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Up to now I didn’t buy a Tecsun PL-880 because of the distortion of SSB reception caused by the too slow AGC attack. I surely hope this will be improved in the PL-990.
Based upon the history of the PL-880: Potential buyers are advised to probably wait for a couple of hardware (and firmware) revs on this model until things are stable.
the video say that is engineering version PL-990,,(test version), used 18650 battery including blue tooth, TF card play function. manufacturer sent PL990 to radio tester for software de-bug now. may be will public in end of Oct.
I have the PL-880, so I’ll base my comments on comparing the 990 to 880.
Pros:
All the buttons are on the front – no need to look at either end of the radio
for the switches.
They kept the three tuning knobs. Of all the radios I own, the placement and ease of use
of these knobs can’t be beat. They just naturally fall under my thumb when holding
the radio.
Hopes:
Better all around performance. Although the performance of the 880
is very good, we can always use more.
Cons:
MP3 Player only. It should record. It’s a waste of engineering to include a player only.
I have a cell phone for playing mp3.
No Bluetooth TRANSMITTER! I would love to be able to transmit the audio to
my Bluetooth speakers. It seems that whenever Bluetooth is include it’s to make the
radio into a dumb Bluetooth speaker. (Ie the Elton BT Field Radio).
No way to add alpha tags to the memories. While I love the ATS to scan for stations,
I would like to have some permanent memory with Alpha Tags. It’s amazing that
every Ham Radio HT I have owned for the past twenty years had the ability for
memory alpha tags. But almost no shortwave receivers do.
And if I had Memory Tags, I would want to be able to program them by a computer.
My VR-500 Yaesu shortwave handheld receiver (along with my HT’s) had that ability
many many years ago.
Lack of mp3 recording may kill the deal for me. I’m waiting for a good quality multiband receiver with recording (and no confounded rubberized sticky coating like the Degens had!) It’s time for this to happen.
Here’s hoping the PL-990 has all the functions that were hidden in the PL-880 because they didn’t work properly. It would be great to finally have the radio the 880 was supposed to have been.
You might comment on the actual video and ask, but based on one of the comments, it can’t record broadcasts internally. That would be a lost opportunity if so.
Some obvious questions which can’t be answered lacking translation — what about SYNC performance, what capacity microSD can the radio take, and are there any other improvements over the PL-880?
It should have recording function!. Otherwise it does not have any merits for me.
Up to now I didn’t buy a Tecsun PL-880 because of the distortion of SSB reception caused by the too slow AGC attack. I surely hope this will be improved in the PL-990.
Based upon the history of the PL-880: Potential buyers are advised to probably wait for a couple of hardware (and firmware) revs on this model until things are stable.
the video say that is engineering version PL-990,,(test version), used 18650 battery including blue tooth, TF card play function. manufacturer sent PL990 to radio tester for software de-bug now. may be will public in end of Oct.
And a new video comparing audio quality https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anWfnsWNi_Q
I have the PL-880, so I’ll base my comments on comparing the 990 to 880.
Pros:
All the buttons are on the front – no need to look at either end of the radio
for the switches.
They kept the three tuning knobs. Of all the radios I own, the placement and ease of use
of these knobs can’t be beat. They just naturally fall under my thumb when holding
the radio.
Hopes:
Better all around performance. Although the performance of the 880
is very good, we can always use more.
Cons:
MP3 Player only. It should record. It’s a waste of engineering to include a player only.
I have a cell phone for playing mp3.
No Bluetooth TRANSMITTER! I would love to be able to transmit the audio to
my Bluetooth speakers. It seems that whenever Bluetooth is include it’s to make the
radio into a dumb Bluetooth speaker. (Ie the Elton BT Field Radio).
No way to add alpha tags to the memories. While I love the ATS to scan for stations,
I would like to have some permanent memory with Alpha Tags. It’s amazing that
every Ham Radio HT I have owned for the past twenty years had the ability for
memory alpha tags. But almost no shortwave receivers do.
And if I had Memory Tags, I would want to be able to program them by a computer.
My VR-500 Yaesu shortwave handheld receiver (along with my HT’s) had that ability
many many years ago.
73
Bill
WD9EQD
Lack of mp3 recording may kill the deal for me. I’m waiting for a good quality multiband receiver with recording (and no confounded rubberized sticky coating like the Degens had!) It’s time for this to happen.
Here’s hoping the PL-990 has all the functions that were hidden in the PL-880 because they didn’t work properly. It would be great to finally have the radio the 880 was supposed to have been.
nice but…
Can it record to the tf card?
Can it show files names?
Line in/out?
?
You might comment on the actual video and ask, but based on one of the comments, it can’t record broadcasts internally. That would be a lost opportunity if so.
Some obvious questions which can’t be answered lacking translation — what about SYNC performance, what capacity microSD can the radio take, and are there any other improvements over the PL-880?