pretty good receiver. No fussing over
where you are tuned, no backlash as you tune, they generally are more
selective than the average portable of decades ago. They will beat the
average boombox with shortwave.

Michael




The T/O's were good radios. But not exceptional. By selecting a
particularly quick, but smooth, AVC time constant, and a very deep
threshold, they appeared to have more sensitivity than they actually
had. But selectivity was nothing to write home about. That said, they
got the job done on the internal, or an external, antenna, and the audio
was better than average.

Grundig's Satellit 600 and 650 Professional radios, were quite another
story. Good performance, three modes of selectivity, sensitive - but not
so much so that they'd overload easily, and they had an automatic
preselector, that, if the mechanism was well maintained, worked quite
well. And audio was outstanding.

Few boombox style radios were great receivers. These were exceptions,
but I wouldn't exactly call them boomboxes.

Now, Hallicrafters made a series that competed on cosmetics with the
T/O's -- The TW series. And these were excellent radios. Same tube
complement, for the most part, but with far superiour circuit design.
And dramatically better audio. They made a solid state model, too -- WR
series. And some were no better than the S-120, but a couple were also
excellent radios, again with good selectivity and great audio. Picked
one of these up at a flea market a few years ago.

As stated above, digital tuning made for a better result in digging a
desired signal out of a crowded band, but many digital tuning systems
brought phase noise, and some digital hash, to the party, which
compromised performance on lesser models. But what digital tuning did
do, was allow for much bigger performance in a much smaller package.

D. Peter Maus wrote: "Few boombox style radios were great receivers. These
were exceptions, but I wouldn't exactly call them boomboxes."

I think there is some confusion over just what
portables I'm referring to here. Please view the
following:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com...87512ce7c6.jpg


Colloquially, the terms "boom box" or "blaster" were
used to describe them. And the vast majority of the
ones from the era I described had shortwave
reception - including this Panasonic - an unusual
example from this make that does have SW bands.


Typically 18-30" wide, 5-20" tall, and weighing
between 5 to 45lbs, they all fit the general
characteristics of the one I posted the link to. One
or more cassette decks, two large speakers behind
characteristic round grilles, mounted in plastic
cases of which most were some variation of the
color gray. Some larger examples could detach the
speakers.


This does not include what you and others might
think I'm referring to: pocket and table-top dedicated
multi-band radios, typically mono sound, less than
8" wide and under 5" tall.


Now that "boom box" has been clarified, you can
see why I find them so desirable: Everything in
one convenient package. So once mo

What are your impressions from any experience
you may have had tuning in to shortwave on boom boxes?

wrote:

Between the late 1970s-mid-1980s - the classic box era - 3 out of 5
portable radio-cassette boxes featured at least SW1 and SW2. Some
had fine as well as regular tuning, and the largest sets had external
antenna posts on the back or side, supplementing the one or two
telescopic masts. Panasonic's and Sony's U.S. lineups of those years,
were most likely to have only the 'mainstream' bands: AM and FM,
for whatever reason. Sanyo, JVC, Golden, Rising, and LaSonic had
shortwaves on nearly their entire lineups, from shoe box sized up to
a suitcase!


What, if any, were your experiences with the world bands on some of
those radios? Overall sensitivity, ease of tuning(not too much overshoot
when turning the knob)? Drifting? etc.


I've got a big JVC boombox. 2 SW bands and they're excessively drifty,
typical of radios with plastic dielectric tuning caps. I never used it
enough to become familiar with the finer points of it's performance.

If I recall, it seemed it's sensitivity was OK but it's selectivity was
too broad for good SW performance. Probably well suited for strong
signal AM BCB reception.

The dial tracked poorly with the actual frequency. I touched up the
alignment and band 1 came out reasonably well but the trimmer for band 2
didn't quite have enough capacitance to get the high end spot on.
Although I'm sure it would be an easy fix, I didn't much care. Although
I think I cared more than JVC did.

thanks analogdial:
"I've got a big JVC boombox. 2 SW bands and they're excessively
drifty, typical of radios with plastic dielectric tuning caps. I
never used it "

That's what I'm after! Still, the fact that those
boxes did have bands besides AM and FM
shows how far we've... regressed?

I would collect a few more medium to
monster sized used ones, but the prices asked
for the better brands: JVC, Rising, Golden,
etc, are ridiculous - almost twice their
msrp when new decades ago.

wrote:

thanks analogdial:
"I've got a big JVC boombox. 2 SW bands and they're excessively
drifty, typical of radios with plastic dielectric tuning caps. I
never used it "

That's what I'm after! Still, the fact that those
boxes did have bands besides AM and FM
shows how far we've... regressed?

Adding SW bands is inexpensive but I doubt it added to boom box sales.
Boom boxes are normally used as portable music sources. Can't call it
regression if the bulk of the customers didn't care.


I would collect a few more medium to
monster sized used ones, but the prices asked
for the better brands: JVC, Rising, Golden,
etc, are ridiculous - almost twice their
msrp when new decades ago

Like most collectables, the prices will peak, then decline. Eventually,
people who want that sort of stuff will have all they can handle.
Later, their families will get rid of them cheap at estate sales and the
thrift store.

On Saturday, July 2, 2016 at 9:22:27 AM UTC-4, analogdial wrote:


Like most collectables, the prices will peak, then decline. Eventually,
people who want that sort of stuff will have all they can handle.
Later, their families will get rid of them cheap at estate sales and the
thrift store.


Based on what I've seen at Goodwills and Salvation
Army stores within 50 miles of my house, plus a large
outdoor flea market that operates most Sundays
from April-October, I think that cycle of the
sales life of old blasters has run its course.


I'll just toggle buy-it-now on E-Bay and start saving
up.

On Saturday, July 2, 2016 at 9:28:34 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Saturday, July 2, 2016 at 9:22:27 AM UTC-4, analogdial wrote:


Like most collectables, the prices will peak, then decline. Eventually,
people who want that sort of stuff will have all they can handle.
Later, their families will get rid of them cheap at estate sales and the
thrift store.


Based on what I've seen at Goodwills and Salvation
Army stores within 50 miles of my house, plus a large
outdoor flea market that operates most Sundays
from April-October, I think that cycle of the
sales life of old blasters has run its course.


I'll just toggle buy-it-now on E-Bay and start saving
up.

Vintage thingys aren't selling so good nowadays,perhaps it is the economy. Many home consumer radios from as far back as the 1930s, or earlier,radios,table models and floor models, had some Shortwave bands.