Thanks, Chris Compton:
Got my Grundig S450 DLX Dec 24. Out of the box with brand new Duracell batteries the AM/ SW started motor boating after 3 minutes. The FM was deaf. Universal sent a replacement I should have in hand on Monday 1-3-11. A BIG disapointment!
On topic of quality, I went through two defective C Crane "CC radio EP"s before I got a good one.
The first one had a defective volume control. The second one drifted badly on FM when the LED dial light was switched on or off.
Crane tells me the first 2 were Pre-Production units. The third unit however is quite good on a par with my RP2100 on AM with good selectivity and sensitivity, that is,once you get the the hang of adjusting the Twin Coil Ferrite knob. Adjustment is necessary for tuning stations above 1200 khz.
The Music/Voice switch is a bandwidth selector and the two bandwidths are well placed.
I like the audio because the Bass is not harsh ala my RP 2100.
The FM is OK, nothing to brag about. Sensitivity is good but adjacent channel selectivity is not so good.
What I really like is the led dial light feature. It can be left switched on with very little impact on battery life.
All in all a nice replacement for GE SR3.
It looks like we're not doing too well with the success rate for S450DLX units purchased by Herculodge readers.
Two good ones - Doug, Harry
Two bad ones - Ed, Chris
This is a very small sample, but it still doesn't inspire much confidence.
Posted by: Gary | January 01, 2011 at 07:05 PM
Chris,
Glad to hear you got finally a good C Crane EP. Guess the third times the charm as they say.
But why did C Crane send you 2 "pre-production" units? Did they know before sending them out? And hope for the best that they would work (if they did know)?
Not exactly great quality control.
Posted by: Robin | January 01, 2011 at 07:45 PM
I had been anxiously waiting for these two sets.viz.S450DLX &CCrane EP,since October.So much so that I didn't go for s350 dlx price cut to 60 usd, (offer by radioshack).Now I am thinking of going for S350DLX. Any suggestion for deals by any seller is welcome.
Posted by: vimal oberoi | January 02, 2011 at 07:17 AM
What's interesting is that the 350 is no longer listed at all on Radioshack.com
The 350 is really good on AM and good on FM. But on Shortwave, it overloads really easily at least on my unit. I get WYFR and Radio Habana in the background at night no matter what I do or where I tune. It's also riddled with images although the images are most out of band as the 350 is a single conversion radio.
Just my feeling, I'd get the CCrane-SW over the 450 for a while, as radios seem to improve in quality the longer they are on the market.
My 350 sits in the garage to be honest. My DE1103 and G6 are my in-house radios.
Posted by: Shawn Patrick | January 02, 2011 at 05:09 PM
While surfing,I came across two very detailed and authentic reviews of CCRadio-EP at RadioIntelligencer by Jay Allen and Russ Johnson.This has made me think again in favour of EP as against my yesterday's choice of S350DLX as posted above.A must read at this link:
http://radiointel.net/c-crane-cc-radio-ep/
Posted by: vimal oberoi | January 02, 2011 at 11:15 PM