| KD6WD |
Rating:      |
2005-09-21 | |
| great radio for 79 bucks |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I just receive my 1103 yesterday. Plugged it in and let it charge for about 8 hours. I was very pleasantly surprised as it blew the doors off my sangean 909.
No noisey pots in this one. Everything works off the single rotary encoder including the volume. I had purchased this radio to use as a receiver for some of my qrp transmitters. The clarifier knob is handy enough for tweeking the frequency (bfo) a bit on side band reception. With just the telescoping antenna I was able to clearly copy ssb stations on 17 and 20 meters. Later on I was able to copy cw stations on 40 meters. The cw reception was a tad raspy, but far better then it was on all of my qrp receivers and this was with just the telescoping antenna.
Considering it comes with quality earbuds, external power supply, battery charger, 4 Nimh AA batteries which would cost you about 50 bucks at radio shack, the radio is supper deal. FM reception and AM is great as well. The fact that the volume control is a rotary encoder means that this radio will not get scratchy in a couple of years.
Finally since you can copy most stations on the ham bands without an external antenna is a real plus. I suspect, however, that an external band pass filter and/or attenuator might be required with a large antenna (such as a yagi or large loop) to prevent front end overload.
Also, at first its a bit weird to figure out the manual. However, setting the volume, and direct entry of frequencies, etc. become second nature once you play with it for a while. In other words the functions are logical once you understand the button setup.
I have not yet checked the current draw. Once I have done that I will post the results.
All in all a great little radio at a very reasonable price.
John kd6wd |
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| LRDHEAT |
Rating:      |
2005-08-27 | |
| very good |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| I agree with ROD330. Very satisfactory. Sensitivity is similar to Eton 10. (Most of the sets that the Kaito competes with have similar sensitivity...don't imagine that the Kaito or another competing radio in it's class will blow the other away in sensitivity - although the Sangean 909 is somewhat less sensitive than the others off of the whip.)The Kaito has less background noise than other sets in it's class. Perphaps most impressive is that there is no noise, no chuffing as one bandscans. This is hugely important...chuffing, even subdued chuffing is fatiguing and tiresome. This radio makes bandscanning a truely pleasurable and relaxing experience. I was expecting that the 1 Khz speed of tuning would be too slow, but the knob is designed to be turned with one finger allowing one to move along through a band at a comfortable, not sluggish pace. 2 fingers on the tuning dial allows for 1 Khz fine tuning. Lack of a 5 Khz tuning increment is a non issue! Single side band tunes very well...the analog fine tuning allows for a normal sounding voice, and stable hold on frequency. SSB usually sounds best on 4 Khz filter. The Kaito's memories are straight forward, easy to access, and remembers the mode that one was in (SSB vs non-SSB). The radio remembers last frequency tuned in each band, and returns to that spot when band is reselected. Selectivity is quite good with 4Khz filter. 6Khz filter sometimes is more pleasing when there are no strong signals 5 Khz away. Dynamic range is quite good...strong signals do not easily overload the set off of the whip. The size and weight of the set are a surprise...it's smaller and lighter than the Eton 10. Very handy size. The display is fine with me...it is attractive, and allows me to quickly view which meter band, and where within the band that I am. Especially welcome is how well the display, and all operating buttons are backlit for tuning around in the dark. It doesn't get better than this. Small keys on the bottom are not a problem as others have mentioned. The lack of a dedicated volume dial is missed...I want to reach for a dial when the volume is not appropiate; that said, it's not difficult to adjust the volume, and should not be a deal breaker. MW reception is quite good, particularly with 4 Khz filter deployed. I do notice on my Kaito that in the presence of a particularly strong signal on MW or SW, I will get a weak image of the strong signal every other Khz perhaps 10 or 15 Khz away from the strong signal. If a real strong signal is at 9780, and I am interested in tuning 9760, I may hear a weak image of the 9780 signal bleeding in at 9760, but no image at all at 9759 or 9761. This happens only in the presence of unusually strong signals, and when it happens, does not pose a problem as detuning up or down 1 Khz takes care of the problem. This is an excellent and affordable portable. The Kaito engineer said that a Kaito 1108 will be out within a year to compete with a Satellite 800 level of set, but in a smaller package along with MP3 play. A Kaito 1107 dual conversion analog SW, no memories, lower price than 1103 should be out soon, he said. |
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| N4KZ |
Rating:      |
2005-08-24 | |
| Great value |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I have owned my 1103 for three months. It's a great value offering a lot of radio for just $80 or so. It does well on the built-in whip antenna but when connected to the external wire antenna that comes with the radio, it's downright hot. On the external antenna, I easily copied 10m SSB ham signals and that says a lot about the radio's sensitivity.
It's not perfect but for the price, small size and features, including a BFO for SSB/CW, it's one bargain. Better than my old Sangean which cost twice as much and is 4 times bigger and heavier and uses twice as many batteries as the Kaito.
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| WILDTURKY2A |
Rating:      |
2005-08-23 | |
| The Best for the buck! |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
| I have had this radio for 9 months and I can't say enough good things about it! I also have a Sangean ats818acs that isn't that hot. |
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| ROD330 |
Rating:      |
2005-06-30 | |
| AMAZING value |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| What an awesome little radio! I purchased this for my son from Universal Radio for $79 after reading the reviews here and on Passport. The quality of construction is excellent, audio is outstanding and SW / SSB reception rivals some of my better (much more expensive) radios. FM far exceeded my expectations as well. Being an old timer, I love the pseudo analog display. I find the absence of a dedicated volume control to be only mildly irritating. Well, another one will be on order from Univeral for my son 'cause the first one belongs to me. |
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| SLIDERULEX |
Rating:      |
2005-06-26 | |
| In a word: AMAZING! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| First off, before I finally decided to buy the KA1103, I did my homework reading many reviews and since I own a couple of other portable SW radios (Grundig S350, Grundig Mini 300PE, and the venerable 'old' Sony ICF 4920) I have a means of comparison. There is no comparison! For SW, I thought the Grundig S350 was good, and it is, and for small size the Grundig Mini 300PE is good too. But for under $100 including shipping, the KA1103 beats them all. I can pull in so many SW stations from around the world just using the whip antenna that I'm amazed, hence the title. And add to it SSB, and you've got one powerful radio! I like it that Kaito includes an expanded FM range too (76MHz-109MHz). Considering that I live on the West Coast where SW is harder to get than other parts of the country, I'm very satisfied with its performance. Its AM/FM reception is also good, but not any better than the Grundigs. I decided on buying this radio because I read enough reviews praising it that I felt it would be a reasonable risk. I'm glad I took the plunge! It's hard to imagine how anyone could improve upon the KA1103, and the price is so low in comparison to other competing brands, it's amazing that people even consider other brands. One final note, RadioIntel did a comparison test recently and of many SW radios, Kaito1103 won, even against much higher priced models! That ought to say something. |
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| VE6TVT |
Rating:     |
2005-06-25 | |
| Good Value |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| Warning !! A small amount of Static Electricity to the Telescoping Aerial can destroy Short wave Reception. There is no ESD protection on antenna input.CKTs. I live in a high altitude dry envionment, while listening to 80M QSO, #1 daughter came scooten across the carpet and contacted the areial whereupon reception died. #1 daughter now #2 daughter. Took radio apart and found Q1 RF preamp fried. Could not find a schematic or parts list. no markings on SOT 23 package, so in examining the circuit determined Q1 looks like a N ch JFET, SOT 23. Replaced Q1 with Philips BF861B from Ebay, USA CAPS Inc, $8.00 for a 100. Radio workes great. Comparisons with another DE1103 could not tell any difference. I also added some antenna ESD protection, 4 turns to the Center loopstick coil and jack for long wave ant, and added shielding to RF board PLL and 456Khz 2nd IF. On long wave the radio can pick up its own 2nd IF at 450KHz . Its a long wave DX'ers beauty now. |
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| KC7JBB |
Rating:      |
2005-06-22 | |
| Best $ value around |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I have been useing this little jewell for about six weeks now. The audio quality is very good for a radio this size. Actually the audio is superior to my Sangean 909 even with the Sony speaker replacment in it.
Some other features like lighted dial buttons along with the frequency display is a nice touch. The big and only complaint on this radio seems to be the combined volume control/tuneing knob configuration. I have to agree this is not the most intuative but it's not really bad either.
Reception and sensativity on AM/FM and shortwave equals my 909 and surpasses the YB400. I have not yet used the SSB. I like the fact that auto scan was included. Of course all the clock functions are also included for the traveler, and the digitized analog looking is cool. Of course I have to mention haveing a real tuneing knob is great a feature I really enjoy on the 909.
The case appears to be of better quality then the YB400 and the battery compartment door remains attached. A lot of thought went into it's design.
To summarize I would have to say this is a very high quality radio and is certainly a rival for the big three portables (YB400,Sangean 909,Sony 7600gr). It actually surpasses these radios in some ways and given that it can be had on e-bay for less than $70.00 US, it's amazing. |
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| KC4NPD |
Rating:     |
2005-04-06 | |
| Great Radio for the Price |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| This radio can ebe found on sale for around 75.00 it includes NIMH batt. and other extras. For the price SSB can't be beat. |
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