| W4KVW |
Rating:  |
2013-02-01 | |
| VERY LOUD! {:>) |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| This speaker is VERY loud.I use it with my ICOM 7000 & it is loud enough to get the audio over the road noise with ease.I gave only $20 or so about 5 years ago at Walmart & all I can find now are about $28 or more but this speaker takes the volume wide open without any rattle or distortion.I would buy another one if I needed a LOUD speaker without DSP. |
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| K4EZD |
Rating: |
2012-03-10 | |
| Great value for the $ |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| Offers a good improvement over the tiny speaker in my Icom 718. Somewhat bassy but otherwise good sound and well constructed. |
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| WB2JVB |
Rating: |
2012-02-15 | |
| Not impressed |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I bought two of these, and am very disappointed in the audio quality. I tried it on two radios, a new Kenwood Ts-590s and my older Kenwood 2M/440 dualbander. Frankly the little speakers in the radios sound far far better. Same problem with both units, so it was not a defective one.
There is a tinny vibration on the highs, which I can eliminate with the EQ on the 590, but then its too bassy.
Perhaps for a mobile environment, where you just need more punch it will be better, but if you are hoping to improve the audio from the built in speaker of your shack radio, look elsewhere.
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| K6DEA |
Rating: |
2012-02-08 | |
| Great for Hf,VHF,UHF,GHz audio |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
i bought this speaker new for $14.00 shipped.
i was very surprised at the craftsman ship and wonderful response it has, for example: when on HF SSB tuning someone in the Speaker has great response on very low, mids and very high. it produces a bit of base which i have yet to notice on any other external speaker in its category.
its a solid 5of5 from me craftsman ship is solid no distortion no problems the wire is plenty long enough for mobile installations too. |
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| SV2BWM |
Rating: |
2011-08-05 | |
| Excellent!! |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
A very good speaker and not overpriced like other known speakers are. I have used it in HF and the voice sound was far clearer and louder than the transceiver's speaker. But when I used it in VHF FM modulation, there it was the great difference! Crystal clear voices!! I think that everybody should hear it...73's
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Earlier 5-star review posted by SV2BWM on 2008-02-21
I bought this speaker to change my old Kenwood SP-50 of TM-732. First impression: the audio of TM-732 was low & poor and I discovered that this was caused from the TM-732 and not from the speaker! Next, I tried with the TS-850 and then..voila! Good audio that can be heard loud and clear despite the environment noise. Good job from Uniden! |
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| KC8UIO |
Rating: |
2011-04-04 | |
| Compare to Icom SP-21 |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
The Icom Speaker costs over $100, with shipping included. I paid $10 for the ESP-20, including shipping.
I gave this product a "4 rating," because it is a simple, monaural (mono) speaker, intended to reproduce spoken language and single-tone CW. This Uniden speaker is a nice little speaker, with a solid sound.
The Icom SP-21 is also a good performer (4 rating), but is 10+ times the price of the former.
Some people may reqire further audio sinal filtering capability, not offered by either one of these speakers. These people can purchase an elaborate alternative, like the Icom SP-20. The SP-20 costs about $325. A cheaper option would be to retrofit a simpler speaker (ESP-20) with several active audio filters. This article may give you some ideas. http://www.electronics-project-design.com/HamRadioCircuit.html
Thanks,
Wayne P. Muckleroy |
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| TURNSOUTH |
Rating: |
2011-03-14 | |
| Great Communications Speaker |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
After reading all the great reviews here for this speaker, I decided I wanted to try one. It took me a while to find them in stock at a cheap price over the last few months, but they seem to be showing up everywhere now (the shipment from Taiwan must have been delayed, or perhaps the containers were held up in customs for a few weeks).
The Build:
Everything about this unit seems to be built to target it to a specific market, and that is the commercial truck industry The assembly is well built, with a 2 piece, air tight plastic enclosure, and a adjustable mounting bracket attached with two thumb screws. The mounting bracket also has detents that position the speaker at approximately twenty degree segments. The setup works really well, once positioned and the thumb screws are tightened, it would take someone hanging on it to move it. It also positions quite nicely like a “picture frame” stand, which is perfect for desktop use (when I first ordered this speaker I thought I might have to mount it to some kind of base, but it stands quite well on its own). Finally the bracket includes several mounting hole configurations, as well as a left and right notch that will allow the pass through of the hook-up wire and its connector.
The wire is a heavy duty, 18 gauge, ten foot long cable that has a mono (2 conductor) 1/8 inch (3.5mm) male plug with a molded strain relief. Very well thought out for mobile mounting, but ten feet might be a little excessive for desktop use. The good news is that it is adjustable inside the speaker. If you remove the bracket, and the four case screws, you’ll find that the wire passes through a rubber grommet and is soldered directly to the speaker, with a simple knot to provide strain relief. Just little desoldering, or some trimming and splicing, allows you to make the cord any desired length, without unsightly splices in the line.
The speaker grill is made of a very strong metal, has no give when pressed, and is molded tight to the assembly, so there is not rattling or vibration, and should be very dent resistant. As well, it has the Bearcat paw print embossed into the grille, looks good, but it is a matter of personal taste.
The Sound:
I would have to concur with the previous positive reviews, with just a few notes:
The speaker does attenuate higher frequencies, and isn’t designed for booming bass. The actual sound tends to center on the lower side of the mid range. So while it does not have hi fidelity response, it does meet its main goal of being a great voice communications speaker. After all, it was designed to be mounted in a truck and to be listened to 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. The tonal quality of the unit does a very nice job of reducing listening fatigue.
For CW use, it produces a nice pleasant tone form a variety of sources.
Power handling- Here again the speaker excels, rated at 20 watts (no doubt to allow for amplification in a mobile environment), the four inch (10cm) speaker has a nice heavy magnet and a large voice coil, which reproduces high volume levels with minimal distortion.
I would definitely recommend this speaker, designed right for mobile use, and looks good sitting on a desk too. |
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| NW9T |
Rating: |
2011-03-01 | |
| Very Happy |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
After reading the reviews here, I thought I'd give one of these a shot. I've tried a number of other external speakers primarily being sold on the market as external CB Radio speakers. I've paid from under $9 to over $30 for these types of speakers and for the most part, I just didn't like them. Many of them are just too tinny sounding, which is the same complaint I have about my built-in speaker of my FT-897. So there was no
improvement, other than the speaker could be pointed towards me rather than blasting the sound towards the ceiling.
I went looking for the ESP-20 locally, and came up empty. Truck Stops were carrying only the Cobra (my $30+ speaker which isn't that great) and a generic Trucker brand. I checked eBay and found them for under $12 plus shipping. That should be affordable on just about anyone's budget.
After connecting it to my rig, I was immediately pleased by what I was hearing. Someone stated in their review that this speaker lacks a bit in high frequency response. Personally I'm not buying a high dollar stereo speaker, I just want a speaker for my rig that works for me. I want a speaker I can hear the other stations, understand what is being said, can turn the volume up if needed without a lot of distortion and has a pleasant tone to it. This speaker does all that admirably hands down and more. I'll be ordering a couple more soon, just-in-case they disappear from the market.
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| W8ROB |
Rating: |
2009-11-22 | |
| Great sound for low price! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| Bought this through Walmart.com and had shipped to store for free shipping. Great sound! Has a nice full sound, not tinny like a lot of other external speakers. Plenty of wire and a 1/8" phone plug is included. Using it on my FT-847 at home and it makes a big difference. Can't go wrong on this one! |
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| KJ4LNL |
Rating: |
2009-05-10 | |
| Bang for the buck |
Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. |
| I must admit it was an impulse buy, you can get these at a great price from Provantage. I am also an audio engineer by trade and am darn floored by the clarity of these units. It can be a balancing act coming up with a speaker that sounds full, some too "chesty" other too "tinny", this lands at about right. Can't beat the build for the price, its an absolute steal! |
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