Mike’s mini review of the RadioShack Model 2000669 shortwave radio

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RS-ShortwaveRadioRegarding the performance of the RadioShack Model 2000669 portable radio, SWLing Post reader, Mike, comments:

I picked one up today, and overall, I’m impressed. It does have complete coverage from 2.5 to 26.1 MHz as advertised, and overall, it has very good sensitivity and adjacent channel rejection for a small portable (in fact, the best I’ve heard from such). Sure sounds like some sort of DSP filter is involved. Reception is at least as good as my old Grundig Mini 300 and much, much better than a Degen DE22. Clipping an external long-wire antenna did not cause overloading (I was very surprised by this). AM BCB reception is actually quite decent: I was able to listen to several distant stations that were only 10 kHz from local ones. Audio is OK but not great, and the case does not stand up stably. I guess you can’t expect too much from a $30 radio. No case or earbuds are included.

By the way, if you go to a local Radio Shack store, be sure you get the internet price. We have two stores near my house; both had the radio marked as $39.99 instead of the $27.99 online sale price. The guys at the first store said “sorry, we can’t change the sticker price.” No sale. So, I went to the other store. When I pointed out the web price to the young women helping me there, she said, “this isn’t right” and called her manager over who overrode the store price with the cheaper one.

So, who makes this radio? Good question. The back of the case says “Custom manufactured in China for Radio Shack Corporation.” Maybe Tecsun?

Sounds like this may be a great portable for the glove compartment of a car, or to keep in your backpack/briefcase.

Thanks, Mike, and please share any other comments about this radio as you use it.

New RadioShack portable AM/FM/SW radio?

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RS-ShortwaveRadio

SWLing Post reader, Paul, points out this RadioShack model 2000669 portable radio and asks, “Is this a new RadioShack shortwave radio?”

Very good question! Though I haven’t been inside a RadioShack in a couple of months, I’ve never noticed this portable on their shelves. In fact, I don’t even recognize the form factor  as a re-badged Tecsun or Degen.

Has anyone purchased the model 2000669 from RadioShack?

Chelmsford Calling adds shortwave relay in Finland

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ChelmsfordWorldService(Source: Southgate ARC)

The Chelmsford Calling World Service produced by Jim Salmon 2E0RMI has added a shortwave relay from Finland

Chelmsford Calling is currently relayed on shortwave by Radio Miami International WRMI on the 2nd Friday of each month at 2300 UT on 9955 kHz. The additional relay will be by Scandinavian Weekend Radio (SWR) which is located in Virrat city, Upper Tampere Region, Liedenpohja village, Finland.

The show will be broadcast on the first Saturday of the month starting on December 6 on a selection of the following frequencies – 1602 kHz, 5980 kHz, 6170 kHz, 11690 kHz, 11720 kHz, & 94.90 MHz.

Chelmsford Calling
Web http://www.chelmsfordcalling.com/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/ChelmsfordCallingWorldService
Twitter https://twitter.com/ChelmCalling

Thousands protest cuts to CBC

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CBCbuilding

Many thanks to SWLing Post reader, David Iurescia, for sharing this story from Radio Canada International:

“Thousands of people marched in several cities in the province of Quebec and the New Brunswick city of Moncton on Sunday to protest ongoing cuts to the public broadcaster CBC/Radio-Canada.

Beginning in the 1990s, successive Canadian governments cut funding to the service. The latest round will lead to 1,500 job losses by 2020. That represents almost 20 per cent of the current, total number of employees.

Cultural groups in particular are concerned about the cuts to the English-language CBC and the French-language Radio-Canada. Preserving culture is particularly sensitive issue in the French-speaking province of Quebec.

Radio Canada International has also suffered from the budget cuts and had to dismantle its international shortwave service in 2012. RCI is now only accessible by internet.”

Also check out this article on the Montreal Gazette.

BBC Relay Station handed back to Seychelles

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BBC Seychelles Relay Station (Photo: Vijay.sc)

BBC Seychelles Relay Station (Photo: Vijay.sc)

(Source: Seychelles News Agency via Andy Sennitt)

Tuesday November 18 marked the closure of an iconic chapter of Seychelles’ history, signalling the end of an era when information was much more difficult to come by. With much of Africa joining the internet and mobile phone revolution, the times of trying to glean information about happenings in the rest of the world on a crackly AM radio station have now passed by.

Over 25 years after its establishment, the site of the BBC’s former Indian Ocean Relay Station (IORS), located at Grand Anse, on the western side of the largest inhabited island in the archipelago, was handed back to the government of Seychelles by the country’s British High Commissioner, Lindsay Skoll.

The station transmitted BBC World Service programmes since 1988 via shortwave to listeners across East Africa in a range of languages, including the BBC’s English-language output for Africa as well as programmes in Swahili, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Somali and French.

In November 2013, the BBC announced its intention to cease all its shortwave transmission services from Seychelles due to a gradual and irreversible fall in demand for shortwave radio services, and on March 29 this year, the BBC IORS retransmission services from Seychelles were officially switched off. BBC World Service broadcasts in East Africa are still available via the internet and also via various other localised frequencies.
The handing over of the site to the Ministry of Land Use and Housing (MLUH) also included the station’s buildings and equipment, all of which are still in working order. The site is spread over a 32,000 square metre property, occupied under a lease dating back to March 27, 1985.

[…]The station is equipped with 33KV high-voltage equipment and transformers which will now go into the possession of the Public Utilities Corporation, while the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority (SCAA) will take over three of the BBC’s four steel communications towers and the annex building.

The SCAA will use the towers to strengthen its air communication and surveillance capabilities and the annex building will be used to house a new high-frequency aviation communications radio system to help control air traffic coming in from the west of the island.

The fourth steel tower will be allocated to the local telecommunications company Cable and Wireless for mobile based telecommunications.

Read the full article on the Seychelles News Agency’s website.