Thanks for your kind words and thanks for watching.

Yes, I wish we could go back to simpler times without the internet, too much technology now which is running our lives and I am really sad for so many Children today glued to screens, it's destroying their Childhoods and in many cases effects their ability to communicate and have proper friendships. What would be really good is if we had no smart pones or tablets where the internet could only be used with the big PC in one room that couldn't be carried everywhere we go, where Children were once supervised but now too many have these smart devices in their pockets to use wherever they want for as long as they want with full access to the internet, it's not good.

I too

Haha, thanks, I hope you enjoy it and also hope that my videos made you aware that there's an updated production run due around the end of March which should fix some issues ?

@@o00scorpion00o i will keep an eye on your vids to see when you follow up with Sangean and if they actually do replace radios. Sounds like it will cost them a lot of $ so I am not too confident that they will replace radios. We will see. Thanks!

@@dieselten01 Funny you mentioned that because I just emailed Sangean a few mins ago. I will update as soon as I know more.

Yes a long wire should really help, maybe also try a 9:1 UNUN ? might help with noise. Yes good ground is very important. My Antenna I was using in this video is the Bonito MA-305 it's a remarkable antenna for only 8 inchs long.

Thanks for watching! :-)

Yeah, ECSS performance on the 909 X2 is amazing. Audio through another speaker ? hard to say, of course the two radios will naturally sound different but in SYNC the Sony will always have the upper hand simply because you get full bandwidth, you keep both sidebands but with SSB on ECSS you get half the bandwidth as one of the sidebands gets removed which reduces quality but can be much better at reducing the effects of fading and it's much less noticeable with speech.

Hi Bob, sure if I am still awake, give me a time in UTC and I'll listen out if it's not too late, unfortunately 3.873 mhz is out of band for me here in Ireland so wouldn't be able to talk.

@@o00scorpion00o we will be on tonight at 8:00pm EST 12:00am UTC , its to bad that you can't join us due to frequency restrictions, we are in the AM MODE and I have had many Qsos with folks all over the world , we mainly are on AM. It will be myself K4KBW and my dad K1KBW and a bunch others we all build class E transmitters check us out on QRZ and k1kbw.com . I hope you can hear us 73 Bob K4KBW.

Unfortunately 12:00 AM is 1 Am here in Summer Time and in Winter we are same as UTC. I will be in bed at 1Am :-( 80m ends at 3.8 Mhz here in Europe and we're not allowed 75m as it's a broadcast band. We could sure do with the extra bandwidth due to the sheer amount of activity it can be difficult to have a decent QSO without QRM on 80m. I checked out the link, those amplifiers you build look really great, lots of hard work went into those I can see! well done!

@@o00scorpion00o We are on now Sir

@@bob02911 Unfortunately I could not make it but maybe at the weekend if you're on ?

Hi Jim, thanks for watching, yes I do love older music it's very refreshing from the noise I hear on the likes of FM today or every shop and restaurant I walk into. Yes the 2001D does have better sound in SYNC than the 909 X2 using ECSS and is to be expected because SYNC keeps both sidebands so you get twice the quality than SSB, I guess it wasn't a fair test on the 909 X2 because it doesn't have SYNC. There was indeed some QRM from another carrier that popped up and got more pronounced after the video which is why I had a hard time trying to tune the Sangean later on in the video on USB. The Sony has great SYNC but ECSS doesn't work on it because it has only 100 hz tuning which can make SSB in general a little difficult to tune in at times. The Sangean, while it has no SYNC ECSS works great and is a more effective tool against fading than SYNC on the Sony at the expense of half the sound quality because remember, on USB/LSB we remove one of the sidebands. For Really weak DX, ECSS on the sangean is more effective than SYNC on the sony and with speech the loss in quality is hardly noticeable, for a modern radio the ATS-909 X2 is one of the best portables you can buy new today that has such good performance on ECSS and SSB in general and if Sangean get the filter options working on SSB it will be a really super radio. I might do comparisons between both radios again this time on the Ham bands. Unfortunately the 2001D LCD is starting to go bad, It wasn't like that when I got it on Ebay around 1 year ago, it wasn't through misuse either. The electrolytic capacitors can go bad in them too but I wouldn't ave the patience to open it up and replace them and I probably won't bother if the LCD is going to get much worse, shame because it's a terrific radio and it's a real crying Shame Sony no longer bother to make multiband radios.

@@o00scorpion00o Thank you for your reply. It is sad about your 2001D. I suppose that SONY never thought that we would be using them 30+ years after their release. My previous one worked well: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/rL6PmMuovdKvfHU.html until quite recently. I had it for just over two years and Is now awaiting repair with Radiocruncher Graham, who I can recommend for repairs. you'll have to nurse it and keep an eye out on eBay for one at a reasonable price. There are some at ridiculous prices. I was lucky and got one in good nick for £100 but as ever buyer beware! 73s and GDX

@@jimgordon1563 haha your screen looks good compared to mine. Yeah got mine off of ebay and the screen was perfect when I got it. Indeed I bet Sony couldn't have imagined the radios lasting so long and I bet they couldn't have imagined a time when they would never make a multiband radio again, that's really sad, imagine today what we could have if they had to keep making them ?

It sure is, or I should say was, it's now dead and the screen is all black. I should ebay it for parts. Sad, but that's the issue with old radios.

In this Video, both the Sangean and Sony are using the same Antenna, the Bonito MA 305. The Sony does have better audio because it's using proper SYNC which the Sangean does not have so as a result the Sangean is using half the bandwidth as it's using only one sideband as I am in SSB mode.

I had the S-2000 and unfortunately sold it to get the PL-880 at the time, big mistake as the SSB sound quality is awful and even on the PL-990x. The S-2000 was a good radio, good sound but overloaded a lot more with external antenna than the 909 X2. Neither radio has narrower filtering for SSB so on crowded ham bands SSB can be a challenge on both radios but the tight filtering on the PL-990x/880/S-8800 is worthless because the audio is so poor and the 4 Khz filter does not work. The Reason I emphasise SSB a lot, for those not aware, is because you can use it on a commercial SW station to weed out the weakest signals you can't so on AM because on SSB you eliminate the upper or lower part of the signal where as with tighter filters you can only widen the whole signal or make it narrower while still receiving signals that might be interfering with the weaker signal you're trying to hear, SSB can eliminate this altogether, just hit SSB and then press USB/LSB until the interference is gone or a lot less. SSB is really a DX'ers essential tool. The 909x2 will handle any antenna you throw at it without overloading or at least with much better ability to handle strong signals, you may still have to lower the gain if you have strong transmitters near you. The 909 X2 has noise on SW when using the telescopic antenna and the audio is too low for me when on battery on SSB. The S-2000 will need much greater care when choosing an antenna, I always recommend the Bonito MA305 Whip because it's got superb S/N ratio and outputs just enough signal for portable radios, it has much lower noise than a long wire antenna, but it still needs a good ground and good H155 coax if you can get it. For base use the S-2000 is nicer to use. If your budget can stretch then one of the best receivers you'll get for the money is actually a Yaesu FT-891 amateur radio transceiver, terrific receiver with much better audio than any Tecsun radio and might encourage people to get their Ham radio license if they haven't. :-) It will need external speaker but most of the time I listen via headphones. If the price is not right look out 2nd hand. Of course it's not as easy to carry around the house as it won't work on a whip but I rarely use telescopic antennas inside the house as you will miss 50% or more of the signals. The difference between the S-2000 and FT-891 is night and day! The 909 x2 is expensive and in my opinion not worth it over the PL-680 which is a really good radio especially with external antenna. I would keep the S-2000 to be honest and if you want a better base radio the FT-891 is a superb radio and I even prefer the audio from it compared to the Icom IC-7300. You could also look out for older base radios from Yaesu.

I always recommend to get a better antenna before you spend money on the radio. A radio is only as good as the antenna. I believe the difference you'd notice the most with the 909 x2 would be the tuning, if I remember correctly the 405 does not have a normal tuning encoder only up and down buttons and would drive me insane. The 909 X2 would give you the ability to listen to SSB and you could listen to Amateur radio folk and the best thing about having SSB is that you can filter out interference from other stations. My advice is to get a better external antenna if you are still using the telescopic whip, the bonito ma305 is a superb antenna and your results will vary depending on your location Urban/Rural etc. After that I would get the Tecsun PL-680 from anon-co.com, it's a great performing radio and sounds really good and works great with external antenna and you simply can't beat it's sound quality and performance for the price. If you were to spend the money on the 909 x2 then seriously look at getting the new version of the Malachite portable SDR directly from RX9CIM malahit_sdr@rambler.ru it will blow away any portable radio in functions and performance but if that's not your thing then the PL-680 is a really good portable radio.

Yes I've noticed this behaviour with the Sangean. I believe it's not as much of an issue with Alkaline cells but have not tested it with these. On SSB it's more noticeable.

Thanks for writing this. That would be a deal breaker for me.

Yes at times the Sony sounds better, this is the trick with SYNC when it works properly like on the Sony it's good but it did suffer a lot more of fading than the Sangean using ECSS. Using SSB is always going to remove some of the sound quality because then you got half the bandwidth in USB/LSB, for voice you'd hardly notice it at all but ECSS is very effective when conditions are tough and there's lots of deep fading or QSB. So while the Sony sounds better in SYNC it can't use ECSS, it's just not possible and this will mean it suffers more from deep fading while the ATS-909 X2 had no problem with fading at all in ECSS, the content was still readable.

Thanks for watching, Portable radios have external antenna input for a reason don't they ? in my opinion, the telescopic antenna should only be used when there is no alternative, even 20 feet of wire attached to the telescopic antenna can make a big difference, a radio is only as good as it's antenna.

I got the russian made malachite on the way in a couple of weeks and I think if you are looking for a new radio then it's worth checking out, there is an updated version only available from Georgiy malahit_sdr@rambler.ru

@@o00scorpion00o Hmm, looks interesting but shipping to me (not in the U.S.) is not possible until the wuflu blows over...Thanks

@@chele-chele Really, how come ?

@@o00scorpion00o The country has a ban on incoming packages except DHL and FedEx which would both be as costly as the radio...regular post has been suspended for nearly a year here.

@@chele-chele That's really bad, sorry to hear that. I hope your regular postal service resumes soon!

The new Sangean is better but I think for the money the Tecsun pl-680 is best. I'd stay away from the DSP portables, and get the PL-680 and a good antenna like the Bonito MA-305 whip antenna, depending on your location and local noise levels it's a superb antenna, needs to be mounted outside. This Bonito and PL-680 and you'll have one superb listening setup. Or, alternatively you could check out some desktop radios which would mostly be older but probably nicer to use.

@@o00scorpion00o You know I bought a Icom IC-7300 and do not transmit or even want a license. Just like to listen. So far it is impressive and realize it cost a lot more. The Sangean I owned in the 80's was such a performer. Makes me wonder what the heck went wrong with them today. Even owned a a killer Sony in the 70's(TFM-8000) that was even more powerful?

I'm in Ireland so I got it direct from Sangean Europe. eu.sangean.com/uk/product/ats-909x2-graphite

I very much doubt you can find a replacement LCD due to the radios age, mine is, unfortunately, much worse now. If you do find a replacement please let me know.

Do you sell

Who knows ? if you don't want it put it up on ebay and find out ?

The 909 x2 has some internal noise on the whip which will hopefully be fixed with the new update coming out around the end of March. Sangean assured I would receive one of these new batches. It appears quite sensitive otherwise. It depends on what you're looking for in a radio, a radio is only as good as it's antenna and using external antenna you receive so much more and even if one radio is less sensitive than another adding some wire to the whip can make a big difference. The Tecsun Pl-880, 990x and most other DSP radios have poor sound quality on SSB meaning ECSS is not possible and ECSS is incredibly useful for the serious DX'er, it reduces or eliminates interference from a noise source or other station close by and can also be very effective at reducing the effects of fading. If you're want a radio that is sensitive on the whip the 990x is good but in my opinion far too expensive to have this poor sound quality on the whip, same with the Pl-880 and S-8800 so depends what you are looking for, I would wait to see if sangean fix some early production issues with the 909 x2 first if you were paying so much for the 990x because the sound quality on SSB is excellent.

My Sony could do with a good service and probably a recap. It's old and sadly the LCD display is dying. So wouldn't be worth replacing the caps. The Sony performs on MW and LW superbly with external antenna. Most radios today do not have connectivity on LW/MW with external antenna.

Thanks for watching, yes the Sony has better audio because it's got twice the bandwidth using SYNC compared to radios which have no SYNC which is only using one of the sidebands in ECSS. It's a shame Sony stopped making radios like this.