The Sony ICF-SW7600GR has enjoyed the cachet as the portable to beat. It's pricey. And it has steep competition from the likes of the less expensive Kaito 1103. So just how good is it? Former Sony engineer and regular contributor Ed weighs in with a review:
Described as the "last great Sony communications radio," this is a heck of a lot of radio for about $140 new. It's the veritable "Swiss Army Knife" of radios, giving you a ton of bells and whistles in a very portable package. Shortwave Listeners (SWLers) will especially appreciate its features, such as Synchronous Detection (no other radio at this price point has it), Single Sideband reception with Upper/Lower sideband selection, and a fine-tuning dial to tune in SSB stations precisely, so voices wont sound like Donald Duck.

First off, if your number one priority in a radio is hi-fi audio, you might as well stop reading. No radio I know of this small, in this form factor, regardless of price, can give you great sounding audio. (Through its built-in speaker, that is.) When I first turned it on, I thought it sounded really tinny, but thankfully Sony gives you a "Music/News" switch... always leave it set to "NEWS"...the highs are cut and the sound is much easier on the ears. But with earphones, you will get very good quality audio, especially on FM stereo. There is even a LINE OUT so you can feed a better-sounding set of PC or powered speakers.
Second, if you have a penchant for big, military-style radios, that's fine, but this little gem is the one you want to take with you. It is the perfect travel radio. It can be used as a clock radio, with 2 timer memories. It even comes with a "leather" travel pouch and a spool-antenna for Shortwave/AM boosting. You supply the earphones, none are supplied. Neither is a an AC Adapter. You may never need an adapter; it uses 4 AA batteries, and is said to have very good battery life.
Sony has had over 25 years to refine this radio, so it has everything...on AM, there is a variable Gain Control to deal with local station overloading. And you may need it--this thing is an AM-DX machine! (especially at night). It may be the most sensitive portable AM radio I've used. Gets San Francisco station 810 easily at night. On FM it is very good, not as sensitive as it is on AM... it gets Jeff's weird stations on 88.9 and 89.3 without too much trouble. At most you need to re-orient the telescoping FM antenna to get these low powered stations. It sits nicely on a desk when propped up with its rear, er, "propper-upper."
It is not a perfect radio... it is not intuitive to operate (the manual is thick), there is far too much button-pushing required initially (but once you get your 100 presets setup, it gets easier.) There is no tuning dial, alas. But the station scanning actually works well! (Rare to find in a low-priced radio.) And it scans up and down (even the $500 Eton E-1 didn't scan downwards), stops for a couple of secs on stations it finds, and keeps scanning. This is almost like the much costlier Sony SW-77 in a much smaller package. It also reminds me of a mini-Eton E-1.
It has a pushbutton light in the LCD display, but it does not stay on, even when you use an AC adapter. And it's useless in daylight. But that's probably done to increase battery life.
All in all, it does almost everything well in a portable form factor at a reasonable price. The only other competition are the cheaper and unreliable Kaitos, and a Sangean or two...I had (and sold) the $250 Sangean 909; it is not as good as this $140 Sony. I would never recommend a Kaito for its poor quality control and abysmal customer service. Sony still stands for quality, and they will backup their products. Believe it or not, this radio is MADE IN JAPAN. Not China!
I'd recommend you get one of these soon if you're in the market for a small portable AM/FM/SW, because the supply of 7600's is drying up. Even if you don't like it, it has great resale value on ebay and Amazon.com. You'll get at least 90% of your investment back. It is the last radio standing in a long line of great Sony radios.
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