A New Offering from Sangean--the WR-11

What I like about Sangean is that, unlike most radios that are built cheaply, Sangean offers high build quality, especially its Sangean WR-2. Now Sangean is offering another table top radio, the WR-11. Unlike the digital WR-2, the WR-11 is analog and should offer strong competition to the Tivoli Model One.  

You can buy the WR-11 as a pre-order for $89.99 on J&R. It should be available in mid-September. 

My thanks to Tom for the update. 

Comments

[gerald j]

kinda ho hum styling.

[herculodge]

Gerald,

I think Sangean is going for clean, simple lines and competing against the Tivoli Model One. Simplicity is their selling theme in style and function.

[Scooby214]

I have the WR-1, and its AM is quite prone to interference. If you get it in an interference free environment, it does fairly well (though not as well as the Model One with an external antenna). The FM is outstanding. I have it connected to my directional yagi antenna, and it never overloads on the strong local stations. It does quite well at separating weak signals from second adjacent strong channels. I had better success with the WR-1 than with the WR-2 on FM.

If the FM on the WR-11 is as good as on the WR-1, it is worth the money.

[jeffrey McMahon]

I wonder why the WR-1 beats the WR-2 on FM. So it's prone to AM interference. I hate that. That would drive me crazy.

And so the Model One gets better AM?

[Scooby214]

In my case, the Model One's better AM comes with the external loop antenna. When plugged in, it disconnects the internal loop (not a ferrite rod to be found in the Model One). The external loop is nice for getting the antenna away from the transformer in the radio, as well as being able to null out unwanted signals without turning the radio.

Even without the external loop, the my Model One is less effected by interference than the WR-1.

Neither one of these table radios outperforms the S350DL on AM.

As far as FM on the WR-1 and WR-2, I get cleaner sound from the WR-1 than what I got from the WR-2 with weak signals. I have to tune the WR-1 carefully to find that sweet spot, but the tuning indicator makes that easy. Once I find the sweet spot, it has very little of that weak signal noise (I don't know what to call it).

[Scooby214]

I do wish they would've added an AUX position to the band selector like the newer Model One has. Even my Recepter has switched AUX input so you can leave a cable plugged in. I don't like having to turn the radio around and disconnect the cable when I want to listen to the radio again, even if the sound of the Sangean is so much better than the Tivoli.

[jeffrey McMahon]

I have a Recepter also. When I turn the knob in preset mode, the presets sometimes skip or go backwards. I think after 2 years mine has developed some bad habits.

I'm bummed that the WR-1 and presumably the WR-11 are so prone to AM interference. They should have the PR-D5 antenna.

[Tom Welch]

Last night here in Phoenix, AZ about 10 PM, many AM/FM stations were blown off the air due to lightning and thunder storms. Tuning around the AM band on my Sangean PR-D7 I picked KNX 1070 from Los Angeles, plus several San Diego stations.