| 
			
			 
			
				May 3rd 04, 12:00 AM
			
			
			
	
		 | 
	|  | 
	
	| 
				  
 
			
			In article 2004050211290116807%ldawson@beatricenecom,says... Does anyone have experience with both of these radios and can compare
 AM/FM performance?
 
 The CCRadio+ is very well built. It offers digital tuning with 1kHz
 resolution.  It is quite capable of room-filling sound. It offers five
 presets for each band (AM/FM/Weather/TV).  It does a decent job on the
 built in antennas, but is subject to very serious overload problems when
 connected to a good external antenna.  The "handle" is nothing more than
 a recess on the back of the radio that does not provide an especially
 secure grip. (If you plan on moving it around a lot, I would recommend
 getting the outrageously expensive carry case. The price is ridiculous,
 but it's worth it to get a secure carrying handle.)
 
 The S350 is also reasonably well built, though definitely not to the
 same quality as the CCRadio+. (It does, however, have an excellent
 shoulder strap/handle built right in.)  It is an analog radio with
 digital frequency display. Due to being analog, there are no presets
 available. It has very good sound, probably a bit better than the
 CCRadio+, but is not capable of acheiving truly room-filling sound
 levels.  (My test for "room-filling" is whether I can clearly hear the
 radio over the sound of the shower.)  The S350 can handle very strong
 signals much better than the CCRadio+, though it does suffer from image
 problems primarily due to it being a single conversion radio. This
 doesn't show up much on MW (at least not for me), but you will probably
 find images of local MW stations throughout the lower portion of the SW
 band.
 
 I don't do a lot of FM listening so I can't give you a good comparison
 on that point. The FM band where I live is pretty crowded. Both radios
 pick up all the local stations I listen to without any problem.
 
 On MW it's somewhat of a toss-up. The CCRadio+ has only one filter that
 is a bit too large to allow good pick up of DX signals crowded between
 strong local signals. It's too bad Sangean didn't add a second narrow
 filter. The narrow filter offered on the S350 makes picking up the
 crowded weak signals a bit easier, though, as with most radios in this
 price range, the filters have rather wide skirts and strong adjacent
 signals will still bleed through to some extent. (Kiwa offers filter
 upgrades for the S350 which are probably a good idea if you plan to do
 any semi-serious DXing.) The analog tuning on the S350 allows you to
 tune off to the side a bit and can make reception of signals crowded on
 just one side a lot better. The CCRadio+ also allows this, but is
 limited to a 1kHz tuning step. Usually this is sufficient, but the S350
 does give a bit more flexibility in this.
 
 IMO, the CCRadio+ is a well-constructed radio that gives above average
 performance on MW. It is, however, much too expensive for what you get.
 It would be a bargain at half the price, but at $160, I think there are
 better values to be had.  Unless you need the weather band or the TV
 band, or need to listen in a noisy environment, I think the S350 offers
 the better value for the money.  It's as good as if not better than the
 CCRadio+ on MW performance and offers SW reception as well.  The SW
 reception is more than a bit on the drifty side, but is adequate for
 casual listening.  If you think of the S350 as a good MW radio that also
 gets SW you won't be disappointed.
 
 - Jay
 
 |