Just got my "new" Sony ICF-7601, which can be seen as the "last of the
analogs" in the "7600" line. Boy, that thing was dirty, must have been a
workshop radio or such (lots of brownish dust inside and some paint dots
outside - but it still works, apart from the small LED for the MW
button; well, it's a SONY). So, after ripping it all apart and cleaning
things up, I gave it a go.
Nice sound via the speaker, and when you plug in some good headphones
(not plugging those in the whole way will give you audio on both sides
for stereo ones) you quickly notice why: Bass expansion. Still, nice to
listen to music with. The tone control does a good job, with normal bass
and noticeably dampened highs in the "NEWS" position.
The overall feel is quite good, even if my SW7600G is heavier.
Scales: Quite accurate on SW2-10 (about 10-15 kHz low on 49m, and
virtually spot on on 13m), decent on SW1 (larger range), fair on MW, too
little marks on FM.
Off to some DX side by side with the ICF-SW7600G (both on the whip):
* SW1, 75 meters: Both are about equal, with a slight nod towards the
7601.
* SW3, 49 meters: Separation of Deutsche Welle (6075) and Bayerischer
Rundfunk (6085) not a problem. Looks like two stations 5 kHz apart
would be more critical. No comparison to 7600G here yet.
* SW10, 13 meters: RAE on 21700 comes in quite listenable on the 7601
and even lights the TUNE indicator sometimes, while it's barely
audible above the noise of the SW7600G! Amazing. Gotta love these
analogs - the 7600G is a "quiet" rig for its price, but it looks like
the muddiness in the audio of weaker stations (as already noted in
comparison to the AR7030 with its very quiet DDS synth) can be
attributed to its PLL. Not a problem for the 7601.
* MW: Gets RTL on 1440 quite well, interference on the same frequency
is more of a problem than sensitivity, ferrite rod seems reasonably
directional.
* FM: Does receive there . Selectivity is not as good as on the
7600G, but the latter got 110/150 kHz filters recently so that would
be an unfair comparison.
* Drift: Not really noticed so far, if you tune to a frequency the
receiver pretty much stays there.
* Quite sensitive to user-antenna contact. Haven't experimented with
"more antenna" much yet.

I'll do more tests later this evening, but so far it looks quite good
for the 7601. Of course it doesn't have the synch detection, SSB, FM
stereo and digital readout that the 7600G has, but as a no-frills
receiver it seems to perform quite well so far. I'll be looking out for
images on 60m.

Stephan
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Never played with a 7600 but the 7601 is the first receiver I ever bought
(in 1990). Since then I've seen 10 other boxes come and some go. The 7601
is the one I always held onto if not for any reason to turn on and do analog
surfing, just looking for something to listen to. Yeah, there are a few
stations that broadcast between the fixed bands but all in all, it's a great
radio. Back in the first gulf war, CNN would show a picture of a shortwaver
radio when getting a voice only feed from Arnett, it was a 7601. Oh, one
last point, the 4 AA batteries last forever.




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Final Verdict:

* Sensitivity: The ICF-7601 is definitely more sensitive in AM than the
7600G, even with a shorter whip. Interesting! (The 7600G was tested
with the same batteries once, made no real difference vs. the
rechargeables it normally uses.) Could get Radio Australia on 13620
quite listenably shortly after 2200z when the same signal was still
stuck in the mud on the 7600G (only audible in SSB).
* Selectivity: Can't keep up with the 7600G and its excellent 7 kHz
(real) filter (-60dB/-6dB: ~2), but still sufficient to separate two
stations 5 kHz apart halfway well. (Such as a station on 5960 kHz in
?Japanese? from a stronger one on 5955 around 0330z this morning.)
* Images: Found none that could be attributed to the 2nd IF (which
indicates good filtering and not particularly high RF leakage on the
rather low 1st IF), BUT the upper 41m and 31m bands are plagued with
images from the FM band. Even the BBC on 9410 is affected here. I
guess that's because of 10.7 MHz used as 1st IF coupled with
insufficient (or even nonexistant) switched lowpass filtering when
tuned to a SW band. Someone with a service manual please clear this
up.
* Stability: Can't really get the thing to drift much, even by warming
up manually (literally . If you tune to a station, it pretty much
stays there. Backlash on the tuning knob is a few kHz, not
particularly bothersome in most cases.
* Scales: Not off by more than 10-15 kHz in most cases.
* Coverage: All the SW broadcasting bands from 120m to 13m including
21m (22m), good.
* Construction: Noticeably cheaper on 7601 (price issue), but still
decent. Had to loosen 4 screws (3 outside + 1 in battery compartment)
to get the back off, one more (again, in the battery compartment) to
get the front off (along with some fiddling).
* Battery life: Came with 4 Panasonic batteries (nothing special)
marked with 2006 - does that mean 1996 or 2001 mfg date? Well, since
the 7600A already ran around 40 hours on normal batteries I'll assume
the 7601 will do similarly well.

Stephan
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Home: http://stephan.win31.de/ | Webm.: http://www.i24.com/
PC#6: i440LX, 2xCel300A, 448 MB, 18 GB, ATI AGP 32 MB, 110W
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Updated summary put up on
http://stephan.win31.de/sony7600.htm#icf7601_addinfo

Stephan
--
Home: http://stephan.win31.de/ | Webm.: http://www.i24.com/
PC#6: i440LX, 2xCel300A, 448 MB, 18 GB, ATI AGP 32 MB, 110W
This is a SCSI-inside, Legacy-plus, TCPA-free computer
Reply to newsgroup only. | See home page for working e-mail address.