Enjoying this PL-390 more and more - great on all bands including LW. Picked up a NDB from the South Pacific last night, the first of my small portable radios to provide me with distant signals on LW. I was tuning around, hearing the usual locals, when up popped a new CW ID. Woohoo! Love it...my 'raison d'etre' in this hobby.
The ferrite rod and telescopic antenna are a bit longer than the PL-380's, but I didn't think that the difference in sensitivity would be so massive.
The PL-380 sounds very harsh as well. The PL-390 won't be winning any audiophile awards any time soon, but it has the best audio of all my small portables.
I did another outdoor test last night, pitting the PL-390 against the PL-660, as requested. Conditions were fairly good. I set them next to each other, facing the same direction, their whips (same size, don't know if the ferrite is) fully extended. I was using the auto-scanning modes on all bands but LW. I left the FM stereo off to dig out as many signals as I could. Station splatter added as a preset was counted as false.
03/12/11
MW (9 kHz steps)
1055 UTC - PL-390: 83 + 3 false PL-660: 21 + 4 false
1207 UTC - PL-390: 78 + 4 false PL-660: 26 + 1 false
FM 1100 UTC - PL-390: 30 + 3 false PL-660: 28 + 6 false
1208 UTC - PL-390: 28 + 2 false PL-660: 25 + 5 false
SW 1132 UTC -
Complete bandscan. 2300 - 21950 kHz on the PL-390, 2300 - 30000 kHz on the PL-660.
My DX touchstones are Radio Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Service - if I can make out the speech then conditions are good, as they're both low-power and far enough away.
PL-390: 133 good, 3 false. Included 3945 Vanuatu & 5020 SIBC.
PL-660: 49 good, 1 false. Missing Vanuatu & SIBC, as well as ALL of the stations above 16 MHz that were found on the PL-390.
Compared by listening; SIBC at good levels, Vanuatu just audible. PL-390 sounds strong and clear on the 4 kHz bandwidth setting. The speech sounds muddy on the PL-660 with the tone switch set on treble, and even more garbled with the tone set on bass. Put the narrow filter on and the announcer sounds like he's drowning in quicksand.
The PL-660 delivers good, clear SSB, though I find my Sangean ATS-909 better on SSB.
It eats batteries - in this 5 v radio 3000 mAh rechargeables last less than one week when in use for one to two hours per day. Full Eneloops last two weeks - they last two months in my Sangean, another battery muncher (6 v) that I use much more than the PL-660.
The scan functions are not sensitive. The cabinet rattles when the volume is increased to what I consider a medium room-filling level, not loud, rendering it unlistenable. It has the most hand capacitance of all my radios.
A loud squeal is produced when using sync detect to separate strong signals, and sync doesn't stay locked on unless you find a signal it likes - it's capricious, you just never know. Someone commented that this radio uses the same sync detect system as the Sony ICF-2010/2011D. As the original owner of a 2010 that I've used every day for the past twenty-three years (and a more recently purchased but older 2001D) I can only say that they don't compare at all. The Sony's sync detect is still the best of any radio I have with sync, by a very large measure. I haven't tried the Degen DE1106 with sync, a bit too expensive, that one...wonder if it's any good...
Final Thoughts on Side by Side Comparison
I explained in my test with the PL-660 vs. PL-390 that auto-scanning functions were used. I went back over every single station found on the PL-390 to hear how it sounded on the PL-660, if it was there at all. I mentioned that the PL-660's scanning functions aren't sensitive.
I kept a log (as always), too long to publish here. Of the 133 SW stations found during my PL-390 scan, 82 were audible on the PL-660. The rest were completely inaudible. On MW the PL-660 could not find nor tune in 35 stations that were easily audible on the PL-390. On FM they are about equal except for the fact that the PL-660 doesn't receive a distant FM station that is the only one I listen to regularly.
They are two completely different radios, and the PL-660 has never performed the way I'd hoped it would. It was the first of several purchased this year, and used the least because it's not sensitive enough and it just sounds bad. Just a personal test for fun, not scientific, your results may vary.
Jules
I have the silver version of the PL-390. For anyone who may have experienced freezing problems, below is a review I wrote on Amazon.
I was really digging the PL-390 radio until I also encountered freezing problems. I played with the different settings trying to see if anything could be causing the freezing. Finally success came with turning off the "charging function" of the radio (with the radio power turned off, press and hold the "M" button until can see "CHR OFF" on the lcd screen display). Overall this has pretty much eliminated the freezing of this radio. I did experience freezing once so far when I powered on the radio, but once I pressed the power button to turn off the radio, then pressed the power button again it successfully turned on the radio without having to remove the batteries. At this time I am still experimenting with this solution, but want to pass this information on to everyone.
UPDATE: (Oct. 11, 2013) Usually when my radio is left overnight, it would freeze in the morning, and would need to have it's batteries removed and reinserted again before it will work again. This is the first morning it did not freeze and it works perfectly. As mentioned earlier about my experience with my radio freezing the one time after changing the "charge function" to off, it may have been due to an internal switching from "on" to "off" that initially caused a glitch. Once it made the switch, I did not experience any more freezing with my radio. Since I use rechargeable batteries, the downside is now the "battery indicator" meter will not accurately tell me the state of the batteries. So I just ignore the battery meter and my radio is working just fine.
UPDATE: (Oct. 12, 2013) So far so good, have experienced no more freezing. The PL-390 is the main radio I listen to in FM. It receives the stations with no problems, and I also use an external wire antenna (I use a wire antenna from another radio, but this one comes with one). The sounds from the two speakers are nice and easy to listen to, but there is no tone control switch on the radio. It is not a boom box, I keep the volumes between 8-12 (the volume dial is rotated in increments and a volume number is displayed on the lcd screen) which is equivalent to modest to medium levels (don't want the risk of blowing out these nice small speakers). The two speakers "stereo effects" for what it is works in a small way, but it is pleasing. The sounds from the speakers is fine for the bedroom or smaller spaces. To tune into stations, I just use the keypad, I do not use the memory settings. The battery compartment can accomodate larger sized AA batteries (the other radios I have that have tight fitting battery compartments, I use the Sanyo AA batteries, they are the right size and works great).
Posted by: John S. | October 18, 2013 at 10:49 AM