Tag Archives: XHDATA D-808

Typhoon Khanun: Carlos’ Radiofax decodes using an XHDATA D-808 and Mag Loop antenna

Carlos’ Radiofax portable receiving and recording station.

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Carlos Latuff, who recently shared a number of Radiofax images of Typhoon Khanun he’s decoded over the past few days–apologies as I’ve been traveling and could not post when received. Carlos writes:

Attached is a satellite image broadcasted today by Japanese meteorological agency via radiofax (7795 kHz USB), and received by me in Porto Alegre, Brazil, at 19h10 UTC.

Even with image quality compromised by the signal, it’s possible to spot powerful typhoon Khanun, approaching Okinawa, with winds of 220 km/h.

Receiver is a Xhdata D-808 with loop antenna, signal decoded by HF Weather Fax app.

Also:

Tropical cyclone forecast broadcasted today by Japanese meteorological agency via radiofax (7795 kHz USB), received in Porto Alegre, Brazil, at 19h50 UTC.

Typhoon Khanun is approaching Okinawa, with winds of 220 km/h.

In addition:

Radiofax (detail) from the meteorological agency of Japan, received today at 19:50 UTC in Porto Alegre, frequency 7795 kHz (USB). In the circle, position of the powerful typhoon Khanun, in southern Japan.

Thank you for sharing these, Carlos. It’s amazing that with such simple equipment we can track and download weather events and imagery like this. Pretty amazing!

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13dka Reviews: The new 2022 “Belka” (generation 3) general coverage receiver

The new 2022 “Belka” (generation 3) general coverage receiver

by 13dka

Since its introduction in 2019, the super-tiny Belka (back then called “Belka DSP”) shortwave receiver sure gained an enthusiastic followership among SWLs and hams. The main reason for this is certainly the way how the Belka is incredibly small yet playing in a different league than the various consumer grade, Chinese mass-production radios, particularly the DSP-based ultraportables: The Belka is an all-mode shortwave communications receiver with a completely different (direct conversion SDR) architecture, developed and produced by a radio enthusiast (Alex, EU1ME) in a small mom&pop shop in Belarus.

In case you’ve never heard about it amidst all the buzz about more popular brands, here’s the skinny:

The Belka offers true allmode (including NFM and CW) reception with a proper 400 Hz CW filter and individual settings for the low and high filter slopes for AM, FM and SSB. It has an AM sync detector and comes with a 0.5ppm TCXO-controlled local oscillator for absolutely spot-on, calibration-free frequency precision and stability, which makes SSB or ECSS reception of broadcast stations a pure joy. The second iteration “Belka DX” brought a slightly extended coverage down to 1.5 MHz and an I/Q output for panadapter display and/or processing via your favorite SDR software.

All Belkas are quiet and very sensitive radios with a surprisingly robust front end, the filters are better and its AGC works like you’d expect it from a communications receiver, without the artifacts and distortion the DSP radios are infamous for, and of course smooth, non-“muting” tuning in variable steps down to 10Hz.

The Belkas have no built-in speaker (available as option tho) but really excellent audio on headphones and external speakers and they actually give my Icom IC-705 a run for its money in terms of reception quality, and they do that for up to 24 hours on a single charge of the internal Li-Ion battery. This stunning feature set is crowned by the best performance on a telescopic whip antenna ever – the Belkas have a high-impedance (>10 kOhm) antenna input optimized for this whip and taking it on a walk is (really!) like having a big rig with a big antenna in tow…

Despite all this goodness setting the Belka(s) quite fundamentally apart from most (if not all) current and former, even much higher priced portables and simultaneously putting it solidly into pricey tabletop territory, it hasn’t put Tecsun et al out of business for a couple of reasons: One reason is that it can only be obtained from Alex in Belarus, which is now often assumed to be impossible (it isn’t, more on that later). Another reason is that it doesn’t try to compete with aforementioned multiband radios from China, so there is no FM broadcast band and – until now – no AM BC band, but most owners and potential buyers particularly in the US really wished it had at least the latter. Well, Alex obviously heard us! After the Belka DSP and the Belka DX, the new Belka is just called “Belka”, so in order to avoid any ambiguity I’m going to refer to this model as “Belka 2022”.

What’s new?

The most prominent addition to the Belka 2022 is the extended 0.1-31 MHz coverage, the previous version only started receiving at 1.5 MHz. With LW and MW included, its “pseudosynchronous” detector (as featured in venerable radios from Harris, Racal or Drake), the great filtering and the great frequency precision for hassle-free ECSS reception are promising that the “squirrel” is now an ultra-ultraportable companion for MW DXers as well.

Continue reading

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Wlodek Shares an Air Raid-Prompted Radio Comparison

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and friend, Wlodek (US7IGN), who writes from Kiev:

Hello!

Because of another air raid alert, I can’t sleep and I decided to make a small comparison of the receivers of the 60s and the modern one.

Of course, you can not compare their size and weight, as well as some features.

This Chinese XHDATA D-808 was given to me by a friend for comparison. When he was just choosing a good receiver, I advised him to buy an old Sony 7600 series or Panasonic B65, for example. But he decided that modern technology is better at handling the task of receiving. But it turned out to be not so clear:

Click here to view on YouTube.

Radios:

73 de US7IGN!

Thank you for sharing this, Wlod. I wish the circumstances for the radio comparison were better–even though I know air raids have sadly become a fact of life for many in Ukraine, I can’t imagine sleeping through them. 

Your short comparison is interesting too. I consider the D-808 to be an excellent little DSP portable, but the audio simply can’t compare with your vintage radios. Indeed, the vintage receivers seem to handle the QRM a bit better than the D-808 as well.

Thank you for sharing this and wishing you the very best, OM.

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Shortwave’s Giant: Carlos explores evangelical broadcasting to MENA

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and political cartoonist, Carlos Latuff, who shares the following guest post:


WINNING HEARTS, MINDS AND…SOULS!

Catechizing via shortwave.

by Carlos Latuff, special for The SWLing Post

During the Vietnam War (1955-1975), the expression “hearts and minds” became popular and referred to the US government’s strategy to gain allies among the South Vietnamese against the Vietcong guerrillas. Over the years this strategy has been used in different contexts. What I’m going to talk about in this short article is how the radio waves have served Christian evangelical churches, to win hearts and minds, specially in Africa and Middle East (MENA).

Different from what I did with the Ethiopian clandestine broadcasts, when I spent around 3 months monitoring, with evangelical radios it took only two days in January 2022; quite simple, since they’re stations with regular programming. Most of them have good signal reception, there’s no jamming from other countries and, despite transmitting in different languages, little translation was necessary since the content is always the same: religious preaching.

All listenings happened in Rio de Janeiro. The radio sets used in this monitoring were the XHDATA D-808 and an old analog radio Sanyo RP-8351, made in Brazil in the 70’s. A 7-meter long wire antenna was used in all listenings. Continue reading

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Video: Stock Radiwow D-808 vs. DeBock 7.5 inch Loopstick model

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Gary DeBock, who shares the following notes and video:

The 7.5 inch (19cm) loopstick Radiwow R-108 model “smokes” the stock R-108 model in this video demonstration of receiving daytime DX fringe station 550-KARI in Blaine, WA (5 kW at 150 miles). The modification uses the same enhanced loopstick as described in the XHDATA D-808 “Supercharging” article, and is reasonably easy to complete (although some experience is recommended)

Click here to view on YouTube.

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The new SIHUADON D-808 portable shortwave radio

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Adid, who writes:

Hi Thomas,

Yesterday I found this short animation:

So I went to their website to look at this nice black and amber screen new model.

https://xhdata.com.cn/ (strangely enough, they sell there Tecsun stuff also)

I don’t plan on buying it any time soon as I don’t think they added “memories scroll” as there is in the R108.

So any of the members here can comment on the Black SIHUADON D-808 ?

Regards, Adi

Thank you for sharing this, Adid!

I’m also very curious if any SWLing Post readers have purchased the SIHUADON D-808 and could comment on any differences (other than the superficial ones) with it and the XHADATA D-808. 

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Adid offers two simple mods for the XHDATA D-808 (or any portable radio!)

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Adid, who shares two inexpensive mods he made on his XHDATA D-808 shortly after taking delivery of it in 2018. One is simply clear tape over the display to protect it from scratches. The second is applying three tiny drops of glue which create tactile points on the keypad for nighttime operation.

Thanks for sharing these, Adid!

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