SIHUADON D808 Portable Radio Transistor AM FM SW LW SSB Air Band Multiband Radio Loudspeaker Alarm Clock Sleep Timer Black

Product Information

The review states the PL-660 doesn’t save bandwidth and other settings when storing in memory. Mine does. It stores USB/LSB, bandwidth and even Sync settings. Maybe this happened with later firmware versions. While I really, really loved the look and feel of the radio along with the outstanding FM performance, I kept thinking that the X2 really didn’t live up to being a radio worthy of its current pricing in 2021. So the manufacturer have cut production costs by eliminating costly LC trimmers and active components of the Pre-Scaler and DC-DC converter, reduced the alignment requirements at the assembly line, and potentially have reduced some internal noise coming from the MCU/Display into the DSP, at the cost of offering a radio with lesser ability to reject strong spurius RF signals. I’ve read a similar comment in one of the other posts about the D-808, so it’s possible that a few units come with this issue. Are you using the proper unprotected 18650s with pin? Another thing to rule out as a potential culprit would be the charger, but I guess the 808 shouldn’t indicate a fully charged battery then. I hope you have no trouble getting the 808 replaced!

The D-808 has no such thing and that makes it at least as vulnerable to overloading from good conditions or big antennas as the PL-660 without attenuation. At the beach it exhibited very faint intermodulation even at propagation conditions that were just “not quite as crappy as the current record low” when the Tecsun did not. They were so soft that I think this can’t be heard when the noise level is a bit higher, still a bit strange. Intermodulation products seem to show up most prominently around 7MHz, 10MHz and in the 15m ham band first. A major culprit in the D808 is no Memory scroll by knob or “up/down” but only by key selection. I see hereCuriosity got the better of me and I ended up buying all three (the Digitech AR170, the XHDATA D-808, and the C.Crane Skywave SSB) to compare and other than minor feature differences, I find them all roughly equivalent in terms of sensitivity and selectivity. Using the D-808 again after a few years reminded me that this little China-made receiver offers no less than SEVEN bandwidths, in AM mode. Let me say that again: SEVEN (7) bandwidths. The PL-880 has the dreaded distortion on SSB which can be annoying, on the D-808 it’s hardly noticeable. The S-8800 suffers the same on SSB.

A valid product review is one where you have experience or knowledge of the product that you would like to share with others. Tecsun started providing this on small receivers years ago, and in the PL-880, the excellent though flawed portable that also took the listening world by storm, and in the recent 330, 990x and 501x. Definitely a fault in the radio which is a shame because it’s a great piece of kit – unfortunately, it’s not going to be much good if I have to keep removing the battery every time I turn it off.The Antenna input on the S-8800 also works on LW/MW but does not disconnect the internal ferrite but once you’re aware of it it greatly improves lw/mw/sw with my Bonito MA205 Whip. I’m wondering if other D-808 owners reading this have anything to comment on the legibility of their LCD panels, as I’m not sure if mine was fitted with a mediocre digital display or the poor contrast is the norm. I’m thinking of requesting for an exchange within the first 30 days’ warranty period but the rest of the radio is fine. There is much room for improvement though – for example the slightly borked control of the DSP, the chuffing/tuning and AGC issues on SSB let the D-808 miss the title “most stunning cheap little radio ever” by a hair. Adopt DSP (Digital Signal Processing) technique,analog high and medium frequency circuit and many frequency conversion,highly improve the receiver sensitivity, selectivity and anti image interference capability The DC-DC converter was not properly shielded in the previous versions, being a source of RF noise. Other better radio brands, even ones using the same basic chassis, use shielded DC-DC converters.

Is it possible to read dBµV and dB SNR instead of 1st temperature, 2nd alarm time and 3rd time before the meter? It is a RADIO so it should read the signal strenght indicator FIRST as you switch on the radio! So far I couldn’t find birdies anywhere on the D-808. The PL-660 is pretty clean on shortwave too, but it has hefty birdies around 100, 200 and 970kHz, despite the efforts Tecsun has put into shielding and clean PCB design. The 808 was and still is compared to the CCrane Skywave SSB, a much smaller and compact receiver. Unfortunately, in my experience both suffer from soft muting. Tecsun PL-880 - I got a good one. Close in sensitivity to the 2010, has nice selection of bandwidths and great audio. I really like this receiver. I guess I’ll keep tossing my 7600 in my bags when I head overseas. Was really hoping that Sangean had a radio that would allow me to retire my Sony.

Frequency stability, accuracy, birdies, quirks

Great review. Would be interesting if you tested them both with a passive MW loop as I find that the xhdata is rejecting signals rather then enhancing them and raising the noise floor, whereas the Tecsun pl-880 will accept the tuned passive loop. Recent additions to the shortwave portable receiver market have been quite impressive, especially considering the continuing decline in the use of shortwave as a transmission method by broadcasters. I love reading a well-prepared review of shortwave radios especially those of multiband portables with SW. This comparative review of the D-808 and the PL-660 is outstanding. I was impressed with the sensitivity of the 808, large speaker, and inclusion of AIR band, though I noticed some digital artifacts and agree with negatives such as slight soft muting and chuffing, and slowness of the processor. I tested my D-808 with the low impedance AKG K240. There is low dB hiss even if you turn the volume all the way down. When you turn the volume up to 5%, you can still hear the hissing. In FM mode, this low noise is more noticeable. However, this hiss is not heard above 10% of the sound.