Category Archives: Portable Radio

MLite-880: A lot of remarks that may also help you enjoy it more 

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By 13dka

After all the recent buzz and watching and reading every video, review, and discussion thread/group I could find about this radio, as per usual, I knew I had to buy one in order to find out if I want one…again. This is not a review, but taking notes while getting acquainted with it and gathering the technical information I couldn’t find, I started thinking that sharing this might be at least entertaining for other MLite owners, maybe helpful to elaborate on a few things for newcomers to complex radios and SDRs on the way and also to tell the undecided why I started calling it names so I had to keep it. Sounds terrible and very much like a review, so let’s get on with it.

Chapter One: What is this thing anyway?  

I couldn’t help noticing the higher-than-usual pile-up of “game changer”, “new era,” or “the radio <brand name> never made” expressions coming with this one, and I was confused. Sure, it is another small, self-contained SDR, functionally more or less just a mildly simplified Malahit redesign with a much simpler display in a more familiar shape, but the Malahits have been around for years, and they’re neither the first nor the only radios with this job description. I couldn’t quite understand what fueled the sudden interest, just because it doesn’t look like Spock’s preschool tricorder and more like the offspring of an Asian travel radio and a Scandinavian business phone? Really? Then I found the price tag and the light came on.

That it’s now also much easier to purchase the new Gründig Sputnik 880 as an official product with authorized firmware from Malahiteam’s new Chinese manufacturer obviously did it for me too, and it may speak even more to people who have really been waiting for an affordable, actual step-up from their first 473x-chip radio for so long that they bought 5 more of those in the meantime. I promise it may be quite an upgrade from any radio that looks similar, and I even deem it pretty user-friendly. However, it’s technically and conceptually still a Malahit and as such much closer to any other SDR hard- and software made to cater to the exotic desires some outspoken radio enthusiasts have, than to anything it is made to look like.

Unfortunately, this is really clashing with very frugal documentation and unusual technical secretiveness about what’s in there; people have to figure out many things on their own and fail at it, and I feel the mimicry is also fueling unrealistic expectations.

Chapter Two: Technical Notes

The “technical secretiveness” extends to filing the markings off most chips, so little is known about the innards of this receiver.  Russian YouTuber Alexey Igonin suspects a single-conversion SDR on shortwave (up to 27 MHz) becoming a dual-conversion radio above. The FM broadcast range appears to be a separate tuner active between 65 and 107.999 MHz and another VHF tuner from 108-165 MHz; both tuners are then downconverted to the high IF of the SW receiver. This abstract string of words explains to the initiated why oddities may be seen here and there, for example, when you tune to 108.00MHz

Operating concept

For a general description of the radio, menus, and general operation of the MLite, please refer to Dan Robinson’s and all the other excellent reviews. I want to sell you on the general concept centered around the telephone keypad, making it strangely not such a big deal for me that it has only one encoder knob and 16 buttons. It’s quite different from all button portables I have met:

Each function menu has its own button, assigned to 9 of the 12 buttons on the phone keypad.  Each function in these menus has a number, too.  That means you can memorize access to your frequently used functions by a 2-digit number, one for the menu, the other for the item you want, and in many cases, that’s all. Dial 25 for AM, 26 for SAM, 21 for USB without further action, 61 is the number of the IF filter warehouse expecting your orders via the knob (unless it isn’t), you get the idea. That means most functions on this radio have 2 buttons you need to tap, but they all have their own 2 buttons right on the front panel.

Direct frequency input is activated by button [4] and is accepting a couple of ways to enter a frequency followed by button [A] for kHz and [B] if you want MHz, e.g. “123*125 [B]” or “123125 [A]” take you to the same frequency, or just hit “123 [B]” to go to 123 MHz and tune up a little. Some even recent radios are much less tolerant and made me give up on typing in frequencies; this is not one of those.

Such an anachronistic flashback to early digitally controlled commercial radios/machines/things or DOS computers seems to be almost ironic on the face of this bundle of latest digital wonders.  But I think it could easily run circles around nested menus on a tiny touchscreen if you can adapt to it. The keys are not backlit but if you could dial 911 in the dark on an old landline telephone like the victim in an old crime show episode, you can position your fingers on the keypad to type “4-27555-A-21” (hyphens for clarity, it’s actually 42755A21), if you have firmware 1.5 or higher this will take you to the CB “highbander” calling channel in USB, hopefully entertaining you until the ambulance arrives.

Unfortunately, there are also multi-page menus like the [AUDIO] page with your filters, so “61” doesn’t always work, and e.g., the steps menu changes its buttons according to the mode, so the “mental phonebook” method becomes a little more involved. Still, when you exit and return to a menu it will still have that previously selected function assigned to the encoder to speed up things and it memorizes that for each menu individually, long press of the SQL [B] or NR [C] button (while they’re on!) takes you directly to their intensity setting in the menu…in short, things have been laid out very well and after a few days that became part of the fun this radio is. Summary: It’s a real asset because it allows you to fly this radio blind, for example, when you’re legally blind or just legally supposed to have your eyes on the road.  

Antenna Input, Impedance Switch, and Bias-T:

An understandable common misconception seems to be that the antenna switch [3][1] is toggling between the whip and the 1/8″ phone-type antenna jack. What actually happens when you insert a phone plug is that the whip is getting disconnected, and the switch is toggling between high and low input impedance. It seems rather important to understand that this high impedance input is provided by the additional amplifier needed for the whip; it remains in the signal path when you use the antenna jack.

In general, switching impedance allows for external antenna configurations that would otherwise not work well, and in the presence of high local noise levels, the shielded input is highly preferable over open wires alligator-clipped to the whip in lieu of a missing Hi-Z input. Besides matching different antenna types, switching impedance can also increase the number of “good” frequency bands on the same (passive) antenna. Most antennas, including simple passive wire antennas like endfeds etc. exhibit a wild up and down of impedances over the wide range of wavelengths we SWLs use them on. When the impedance mismatch happens to be at its most loss-inducing extremes in the band of our choice, switching the input impedance may or may not improve reception:

VK6YSF’s impedance vs. frequency plot for an endfed antenna in different orientations

For example, a simple magmount whip on the car roof is often all you’d need for a bit of quality mobile SWLing, but impedance mismatches between the external whip, the cable, and the input can suck the life out of it on many frequencies. My “Little Wil” CB magmount doesn’t work well on 20m…switching to Hi-Z can fix this. In other bands, this will not improve anything, and the MLite is kind of giving a clue on this bad constellation by becoming very noisy when you switch to Hi-Z in these cases.

The additional amplifier helps with these small, lossy antennas, but that advantage can turn into the opposite when it gets overloaded by “full-size” antennas, and the simple logic “Hi-Z antenna works best on Hi-Z input” doesn’t always work anymore. Leaving this for everyone to figure out on their own is provoking bad results and bad rep.

This radio offers to pass the (unregulated, drops during discharge!) battery voltage to the antenna jack for active antennas and LNAs at no extra fees. I could finally try if a tiny miniwhip could be a worthwhile low-profile solution for the car roof, one that gets enough shortwave in while keeping the considerable electromagnetic racket within the car out. Turns out the 15 bucks drawer-queen miniwhip PCB that was once powered up for 10 seconds 10 years ago seems to be pretty happy with sitting on a car roof, it works almost as well as a 47″/1.20m telescopic whip while theoretically giving a very low profile, avoiding the RC-car looks. Too bad nobody makes an autobahn speed compatible, magmount miniwhip for cars, hint, hint, nudge, nudge.

Spectrum Display

If the Panicsonic RF-KGB-65 is your first radio with a spectrum display, welcome or welcome back to the world of radios that have something nice to look at. I appreciate the feature too, and maybe it’s a good thing that it doesn’t overwhelm people with information, but a spectrum graph line without scale/grid to tell how wide, far apart and strong signals are on that spectrum does not provide very much information beyond revealing the pure existence of something left and right of your tuned frequency. Still a great thing to have and a mesmerizing and instructive eye catcher and only a white cat can make you look more like someone out of a James Bond movie while consuming almost no battery.

How much of the spectrum you can see depends: What you actually get anywhere on AM/SW/VHF is a 40 kHz portion of the band, and you can’t zoom in or out, likely because that’s how much you can reasonably expect to show on a low-resolution dot-matrix display, expecting narrowband signals on the band. Narrow signals are also why the spectrum line should be filled, or unmodulated carriers/CW will be represented by a single, hard-to-see dot instead of a full single line. In WFM we get roughly 600kHz of spectrum from that display, which is just the FM equivalent of “not an awful lot”. On the plus side, you almost never have to bother with spectrum settings (which can be a rabbit hole, trust me).

Averaging means that the height of each dot in the spectrum line is calculated off more samples, the more samples, the longer they live on the display, too. This allows the display (and us) to differentiate between weak signals and noise. I found the most useful averaging settings in the upper half of the range 50-99, not quite as good as a waterfall display (= a history of spectrum plots), but ’99’ will allow you to blink very slowly and not miss an activity, at the cost of display responsiveness. Too little averaging also makes you miss fast events on the “bandscope” even when they’re loud.

To alleviate you from more settings, the radio is automatically scaling the levels of the spectrum line. If a strong station comes up within the spectrum passband (not necessarily within the 40 kHz display range), the scaling changes and the visual noise floor drops. This looks confusingly the same as if the AGC was “pumping” and radio would be actually desensitized by that station. This can actually happen, but then you will also clearly hear the AGC “pumping” the noise floor as the display seems to indicate. That scaling also means that the visual noise floor does not reflect the actual level or proportion of the noise floor; deriving SNR differences from the graphical representation is not always possible.

Both spectrum and signal meter displays seem to indicate frontend input levels pre-AGC; changing the gain in the radio does not affect the display (the built-in attenuator does, of course). Besides the spectrum, the display has the usual status indicators but the very limited display space may not allow for all indicators people could wish for. The bargraph signal meter can be switched to an alphanumeric dBm display aligned with the classic S-meter 6 dB/step scale (not dB/?V) as indicated by the meter refusing to measure signals beyond -73dBm (S9), in which case it just notifies you of the surplus level by adding a ‘greater than’ sign to the value, “>-73dBm”. Still, the numerical measurement is pretty averaged/integrated and therefore nicely readable below that. Which is good because the meter does indicate the noise floor.

Controlling Gain, AGC, and ATT:

Most of the radios the MLite-880 is cosplaying have an AGC that doesn’t require any interaction and many of them just have a “one size fits nobody” response curve for AM and SSB. Likewise, most portables don’t have gain control beyond a “Local/DX” switch on the side. The MLite AGC, on the other hand, offers 4 release speeds with variable ‘Gain’ and ‘Limit’ parameters, plus a manual gain control option.

Of course, I’m pulling this out of the nose since it’s all not documented, based on my observations and similar arrangements: In very simple words, ‘Limit’ sets how loud you want the loudest stations to be, and ‘Gain’ is how loud you need to have the weakest station, particularly in SSB.

To elaborate on that, ‘Limit’ sets the threshold level where a signal causes gain reduction, and ‘Gain’ is basically the “RF gain” control some people think is missing on this radio, giving remarkable gain reserves (60dB). Use ‘Gain’ to bring weak stations closer to the ‘Limit’ threshold. “Limit” defaults to “75dB” and it looks like signals around S9 are going to be, well, limited to that, which means raising that is lowering the overall AGC action as much as decreasing gain while it increases the volume. The closer these two values get to each other, the more compressed, noisy, and “pumping” the channel will sound. Keep in mind that gain does not equal sensitivity, and avoiding AGC action is often preferable over the convenience of not needing to touch the volume knob. Matching gain to the conditions and signal you want to receive is also a prerequisite to make the most out of the noise reduction. This old clip demonstrates the difference it can make when you can control gain to avoid getting loud signals squeezed by AGC and the noise floor not being pulled up unnecessarily (same transmission received on a D-808 (no gain control) vs. a Belka (has gain control), recorded simultaneously):

A sound like this is the sign that you may want to reduce ‘Gain’, or use the attenuator (dial “33”) to that effect.

I’m not sure I understand or experience all of the issues some seem to have with the AGC; other than that, it does not default to the hottest gain settings it is capable of, which adds to a different problem with this radio – the harsh drop in volume in SSB/CW and WFM modes compared to AM/SAM/NFM. That also might be pushing people towards increasing gain beyond reasonable values to compensate.

The ATT can be set to 36dB of attenuation in 6 dB-steps, but for some reason, I can see at best 15dB of it on signals anywhere on the S-meter scale, high or low, which seems as strange as the fact that it didn’t help in the only overload situation I had with this radio. If this is your first ATTenuator, it’s supposed to decrease the signal in front of all amplifier stages, unlike most RF gain controls, it is often the radio’s only reliable (onboard) way of keeping the radio’s first transistors from overloading in the presence of very strong signals. Please note that it says “Attenuator for SW” for a reason: It does not work on VHF, which in this radio seems to start circuit-wise on 27.000 MHz so the 10m-band has to make do without.

Noise Blanker

Unlike most portables, this one has a noise blanker, and of course, it’s not only an on/off switch like in the old days. Invented 100 years ago to mitigate engine ignition impulses, nowadays they can be used to mitigate impulses from electric fences, OTH radar, or local PLC modem (!) impulses, which is why you can often adapt the timing parameters. Of course, this one is hurtfully undocumented again, I assume that the 3 modes of the NB relate to bandwidth presets. The other dimensionless control seems to set the timing of the countermeasure, but it always seems to work best or at all at the minimum value. Since I assume this radio attracts many buyers unfamiliar with these things, be advised that wrong and even the default settings in modes 1 and 3 can cause distortion in the demodulation when you don’t expect it, so it’s better not to leave that permanently on.

Here’s a short video showing how it works on a strong OTH radar, the noise blanker is acting in/before the IF stage so its effect also reflects in the spectrum display:

IF filters:

A big giveaway that the 880 is not to be confused with a radio is that it visually alludes to are “the filters”. Of course, in SDR, there are no physical IF filters and barely any limits to their number, shape, or properties, and it shows:

The [AUDIO] menu has 3 slots for your own filter settings named “narrow”, “normal” and “wide” and in each you can define low and a high cutoff frequencies, so that’s 3 variable filters so far. But of course, each mode has its own set of 3 “filters” you can define to your liking. The MLite-880 is one-upping this by giving AM and SAM, USB and LSB each an individual set of 3, too. WFM has 4, that’s 22 (!) places to set filter bandwidth. That’s not mandatory, of course, but still one nice source of confusion for elderly people like me and something to keep an eye on for a while.

The filter shape itself is fixed, it has less rounded shoulders than what I have in the Belka and the IC-705 in “sharp” mode, with the same quality and perceived stopband rejection of those, and that alone would be enough to lift the long-term reception experience with the MLite way above and beyond the 473x chip radios, or even the best of their small analog ancestors from Japan.

Nice upper filter slope (lower filter frequency = 0) to claim all of a 9kHz ITU region 1 mediumwave channel and still keep the neighbors out.

25m band scan on a 10m vertical at the dike. It also demonstrates that the 4.5 kHz filter setting shown above is keeping the signals 10 kHz to each side of NHK on 11,625 kHz in check (NHK also received on 11,860 kHz, both direct from Yamata).

As for the mildly important question, what bandwidth is meant when you set the filters in AM – this is once again “per sideband” in AM, like on the Tecsuns: 4.5 kHz means 4.5 kHz audio bandwidth, the old-school physical IF ladder filter equivalent for that kind of passband would be labeled “9 kHz” if you want to compare that with some old rig. What sets this apart from e.g. my Icom is the possibility of having very wide sidebands up to 15 kHz for 30 kHz wide experimental AM broadcasts, also in SSB. The MLite reflects the IF filter equivalent in the width of the “dial pointer”:

The properly narrow (>200Hz) and SNR-increasing CW filters are what make this ????? Trans-Okhotsk and the Belka the only receive-only portables with proper CW reception and a price tag around $200. Since FW 1.5, it also does CW “offset compensation”, so you don’t have to go through the hardships of subtracting your adjustable CW pitch frequency to correctly tune to a published frequency like in the Middle Ages anymore.

MLite 500Hz CW filter more or less centered at the CW signal at 700Hz

Frequency Calibration and Stability:

You can skip this section if you’re not much into SSB, and the following is not a complaint, just an observation and generally not a big deal, or rather part of the deal: The MLite-880 is not perfect <gasp> and it has “Lite” in the name for a reason:

Besides more obvious things, it lacks the automatic notch filter and the TCXO (temperature-compensated crystal oscillator) of the “big” Malahits. It has to make do with an XO and a lot of XOXO, and with that, it can’t quite match the linearity and temperature stability of the Belka, which is 99% on par with the IC-705. Most people are probably familiar with the need to calibrate their radios, and a few less have a radio that lets them do this, but not needing to do this is understandably one of the expectations people have with this SDR. But unlike the SW range, which is generally close enough to the nominal frequencies for most buyers, the separately calibrated VHF range seems to be in need of an initial calibration on many shipped radios; it was several kHz off in the VHF marine band on mine, too. I just tapped [3][5] and turned the knob until the station showed up right. Easy enough.

On shortwave, I’m talking about very small but occasionally inconvenient offsets/non-linearity in the tens of Hz range, nothing that makes you want to find your pocket calculator even if you’re a heavy SSB/utility listener. Calibration on digital receivers means you can fine-tune the master oscillator conveniently in a menu, and “non-linearity” means an offset varies over the course of the frequency range and does not plot a straight line. The offset is different in different bands, and you may or may not want to recalibrate there.

Calibration procedure (may not work on analog receivers!): Find a frequency standard station  (like WWV, BPM, or RWM) or just a regular station with no (or a published) offset. Tune 1kHz lower than this frequency and switch to USB to create a 1kHz het. Put that in a memory slot.  Tune 1kHz higher and switch to LSB to create a het again from the other side.  Now get your cellphone with a free spectrum analyzer app like Spectroid or Phyphox on it so you can easily measure the frequency of the het: It should be close to 1kHz in both USB and LSB. Starting technically at 27.000 MHz, the VHF range has its own calibration setting when you go there and you ideally want to find a calibration station near the top end of the range, like a 2m repeater or something.

For example, the needed offset on 5 MHz is -5 on my radio, on 10 MHz it’s +64, and +72 on 15 MHz at a cozy 25°C. That means I can calibrate for a negligible deviation in the 10 and 15 MHz signals and live with a somewhat bigger offset on 5 MHz, or I can make them all within +/- 30 Hz off, which is still awesome by analog radio standards and not terrible for a modern radio, but requires fine-tuning when you need it better than that. Calculating the indicated vs. actual offsets it dawned on me that the unit used on the shortwave side is still “x0.1ppm” and the math doesn’t math, that should read “x0.5ppm” as well.

The best I can get without 5MHz being off too much – good enough!

On top of the general offset, there’s also a noticeable (at 10-15°C differential) temperature drift, making the calibration efforts less persistent outside than I’d wish for. +72 for 15MHz at home to 120×0.5ppm at 15MHz equals 24Hz of temperature drift, adding to whatever offset was there before, which can amount to “too much” and there seems to be some “ripple” in the deviation curve: Here’s a recording of CHU on 14,670 kHz somehow ending 80Hz off right after calibrating the radio on 15 MHz:

Again, not great but not terrible in the grand scheme of things because deviations below 100 Hz are only ever a factor in SSB, and it may even add to the odd charme of this radio that it is very analog and old school within a tolerable margin in this regard.  But if you try ECSS reception with music, your ideal deviation is none and 10Hz at the end of “tolerable”.

Fixing the tuning emergencies when your fav song is playing and sounds terrible in SSB is done by dialing (think nine) [1][1], the useful number of the fine(st) tuning step in all modes, or just hit [3][5] and use the calibration function as “RIT” knob until it sounds right, and you will be good. It’s not a calibrated Rohdow & Shwartzkiy lab instrument, you can’t break anything, and it provides the needed fine resolution you’d need for true “zero-beating” but yes, it does feel very luxurious to switch to sideband when a $5 TCXO makes sure you can rely on the radio being spot-on in SSB when the station is, on any frequency, even in winter.

Synchronous Detector

…can’t be missing on a decent SW portable and this one seems to be a (non-selectable sideband) “PLL”-type detector and gives SDR-typical results: Remember that AM and SAM have individual filter settings so you want to make sure you match them when you compare that, but this detector is as unspectacular in a good way as it could be, it has super-solid lock and does absolutely nothing, zero, nada to the signal other than keeping the multipath distortion in check, which it seems to do very well.

31m band scan (antenna; car roof whip) with a brief demonstration of the sync detector at 0:16 seconds into the video. Note how the piano distorts when I turn it off again. Continue reading →

MLite-880 Review: Advanced SDR Performance in a Traditional Portable Design

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Dan Robinson, who shares the following review:

MLite-880 Spectrum Display Portable:  Advanced SDR Performance in Traditional Portable Clothes

by Dan Robinson

For years, radio listening hobbyists (as many of us who are still around in 2026) have had numerous choices when it comes to portable receivers.  Those of us who got our start as DX’ers/SWLs in the 1960’s (some earlier) or 1970’s have seen a lot of hardware come around the corner.

Some years ago, the Malahit/DSP receivers, firmware, and hardware designed and made in Russia appeared.  There was the Belka, amazingly small but a superb receiver that many of us still use.  Although shortwave broadcasting has generally been on the decline, we were lucky that companies such as Tecsun, Sangean (reported to have now stopped all production of SW portables), and other China/Taiwan-based companies continued to make impressive portables.

ICOM, Yaesu and Kenwood began putting spectrum scopes in displays a long time ago.  ICOM’s IC-R9000 (produced 1989 to 1998) was the first to bring that feature. The more recent Icom 7300, 8600, and 9500 demonstrated far more advanced spectrum displays, as did Kenwood.  Ten Tec in its original form put rudimentary spectrum display capability in its RX-350/Jupiter receiver/transceiver.

Today, we’re seeing a number of HT units with some kind of spectrum display.  The Radtel 950Pro is one example of this.  ICOM’s IC-R30, discontinued but a superb wide band unit, also has a spectrum option though quite limited.  Various China-based companies started putting spectrum displays into the ATS series of receivers, and scope displays became standard on transceivers by Xiegu and others.

Malahiteam in Russia licensed firmware out to a range of China-based manufacturers.  The China-made “ATS” portables available from AliExpress and Banggood have been through numerous versions, including the ATS25 Pro + AIR desktop, the ATS25 Ultra, ATS25 XF (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJC-pAu4nUk), and these are increasingly emphasizing the spectrum option on the display. There have been some very interesting front panel designs such as the DP-666 based on the TF6686 chip, and the AMNVOLT ESP138, the first with dual 4732/6686 architecture (see:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1njJskDSUI&pp=ygUMZXNwMTM4IHJHzGlv)

What we had not seen until recently was anyone putting a spectrum display into a “traditional” portable cabinet (some years ago, I had suggested to County Comm/Maratac which has carried a re-badged Tecsun PL-368 that they consider doing so. At one point I received from them a photo of a prototype which looked like a PL-368 with a spectrum display at the top.  But to my knowledge nothing was done to advance that to market).

WHAT IS THE MLite-880?

There have been a number of reviews/demonstrations on YouTube of the MLite-880, including by Tech Minds (see:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmO8TIr_VFo).  One of the most extensive is a nearly hour-long review by a Russian YouTuber RADIOCHIEF.RU (see:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ut6cY2jZv7Q&t=1065s) and another excellent overview by Radio Bunker here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgcRoha-mfM).

The major feature can be seen at power on.  Instead of just a digital/numerical display of frequency we see the frequency AND below, a 40 kHz slice of spectrum.  As the advertising description on the Elecevolve.com website states:

“A new generation of SDR digital radio that can “see” radio stations” . . . and “the radio in people’s impressions stays in the last century.” 

The message that Malahiteam wants to convey is clear:  this is a major step forward from portable design of the past.

The radio is very light, with a back-stand and a fairly robust whip antenna which stands at an angle when the receiver is being used with the back-stand (unfortunately, the antenna base does not allow it to go vertical).

Around the cabinet, there are a minimum of controls:  on top, we have a simple power-on/off switch and a microSD slot (more about that later).  USB-C and headphone jack are on the right, and an external antenna jack on the left.  The frequency display module of the radio looks like just that — it’s on top above the multi-function keypad and ABCD keys.  As for mode displays, there are battery and Bluetooth lights below and next to the LITEMALADSP letters.  On the back, we find the 21700 battery compartment, and on the back-stand, we find information about the receiver, but no “Made in…” information whatsoever.

From the videos, and certainly from the name of the radio (LITEMALADSP) we have the impression that the MLite-880 is a cost-reduction version of the Russian DSP/2/3 receivers.  Neither 4732 nor TEF 6686 chips are used.  While one video review states that an MSI-SDR-M1 chip is inside, Georgiy at Malahiteam states that this is not so.

There was obviously a deliberate choice of the 21700 battery rather than 18650 used in Tecsun, Choyong, and other portables.  First adopters say that so far, this battery keeps the receiver going for hours, something I can confirm.  Anyone unfamiliar with professional type batteries like this should invest in a good standalone charger; if you already own a Tecsun PLxxx or D808 portable you will be familiar with 18650 and similar cells.  [UPDATE]:  Larger size 21700 battery does not fit — the battery provided with the radio is a EVE INR21700/50E

The inclusion of a backstand is very welcome, since Russian DSPs and China-made SDR portables often lack one.  The whip antenna is not thin and flimsy like those found on some China-made small portables.  There’s a mini to SMA adapter included in the box.

One reviewer notes that high-speed microSD cards are needed because files are recorded in WAV format.  Georgiy at Malahiteam states that 16 and 32 GB cards have worked, BUT one user reports a 256GB card worked.  Recording capability is a feature seen on other portables like the Raddy RF919.  A good sized speaker is on the left.  The tuning knob has a dual push-pull function for volume and frequency change.

And the radio has Bluetooth capability, which worked fine when I first tried it with a Bluetooth speaker.

In menus under “About” we see “Designed in Russia/Made in China.” I recommend that readers view the various videos available online.  While I was in the process of writing, I was surprised when the MLite-880 I had ordered from Banggood showed up on my doorstep.  So, I’m able to provide initial impressions, and when a second unit arrives here, I’ll do some unit-to-unit comparisons.  [NOTE:  Testing done using only the onboard whip antenna]

VIDEO: UNBOXING AND DEMO

Click here to view on YouTube.

“LITE” BUT NOT LIGHT ON FEATURES

If this is supposed to be a “Lite” version of the Malahit DSP receivers, whether the original Russian-made units or those from China, that would not be apparent to someone using this receiver for the first time.  Numerous options are brought over from the Malahiteam DSP.  We have synchronous reception (but see below) and the ability to correct calibration variations.  Recalibration and BFO fine adjust is something we see on Tecsun portables, and China-made SDRs, and the AFEDRI SDR.

I won’t list everything, but we also see Hi-Z/50 Ohm, BiasT, Attenuation, and options for adjusting display brightness, spectrum average, spectrum fill, and RDS view.  That is quite a lot of flexibility and reminds me of what we find on receivers costing thousands of dollars.  Under Audio settings, we see Filter Type, Filter Low Freq, Filter High Freq, and variable Noise Reduction.  One reviewer asserted that NR “works significantly better than on the Russian-made DSP-3, which costs near $500,” and based on my first tests, I agree.  NR runs from 0 to 15 and, once set, can be quickly activated by pressing the C button on the right labeled NR.  Overall filtering ranges:  0 to 8 Hz, 0 to 12 Hz, 0 to 15 Hz for the three designated filter positions.

AGC settings include AGC limit, AGC gain, and manual control, all settable in dB.  On a third page of options, we find NB Mode, NB Threshold, Equalizer Type, Key Beep Level, and SQUELCH Threshold.  Recording is accomplished with a direct access button (NOTE:  I had some problems getting record working with a 1GB microSD but switched to a FAT32 8 GB and it worked).  A quite nice printed manual shows the modes: USB, LSB, CW, DSB, AM, SAM, NFM, WFM.  Steps are listed as:  100 Hz, 500 Hz, 1 kHz, 2.5 kHz, 5 kHz, 6.2 kHz, 8.3 kHz, 9 kHz, and 10 kHz.

The MLite-880 contains band ranges selected by pressing the appropriate key and then A/B to scroll through those ranges.  Coverage is from 100 kHz to 519 kHz, from 520 kHz to 1710 kHz, and up to 29,999khz.  But one can directly enter any frequency in this entire range, regardless of the ranges.  Under AMATEUR BANDS, we find 135.70 kHz to 137.80 kHz (2200m), 472 kHz to 479 kHz (630m), 1800 kHz to 2000 kHz, 3500 kHz to 3800 kHz, 5351.5 kHz to 5366.5 kHz, 7000 kHz to 7200 kHz, and on up to 29.700 kHz, with 70 mHz to 70.5, and 144 mHz to 148 mHz.  Finally, FM/VHF bands include 65.9 mHz to 74 mHz (OIRT), 76 mHz to 108 mHz, and AIR band 118 to 137 mHz.

The spectrum display on the MLite-880 is 40 kHz.  For most people, especially those coming from a portable with just a digital numerical readout, I don’t think this is going to be a problem.  The 880 obviously has a smaller spectrum display than the full Russian DSP or Chinese-originated portables.  Under VISUAL settings, we have choices of:  BRIGHTNESS LEVEL, BRIGHTNESS OFF TIME, SPECTRUM AVERAGE, SPECTRUM FILL.

I have not opened my MLite-880, but RADIOCHIEF.RU on YouTube shows the cabinet back removed (around the 29-minute mark).  We see extensive shielding with metal covers over key sections. Very impressive, and it finds me wishing that other manufacturers would have done this.  How much better the short-lived “Elite Satellit” by Eton might have been with better internal shielding.

What remains to be seen is the extent to which the MLite-880 monochrome display throws off interference, a well-known issue with the original Russia-made Malahit units and China-made portables.  See my interview with Georgiy of Malahiteam, who notes that not all noise is gone.  “We weren’t able to completely eliminate the noise,” he says, adding that “it still occurs in places, mostly on the long and medium wavelengths. However, significant attention was paid to the screening, and turning off the display completely solves the issue.”  The screen shutoff he mentions is accomplished as of now by pressing the “9” key.

We learn from the few available YouTube reviews that the main microcontroller in the MLite-880 is the STM32H743, which one reviewer says is “about the same as the older version in the Malahit DSP-3”.  And he adds:  “It’s a full-fledged SDR like the DSP-3 that is, unlike all sorts of superhet Tecsuns and DEGENs on chips with all sorts of soft mutes, the Malachite works just as well but significantly better. . .”

Unfortunately, so far we see that firmware updating is accomplished using the STMCube program used by the Russia and China units and the excellent AFEDRI.  I find STMCube to be clunky and often frustrating, though it seems straightforward when explained in the ML-880 manual.

RADIOCHIEF.RU on YouTube provides a demonstration of the MLite-880, comparing it with an ICOM IC-R20 and a DSP-3.  He notes that while there are flaws in the 880 they appear to be fixable via  firmware upgrades.  In the downloads section of the elecevolve website we see version 1.2 dated 6 February 2026.  The unit delivered here has 1.1  The printed manual shows “v2.1.0 Release date July 10, 2025”.  I’m not aware of videos or other online presence of the ML 880 before January 2026.

WHAT’S THE BIG DEAL?

SWLing Post readers, whether SWLs or amateur operators, may be asking what the big deal is with the MLite-880.  That’s understandable, but let me explain the significance.  Much as the Choyong LC-90 became the first receiver to provide HF and Internet radio in a traditional radio cabinet (though without any spectrum display), the 880 shows that placing such a display in a traditional portable cabinet has been quite possible for some time — it just took someone to go ahead and do it. Continue reading →

Portable Antennas for Serious DXing: Don’s Field Tests from Parks to the Open Road (Part 1)

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Don Moore–noted author, traveler, and DXer–who shares the following post:

Two Portable Antennas for Remote DXing (Part One)

By Don Moore

Don’s traveling DX stories can be found in his book Tales of a Vagabond DXer [SWLing Post affiliate link]. If you’ve already read his book and enjoyed it, do Don a favor and leave a review on Amazon.

Once upon a time, I had a traditional DX shack with an L-shaped desk and shelves of receivers, radio gadgets, and DX books. Everything I wanted or needed as a DXer was right at hand. Then I retired and was finally able to pursue my lifelong itch for serious travel. But there was no way to carry that DX shack along with me. Fortunately, modern technology was there to help. SDRs are significantly more travel-friendly than my old Sony ICF-2010 (let alone the Drake R-8). Instead of books and bulletins, my DX reference materials are websites and PDF files on my laptop.

I spend several months a year traveling internationally with just a suitcase and knapsack. That doesn’t leave much room for DX equipment. Several years ago I described my approach to vagabond DXing in an article here.

https://swling.com/blog/2019/03/radio-travel-a-complete-sdr-station-for-superb-portable-dxing/

Since writing that article in 2019, I’ve continued to work on making my portable DX shack better and more compact. Recently, I replaced the Elad FDM-S2 with three Airspy HF+ Discovery SDRs. Not only are they smaller and lighter, but I can record three different band segments at once. Next up was rethinking my travel antennas. A wire loop with the Wellbrook ALA-100LN is still, in my opinion, the best travel antenna. But the components are heavy and are now irreplaceable since they are no longer made. So over the summer, I set about testing and comparing both old and new options. But you don’t have to wander the globe for my findings to be useful to you. This can be just as helpful for DXing from a nearby park. That’s how I did my testing.

I spent the past summer staying at an AirBnB in the north Chicago suburbs. I wanted a better location for testing so I checked out parks in the area and finally settled on Preserve Shelter B (42.26797, -87.92208) at the Old School Forest Preserve, east of Libertyville in northern Illinois. The shelter was entirely wood, with standard asphalt shingles (rather than steel), and had no nearby power lines. I made four daytime DXpeditions there to do some utility DXing and to run my tests. Here’s a photo of my setup.

I decided I should rerun the tests at least one other location. So while driving across the US in mid-October, I stopped for a few hours one morning at Park Shelter A (39.11144, -94.86629) in Wyandotte County Park, just west of Kansas City, Kansas. There, I just had a minimum setup.

The Antennas

So, what were the antennas I was testing? The first was the tried-and-true PA0RDT mini-whip from Roelof Bakker. The PA0RDT is described in my 2019 article and is probably the most portable quality antenna you can get. To power it I use a battery box and eight rechargeable lithium-ion AA cells.

 For the traveling DXer, setting up the PA0RDT is as easy as it comes. I just attach the coax cable and throw it over a support, such as a picnic shelter beam or a tree branch.

But I’ve always believed that the best antenna is another antenna. That is, every antenna works differently, and therefore the more options you have, the more likely you will have something that works well in any situation. So if I wanted to leave the Wellbrook at home, what might complement the PA0RDT? I contacted my friend Mark Taylor, who I knew had a large collection of the various inexpensive Chinese-made amplified loops. With his help, I settled on the MLA-30+ MegaLoop from DmgicPro.

This antenna consists of a steel wire loop that connects to terminals on the amplifier box. The amplifier has a ten-meter coax cable, which in turn is connected to a small bias-T power supply, which gets its power via a USB connection. The MLA-30+ is designed to be used in a permanent installation with some sort of vertical support, such as a PVC pipe. Some users replace the wire loop with copper tubing.

Those options aren’t practical for me, and simply hanging the antenna from the top would cause the steel loop to stretch and deform. So I came up with the idea of tying a strong cord from the top to the bottom of the loop so that the cord, and not the loop, bears the weight. To hang the antenna, I throw the cord over the support, attach the antenna, and then pull it up into place. That works well if you have rear support to hold it in place, such as the beams of a picnic shelter.

It’s a bit more difficult to mount the MLA-30+ in a tree.

Comparing the Antennas

I ran comparisons between the antennas several times at Old School Forest Preserve and then again at Wyandotte County Park. The results were practically the same every time. The images below were made at Old School unless otherwise stated.

The PA0RDT was designed to be a good performer on longwave and medium wave. Unsurprisingly, it shows a lot of signals on the upper end of the medium wave band, even during the daytime. Except for being non-directional, the PA0RDT is an excellent MW antenna.

The MLA-30+, on the other hand, isn’t good for much beyond hearing the strongest local signals on medium wave.

When I ran these tests in the late morning, WWV on 5 MHz was the only signal in the 60-meter band. It had a very listenable signal on the PA0RDT.

But on the MLA-30+, WWV was barely there.

Likewise on 49 meters, CFRX on 6070 kHz was very clear on the PA0RDT but barely listenable on the MLA-30+. But when I moved up to 31 meters, the difference between the antennas mostly disappeared, as in these images made in Kansas. The PA0RDT is top and the MLA-30+ on the bottom.

On 25 meters, the PA0RDT is picking up a lot of noise and the signals are not that strong. Nor were signals very strong on 19, 16, 0r 13 meters.

However, on 25 meters with the MLA-30+ there isn’t much noise and the signals are booming in. And 19, 16, and 13 meters likewise had strong signals.

So the PA0RDT is clearly the best antenna for MW and the lower shortwave bands, but it doesn’t do as well on the higher bands. This wasn’t a surprise to me as I’ve always felt that the PA0RDT underperformed above nine or ten Megahertz. The MLA-30+ was abysmal at the lower frequencies but worked better or just as well in the middle and higher shortwave bands. The best antenna is another antenna. Each one performs better in different situations. But I couldn’t help but wonder … was the problem with the MLA-30+ that small steel wire loop?

Look for Don’s Part 2 article next weekend on the SWLing Post!

Rediscovering Simple Radio Joy with the XHDATA D-219

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by Thomas (K4SWL)

It’s been a long while since I’ve written a receiver review. Years ago, I cranked them out several times a year and genuinely loved the process–evaluating performance, quirks, economics, and overall user experience. Writing reviews is, to this day, one of my favorite things to do.

But over the past four years, my reviewing work shifted more toward amateur radio and portable operations, especially as my QRP activities ramped up. And as many of you know, the SWLing Post now has an incredible group of contributors who regularly write thoughtful reviews, taking some of the pressure off of me.

So when my contact at XHDATA reached out a few weeks ago asking if I wanted to try two new color variants of their ultra-affordable D-219, I surprised myself: instead of passing it along to one of our contributors, I decided I wanted the chance to revisit the world of simple, inexpensive portables firsthand.

Why? Because I’d been hearing surprisingly positive things about this little radio—and because it reminds me of the DX-397, a tiny analog portable I used for years after working at RadioShack right out of college.

This review, then, is less about testing a product and more about rediscovering the joy of having a simple, super-basic radio at hand.

Disclosure: XHDATA is a generous long-time sponsor of the SWLing Post. They sent both of these D-219 radios free of charge. Honestly, I don’t know many companies that would send out a sub-$20 product as a review loaner–it probably costs them more in shipping.

As always, I’ll be gifting these units back out once I’m finished. And in this case, I’ll also be buying three more myself for Christmas gifts… one of those, I’ll keep.

Design & First Impressions

Let’s be clear: the D-219 is a simple radio. It looks like something straight out of the mid-1990s, with:

  • an analog tuning dial
  • band-switching sliders
  • a dedicated on/off switch on top
  • a small, lightweight plastic enclosure

But inside, it’s very much a modern radio. The D-219 is based on the Silicon Labs Si4825-A10 DSP chip, meaning that although tuning feels analog, you’re actually listening to a DSP-based receiver stepping through the band in predetermined increments.

XHDATA sent me two new color options: off-white and light silver-green. Both look great in person.

Using the D-219 Outdoors

I used my truck tailgate to hold the D-219 while stacking firewood.

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been doing a lot of work outside—stacking firewood, yard projects, general winter prep. The D-219 became my little companion radio during all of it.

I mostly listened to:

  • Mediumwave
  • A bit of shortwave
  • and FM radio

Audio Quality

The audio surprised me. It’s a tiny speaker, so don’t expect brilliant fidelity, but it’s perfectly listenable and cuts through outdoor noise when the volume is up.

Performance

FM performance is excellent—far better than I expected. I have a handful of “benchmark” distant FM stations that many small portables struggle to hold onto. The D-219 locked onto them easily. DSP chips often shine in FM, and this was no exception.

Mediumwave was the biggest surprise. I have a regional AM station–WTZQ 1600 kHz–that I enjoy during the day, especially around the holidays. Only about half of my small portables receive it well enough to be pleasant.

The D-219 locked it in better than most of my other inexpensive portables.

That alone impressed me.

Shortwave performance is quite good for the price. Sure, it lacks an adjustable filter, and tuning steps mean you don’t get that smooth, fluid band-scanning experience like a proper analog receiver. But overall, it works pretty well.

On 31 meters, for example, tuning felt natural and not cramped–something many ultra-cheap shortwave radios struggle with. It helps that the selected shortwave bands have enough tuning bandspread that you don’t have to use micro adjustments during tuning (I’m looking at you, XHDATA D-220!).

Back in the Cold War era, when the bands were jammed shoulder-to-shoulder, a radio like this would have been harder to use. But today, with fewer simultaneous signals, it’s totally workable.

Real-World Utility

In the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, I’ve become even more vocal about keeping at least one AM/FM/SW radio as part of your personal preparedness kit. The D-219 checks many boxes:

  • Runs on AA batteries
  • Very low power draw
  • Lightweight and pocketable
  • Small enough to disappear into a backpack or glove compartment

I’ve been using mine heavily for two weeks on a pair of Eneloop rechargeables and haven’t had to recharge yet.

Two of the D-219s I’m buying will be stocking stuffers for my daughters, just so they always have a reliable source of news and info while at university–even if the power or internet goes down.

Why This Radio Works

The band spread is generous compared to the D-220

I’m sure own more than three dozen portable radios here at SWLing Post HQ—from high-end benchmarks to tiny ultralights. Normally, I advocate for buying a good-quality receiver instead of “throwaway” electronics.

But I don’t think the D-219 is a “throwaway” radio; being based on the Silicon Labs DSP architecture, it doesn’t have an insane component density–inside, its board is almost roomy. Looking at it, I think I could make modest repairs myself as long as the chip still functions.

Sometimes simple designs translate into long life rather than an early landfill destiny. Of course, only time will tell, and I will post an update if my radio experiences any issues.

This is why I’m comfortable giving them to my daughters as everyday radios. And frankly, I’d much rather they lose or break a $13 D-219 than my old Panasonic RF-65B, PL-660, or ICF-SW7600GR–some of my most cherished (and irreplaceable) legacy portables.

The D-219 is also a perfect glove box radio. One to grab and listen to when you’re waiting on your spouse/partner to finish a yoga class, or waiting on your kids at schoool.

In Summary

If you’re looking for a true benchmark portable, obviously, this isn’t it.

But if you want:

  • a fun, capable, ultra-affordable little radio
  • something to give as a holiday stocking stuffer
  • a simple preparedness radio that uses AA batteries
  • a pocketable MW/FM/SW companion
  • a “leave-it-in-the-car” radio

…the XHDATA D-219 genuinely delivers for well under $20 each.

And as someone who hates e-waste and often avoids ultra-cheap electronics, I’m betting this radio will age better than most. Its internal design is refreshingly simple and built around the reliable Si4825-A10 DSP chip. There just isn’t much inside to fail.

For the price, performance, and sheer fun factor? The D-219 is a solid option.

Purchase options:

Paul Reviews the Radtel RT-880G

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by Paul Jamet

Looking for a versatile radio?

Which radio listener hasn’t dreamed of owning a portable multi-band receiver allowing them to explore the widest possible radio spectrum?

For nearly a year now, walkie-talkies have appeared on the market which, beyond the classic VHF–UHF functions, also allow listening and transmitting on CB (27 MHz) as well as listening to LW/MW/SW bands (LSB/USB/CW). The RADTEL RT-860 has won over those who have tested it.

Read here: Dan Reviews the Radel RT-860

The arrival of the Quansheng TK-11 — available in three versions — has caused quite a stir on social networks. Then, almost at the same time, the RADTEL RT-880 and RT-880G (G for GPS) appeared, also sold under other names such as iRadio UV98.

Among all these available models, I chose — as a radio listener, especially when I’m traveling — the RADTEL RT-880G. My choice is explained mainly by its antenna connectors (SMA-Female and SMA-Male), its large color display, its GPS module, its thousand memory channels, and the possibility of simultaneously monitoring three VHF/UHF frequencies. This device is highly customizable, but its user manual would deserve to be much more detailed and explicit.

The RT-880G comes with a “standard” 18 cm antenna for VHF-UHF bands, which is also used for FM station reception. I haven’t yet tested the device on the 27 MHz (CB) band, for which a dedicated antenna is preferable. No antenna is provided for LW/MW/SW listening.

For listening to LW/MW/SW bands, the device is often shown with small donut-type loop antennas (10 cm diameter).

However, for easier transport, I simply chose this small telescopic SMA-Male antenna, 48 cm long (weight: 20 g): to which it is possible to clip a wire antenna, such as the SONY AN-71, which can prove very useful.

I also used an antenna normally intended for CB, the ABBREE 27 MHz telescopic antenna (130 cm), admittedly heavier (weight: 78 g) and bulkier, but which gives very good results for the HF band.

The purpose of this contribution — which concerns only listening — is to arouse curiosity among mobile (or stationary) listeners, to invite those who own this walkie-talkie to come here and share their experience, and to collect your comments. It is therefore not a full review of the RT-880G, but simply an illustration of what it offers for listening to LW/MW/SW bands.

For LW/MW/SW bands, the RT-880G allows you to set the:

  • step to 1 – 5 – 10 – 50 – 100 – 500 – 1,000 – and 9 kHz],
  • bandwidth [0.5 – 1.0 – 1.2 – 2.2 – 3.0 – 4.0],
  • AGC (Automatic Gain Control)
  • BFO – (Beat Frequency Oscillator) – used for fine tuning SSB reception (the minimum step being 1 kHz).

Sample Recordings

Local park where some of the recordings were made.

Here are a few audio files that will help you form an opinion.  The recordings were made with a smartphone placed near the receiver.  The recordings were made using a smartphone placed near the receiver. The sound quality is quite good, even surprising. Continue reading →

Retekess V112: An Ideal Ballpark Companion

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The Retekess V112 takes in the scenery at a Lehigh Valley IronPigs game in Allentown, PA

by Aaron Kuhn

In my previous post for SWLing Post, I suggested the characteristics of an ideal ballpark radio and considerations for radio selection. While researching that post, I came across the Retekess V112 which ticked a lot of the boxes I recommended – compact, cheap, unobtrusive.

The Retekess V112 has indeed turned out to be a compact, affordable, and unobtrusive companion for enhancing the game-day experience at the ballpark. Priced at a consistent $15.49 on Amazon [SWLing Post affiliate link] for over a year now, this little red (or Gold) radio has exceeded my expectations.

Unboxing and Accessories (and what to replace):

While the physical packaging is a distant memory to me, the V112 comes with earbuds, a neck lanyard, and a Micro-USB charging cord.

  • Earbuds: While included, the provided earbuds are notably uncomfortable and were quickly relegated to the recycling bin. My ears are not your ears of course, and they might be salvageable with interchangeable eartips if you have some lying around, but it’s highly recommended to bring your own comfortable earbuds or headphones. This is especially important as the headphone wires double as the antenna, and reception can vary significantly between different pairs of headphones based on the cable. My older Apple EarPods offered good comfort and reception, while Sony MDRE9LP’s performed poorly. Experimentation of pairing the radio with low-cost IEMs would be an interesting project.
  • Neck Lanyard: Surprisingly, the neck lanyard is the hidden gem of this package. It allows the radio to hang around your neck, keeping your hands free for hot dogs and foul balls.
  • Micro-USB Charging Cord: While USB-C would be a welcome modern update, the included Micro-USB cable is understandable given the radio’s price point and older engineering. It’s hard to complain about the cable-port standard chosen when they give you the cable you need, and you probably have multiple other Micro-USB cables kicking around in storage boxes and drawers already.

Portability and Power:

  • Size and Weight: The Retekess V112 truly shines in its portability. Weighing 45 grams (0.1 lbs) and measuring 3.3 x 1.8 x 0.5 inches, it’s so small and lightweight that it’s easy to forget you’re carrying it, and easy to lose it in your pocket (like I have done multiple times!) This weight is even more impressive given the battery is built-in. I like to leave my earbuds plugged into it and wrap them around the radio body for transport, producing a tidy, tiny package of everything I need.
  • Battery: Battery life is another strong suit – I have yet to accidentally run it down, even forgetting to charge between games. I typically throw the radio on a battery bank on the way to the game, or shortly before the game, and have never run down the 500mah battery. I can’t find a stated battery life, and due to my experience really can’t estimate a runtime besides “long enough for extra innings.”

Features and Functionality:

  • Antenna: While relying on the headphone cable for an antenna does impact reception, it eliminates the bulk and vulnerability of a traditional antenna whip. This helps to make the radio instantly pocketable and prevents accidental seat-neighbor-pokes or damage. There’s nothing fancy such as selectable bandwidths to really help you out here, so you’re either going to have usable reception or you won’t.
  • Power/Mute Button: The power button cleverly doubles as a soft-mute, perfect for cutting out commercials between innings. A quick button tap when the last batter is out mid-inning mutes until you see the next batter up, and returns the previously set volume quickly.
  • Keypad Lock: The keypad lock function is invaluable for setting the desired volume and then tossing the radio in your pocket or letting it hang from the lanyard without accidental button pressings changing stations or volume.
  • Presets / Direct Frequency Entry: The lack of a number keypad for direct frequency entry is a minor inconvenience and my only real complaint, but in reality it’s lack of preparation. The radio does offer presets, making it easy to save your preferred stations before heading to the game – as long you remember to do so.

Future Wishlist:

If any radio manufacturers are out there listening (get in touch, Retekess or Tecsun!) I still think there’s a few features that would make an even better ballpark radio as discussed in my article from last year:

  • Bluetooth Headphone Support: There are a number of small radios on Amazon that advertise themselves as having “Bluetooth”, but when you dig deeper the feature just turns the radio body into an external speaker to your phone/tablet/laptop. The exception to the rule is the Prunus J-618 which claims actual bluetooth headphone support. Bonus points to manufacturers – allow two sets of paired headphones to be driven simultaneously. Finding comfortable Bluetooth earbuds is way easier these days at retail than finding a pair of wired earbuds, and you probably already own a pair to your liking.
  • Replaceable Parts: Implementing Bluetooth headphone support is going to require the move to an external antenna, and with that I’d love to see an antenna that can be easily replaced if it snaps off / is broken. I’m pro-repairability on electronics, so it would be great to see parts kits available at a small cost up-front with the radio to increase the likelihood the device lasts for years. Think antennas, plastic trim/doors, clips, lanyards, etc.
  • Selectable Bandwidth: I’d pay a little more for a radio that has a selectable bandwidth feature on both FM and AM. Legible commentary for a ballgame doesn’t require a very wide bandwidth, and this would go a long way towards turning an unstable/fringe signal into something more enjoyable. I’ve made use of bandwidth selection on Tecsun radios at the ballpark in the past and this is a sorely missed feature.
  • USB-C Charging: It’s 2025 – the world has moved to USB-C. Any device worth its salt these days should include a USB-C charging port, with actual proper USB-C PD support – none of that hacked up USB-A to USB-C junk.
  • Multiple Mounting Options: The lanyard on the Retekess V112 is great, what would be even more fun is some kind of clip that could attach to a stadium cupholder, or be attached to a seat in some fashion. Being able to strap a radio somewhere with bluetooth headphone support would be the ultimate convenience.

Conclusion:

For under $17 delivered to your door, the Retekess V112 is a great investment for live baseball enthusiasts. This radio has consistently enhanced my enjoyment of baseball games with its portable size, performance, and ease-of-use.

At $25, the Prunus J-618 looks like it might be a contender to the Retekess V112 throne and is one I’ll likely be checking out in the future. The Tecsun PL-368 is an attractive proposition for a ballpark radio, but in my mind provides more radio than you need, at a price-point ($75-$100) where I’d be afraid of breaking it or misplacing it in a ballpark environment.

For what it is, I’m not sure there’s much else that can compete at this price with the Retekess V112 for a low-cost, turn-key solution to live baseball play-by-play.

Bob’s Radio Corner: The Last Radio I Really Needed

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My original PL-660 has high mileage but still
has its original kick stand and whip antenna.

The Last Radio I Really Needed

By Bob Colegrove

Like most folks, I have a favorite radio.  My favorite radio is the one I happen to be listening to at the time.  Each radio has its own attractions.  The fact that one particular radio is turned on indicates that, at least for the moment, it is my favorite.

I also have a special radio.  It is special because, ever since I bought it, there has never been a compelling reason to buy another radio.  That said, there is no accounting for irrational behavior which has subsequently caused me to buy several more radios, always with the hope that the next radio would somehow provide better performance than my special radio.

My longstanding experience has been with vacuum tube radios.  I have used multiband radio consoles.  I have used everything from a Hallicrafters S-38 to a Collins R-390A and most everything in between.  I tried a couple of analog, multiband, solid-state portables in the 1960s and ‘70s.  I bought a Sony ICF-2010 early on and still have two of them fully functional.  For many years, the -2010s were my go-to radios.

Then, I happened to read the review of the Tecsun PL-660 in the 2012 WRTH.  The price seemed reasonable, and I decided to buy one.  From the very beginning, I was not disappointed.  Selectable sidebands and synchronous detection – not a Sony, but very good.  Further, the -660 was notably smaller and packed quite easily.  I could include a pair of earphones, a length of wire and this radio, set up away from the shack, and operate.

So why is this radio special?  It is not perfect.  But for LW, MW, SW, and FM, there is nothing I can hear on any of my radios that I can’t hear on the Tecsun PL-660.  Reception seems to be especially sensitive and clear.

I must qualify the claim above.  Normally I use external antennas.  External antennas are the great equalizers.  Properly matched they make a radio perform at its best.  Radio reviews and comparisons will often include judgements about sensitivity.  Unfortunately, many reviewers do not specify the conditions under which they tested the radio.  The reader must assume that these judgements are based on the use of stock internal antennas — most often the LW and MW ferrite loop and the SW and FM whip.  For portable radios this makes sense, as internal antennas are paramount to the radio’s transportable versatility.

Not Perfect

I will spare everyone yet another review of a radio now in its adolescent years.  I merely focus on a couple of picks I have with the PL-660.  There are others which are well documented.

Birdies

Probably the worst fault with the -660 is birdies.  There are a few along the LW spectrum but the worst by far is one which generally appears between 950 kHz and 1000 kHz in the MW band.  I have read where this is traceable to the DC-DC converter but have never found a remedy.  This nasty signal is very rich in harmonics and will replicate through the entire SW spectrum.  Further, the fundamental birdie and its harmonics tend to slowly drift upward for about an hour after the radio is turned on.  The drift accelerates with multiples of harmonics.  For example, while the fundamental birdie is creeping up 1 kHz, the second harmonic will travel 2 kHz, the third 3 kHz, and so forth.  There are many harmonics where no harm is done; however, the 4th harmonic will blaze a trail squarely through the 80-meter ham band.  Wait a while and it will drift onward but ultimately stop at some equally inconvenient location.

Poor Encoder

The PL-660 tuning encoder, as with its cousins in the -600 and the -680, is … well, very poor.  From the get-go it will jump erratically forward or backward.  This becomes worse over time, particularly with any prolonged periods of disuse.  I have not determined whether this is dirt, poor contact, or just poor design.  I have found that vigorous exercise forward and backward with the tuning knob is the best temporary remedy.  This will generally bring the encoder back to tolerable performance.

Replacement encoders are available at modest cost.  I went this route as a last resort but managed to lay up my -660 for several months having failed to make the replacement work at all on the first attempt.  A few months later with renewed determination, followed by a series of deep cleansing breaths, I reopened the radio and discovered that my mistake was just a solder bridge between two of the encoder pins.  Note to self: For the future, this surgery should only be performed by people with good vision and steady hands.  After several months of storage there was unbounded joy when the 12-year-old -660 came alive and began to tune perfectly – well as perfectly as it could.

My Mods

One of the reasons why the Tecsun PL-660 is special to me is that it is a tangible link to my tinkering past.  In former times, much satisfaction was obtained by aligning RF and IF stages, restringing dial cords, and replacing leaky capacitors.  For most tinkers, the advent of large-scale, solid-state integration and surface-mounted components has made tinkering virtually impossible.  Detailed data are scarce, parts much more specialized, and soldering skills more demanding.

The PL-660 came along at a point where vacuum tube tinkering was still within recent memory and the skills for maintaining and modifying high-tech radios had not become so intimidating.  To summarize, with just a few exceptions, today’s radios are for all practical purposes unrepairable, unmodifiable, and therefore more readily disposable.  What a pity.  The term “parted out” has entered our vocabulary, whereby a defective radio is cannibalized to provide its serviceable vital organs to its remaining siblings.

Dynamic Squelch

Briefly, the Tecsun PL-660 dynamic squelch function automatically adjusts the signal threshold based on its strength.  Ostensibly, this helps prevent the radio from being overwhelmed by noise when no signal is present while still allowing strong signals to be heard.  The “dynamic” part of the term refers to the feature turning itself on or off as the situation demands.  The downside is twofold:  a) weak signals may be totally blocked with squelch engaged; and b) the feature may oscillate on an off as a signal fades and then gets stronger.  There are several demonstrations of this on YouTube.

In 2012, a Russian radiofile managed to identify the transistor that switched the feature on and off.  By the simple expedient of grounding one of its leads, it could be permanently turned off, eliminating its drawbacks.  An optional further modification provided for the tone control switch to be repurposed to manually enable or disable the basic modification.

The relatively simple concept turned out to be rather involved surgery requiring a large metal circuit shield to be unsoldered and removed to access the transistor.  The old Yahoo PL-660 Group was abuzz with interest at the time.  Many folks were doing the modification.  Had it not been discussed so widely, I would likely have ignored it.  But being a wild, impulsive 70-year-old at the time, I had to give it a go and fortunately was successful.

Disablement of the dynamic squelch required removal of a shield on PCB

External LW and MW antennas

I do not like to be limited by the lack of an external LW/MW antenna connection.  The PL-660 has no means to switch one on.  You can easily inductively couple an AN-100/200 or Terk Advantage loop and get good results, but I wanted more.  I took the classic approach of winding a 5-turn transfer coil around the ferrite bar.  Initially I simply connected this to a twisted pair which ran out the unused hole for the wrist strap.  The twisted pair was connected to a phone jack and dangled out of the radio like a pig tail.

Pigtail used the hole in the case vacated by the wrist strap.

Sometime after my mod, Geir Laastad, LA6LU, published a paper with a much more elegant solution.  He discovered that the PL-880 used a stereo external antenna jack, the center (ring) terminal was not used, and the cumbersome pigtail could be eliminated by connecting the added transfer coil between this center terminal on the jack and the radio ground.  This necessitated use of a stereo plug to mate with the jack for connection of a LW/MW external antenna, but the jack could otherwise be used normally for SW.  I found that Tecsun used the same stereo jack approach on the -600, -660, and -680, and was able to connect the transfer coil to each radio the same way.  Geir’s paper is at https://groups.io/g/Tecsun-PL-880/files/_Tecsun_PL-880_LW_&_MW_Antenna_Mod.pdf, but you may have to request membership in the group to download it.

Enlarged fine tuning knob

One of the weak features of the -600, -660 and -680 is the fine-tuning pot.  Zero-beating a signal is a bit touchy.  The problem is exacerbated by a mechanical detent in the control’s center of rotation, that is, the point where zero beat is likely to be encountered.  I found a foam, doughnut-shaped packing spacer from a spindle of CDs had just the right internal and external diameters to slip over the fine-tuning knob and provide some added gear reduction.  By pressing the foam against the case, the effects of the detent could be mitigated.

Well, unfortunately, CDs are going the way of cassette tapes these days, so the availability of the packing spacers may not be so good.  It may be within the realm of possibility to fabricate one.

Wrist Strap

My final alteration is not so much a modification as it is a simple omission.  On the first disassembly of the -660 I omitted reinstalling the wrist strap.  IMHO, this piece of ribbon is no more useful than fender skirts on a ’57 Chevy.  Besides, it’s usually in the way.  Sometime in the murky past, this appendage made its appearance on a small portable radio.  Since then, nearly every manufacturer has felt compelled to include one.  I envision someone grabbing the radio by the strap and sashaying down the street with it dangling precariously by one’s side.  I have tried to imagine how its purpose might be inverted into a safety feature – perhaps first looping the strap around the wrist and then grabbing the radio with the hand.  But somehow, I can’t imagine anyone going to that trouble.  Maybe I’m missing something.

The wrist strap on this Realistic 12-714 AM/FM pocket radio from 1984 is hard to ignore.

The reader may be aware of other modifications to the PL-660, but mine are limited to those described above.

Epilogue

The old -660 has never been coddled.  Neither has it been subjected to the same vicissitudes as a soccer ball.  It remains a relatively handsome, finely crafted instrument still capable of soldiering on in the frontlines of the DX battle.

Is my old PL-660 a better-than-average “creampuff” off the Tecsun production line?  Does that make it special?  During the three or four months it was laid up with the encoder problem, I took the precaution of buying one of the last production units – this on the chance it might be my only opportunity of having an operational PL-660.  The newer one looks like its predecessor; it operates like its predecessor, even to the extent that it has the same birdies and the erratic encoder.  It does have the added feature of dial recalibration – a feature totally unnecessary on the original PL-660.  Somehow, it’s just not the old PL-660.  That one is special.

Maybe you have a special radio.