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Reviews For: Redsun RP2100

Category: Receivers: General Coverage

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Review Summary For : Redsun RP2100
Reviews: 12MSRP: 56.90
Description:
Dual conversion PLL synthesized digital world band receiver with IF output for DRM
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.radiointel.com/review-redsunrp2100.htm
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
00124.1
SAILCAT Rating: 2013-05-18
An FM Powerhouse Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
Briefly, the Redsun 2100/CCRadio-SW is an outstanding performer, especially at receiving FM. It is very slightly less adept at receiving MW but it is still very good in both receiving distant signals and keeping close stations separated. SW is very good to excellent, as well. No SSB, however, but that isn't a deal-breaker for me at all. Audio quality is satisfying and the controls are blessedly easy to learn. Build quality is better than most Chinese radios, but it is not quite up to the standards of Japanese-made products...or, for that matter, many Taiwanese electronics, either. Still, I have had my CCradio-SW for nearly a year and there are no loose parts, rattles, or balky controls. I am, overall, very satisfied. Recommended.
PHO1NL Rating: 2010-05-20
bad luck Time Owned: N.A.
finnaly after three repairs I got a new rp 2100,I tried it in the shop but this one had 100khz tuning deviance,so I got a refund.I never want a chinese radio again. I know you mainly want to read good reports abouth this radio, I have several brands of portables where I'm vere pleased over.old and new ones.

----------------------
Earlier 0-star review posted by PHO1NL on 2010-03-08

had my radio back and with the same problem,bad soldering, shortsircuit in the LF amp, KBC ,the importer in holland, won't give me a new one and keeps messing with it for over six months now.I don,t like this at all. I had no use of it at all.
KD7RDZI2 Rating: 2010-05-05
Mezmerized! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Totally mesmerized by this receiver... I got a second receiver! Why a second receiver... well respectable transceiver have a second receiver...

This is my second review about this fantastic portable.

With the telescopic antenna this is the best receiver I have ever listened to. Sound quality is excellent, AM and FM and there is a why it is that good!
First the speaker is large!
Second filters in the AM mode are wide, optimized for either DRM or AM.

The receiver as such is somehow robust against to overload, however when I connect it to wideband external antennas I use a good preselector between the antenna and the receiver to avoid any possible overload.

The receiver has an IF connector. You can use a BFO to receive SSB, CW and digital modes... but will this eliminate the unwanted sideband? I don't think so. More, the wide filters are good for AM and DRM, but are too wide for SSB or CW. There is only one good solution: an external mixer between the IF output and the soundcard!

The Crystal mixer fo=462 KHz by Sat-Schneider (http://www.sat-schneider.de/DRM/DRM.htm) offers a good (not very cheap) solution. Between the IF output and the mixer I use a step-up transformer to better match the impedances (I made a 50:1500 ohm conventional transformer around a toroid with permeability of about 800 and works well).

Once connected the radio to the mixer and the mixer to the soundcard I use either Winrad or Flexradio or Dream software and have perfect SSB, AM, ECSS, Synchronous AM, CW, RTTY, FAX, FM whatever modulation, IF-DSP, Noise reduction, Noise blanker and digital AGC. The unwanted sideband is completely removed in this way and demodulation can't probably be better.

I made the s9 generator by Norcal to test Noise floor and sensitivity. The Norcal gives a tone at
50 microvolt or 1 microvolt, i.e. S9 or S3 at various HF frequencies up to 14Mhz. I can assure I can hear the S3 signal at about 15-20db above the noise floor! This value is similar to all the radios I tried, tabletop included! My ears also hear well the S3 Signal above the noise floor!
Similarly to the Degen DE1103, only above the 25Mhz the receiver seems much less sensitive but I tested this with the harmonics of the 14Mhz tone so the test is only relative to other radios.

Trying this receiver with a vintage Drake transmitter and using the excellent ELAD SWITCH-BOX to protect the receiver, qsos were just a joy!
ZS00011 Rating: 2010-01-20
Outstanding portable Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have had the radio now for three years of excellent and trouble free service.
MW mediumwave reception on the BCB band still amazes me with it's clarity
and sensitivity. Regular reception of stations that are 5,000 miles/8,000
kilometers away with good readability is possible on a regular basis. The local
stations that are 700 miles/1,200 kilometers away simply boom in with great
sound and clarity. Very impressive on a portable with only a ferrite
internal rod. Provision is made on the back for the connection of a longwire
antenna to a 500 Ohm post, also a ground/earth connector, but I have not
tried this as reception on the internal ferrite rod is so good.

FM band. The most powerful FM receiver I have owned is my Drake SW8, but the
RP2100 is quite a bit more sensitive on the internal whip, and the marginal
long distance signals are a lot clearer. It leaves my GE SRIII and Sangean
818 in the shade.

On SW it's pretty good too, as good as the better SW ortables I hhave owned.

Connecting to AC mains with the built in power supply. This works seamlessly and cuts off the battery and a
mains indicator appears on the LCD display. Only snag is that this
introduces a lot of RFI hash onto the MW band and makes the more distant
stations unpleasant to listen to. It doesn't seem to affect the FM or SW
bands at all though.

Connecting a powerful 50 Ohm antenna for shortwave. I have a RF Systems DX-1
Pro active antenna which produces a very strong signal to the receiver. If I
connect this to other portable's it overloads them badly and even risks blowing the
front end FET's. I connected this to the 50 Ohm input of the RP2100 and enjoyed
amazing SW reception with NO signs of overload at all. Compared with my much
more expensive tabletop receiver the RP2100's performance was impressive and
on many stations the RP2100 was preferable to listen to because of its warm
wide spectrum sound compared to the rather tinny and shallow sound of the
tabletop.

The RP2100 is no tabletop though as it does not have the extensive
facilities of my big Icom to clear up various forms of interference. All you
can do is narrow the bandwidth and offset the frequency slightly either side
to rid yourself of the interference, but often this is not sufficient.
Actually, having owned a Kenwood R1000 for awhile, I think the RP2100 would
substantially outclass it!

The 50 presets/memories have driven me Harpic, that is clean round the bend,
so I no longer use this function. You see, if your favourite station is on
preset 1 and you have been tuning around, when you want to go back to your
favourite station and press the preset button, it will go up one, so you end
up on preset 2. You then have to press the preset button another nine times
to get back to preset one. That's annoying and time consuming, so it is
faster to use the excellent "Q tune" function button to get quickly around
the dial to where you want to be. Q tune jumps one segment up the shortwave
band at each press, and the fast tuning knob will take you quickly to where
you want to be.

Altogether by far the best portable I have ever owned, including my Sony
2010. Very satisfying performance and excellent value for money at just over
$100.

OLLIEOXEN has written two very bad reviews of this radio and I can
only assume he has a faulty one that should be returned.

John Plimmer, Montagu, Western Cape Province, South Africa
South 33 d 47 m 32 s, East 20 d 07 m 32 s
Icom IC-7600, Perseus SDR
ERGO software
Drake SW8. Sangean 803A, Redsun RP2100
Sony 7600D, GE SRIII, Grundig G8, Eton E100
Antenna's RF Systems DX 1 Pro Mk II, Datong AD-270
Kiwa MW Loop.
http://www.dxing.info/about/dxers/plimmer.dx
OLLIEOXEN27 Rating: 2009-11-15
over rated Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I've had this set for two weeks now and can only say I don't know how this radio received so much praise. The radios biggest weakness is it's audio quality. It is just plain dull. It reminds me of my old R75 in so much as they seem to have found a way to narrow the audio frequencies instead of just the RF frequencies which would have sounded a lot better. This leaves the radio with a rather hollow sound much like we've become accustomed to from radios from China - Degen 1103, etc. I like robust audio and the only thing you can do here is completely reduce the bass to gain some crispness in the sound but it doesn't work. For me a radio that doesn't sound good is just a large paperweight.

Second, this radio is noisy. Also, the background doesn't sound deep but very shallow which also contributes to the hollow sound. One star for me.

KB0GXM Rating: 2009-11-06
Geat Radio Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I wanted a portable radio, mostly for MW, to replace my Superadio III.
The 2100 is a hot receiver, adjustable bandwidth and has a good FM side. I don't know too much about the SW, but overall this is a good replacement for the III.
KA9ZMZ Rating: 2009-08-20
Great SW Radio Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I have been an SWL all my life. In recent years I have used a Sony 7600 and a Sangean 505. They were good radios and I got a lot of use out of them but they were not as fun or fun to listen to as the 2100. I have always gone for potability over sound. While considering which radio to get this time, it was between the Tecsun pl600 or the 2100. I decided I might like the better sound. I was right. It is a pleasure.
I would like to also say that the ordering process and time for shipping and delivery were amazingly short. I was surprised at how it was shipped though. The box that the radio is originally packaged in for the store shelf has a thine layer of bubble wrap around it. Then green paper with string on the outside. When I opened the box the styrofoam inside was pretty busted up but the radio was fine.
KC7JBB Rating: 2008-12-01
Great Radio Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
My 2100 happens to be the C.Crane version, so I guess I could have posted in either the Kaito or Redsun section. I will not rehash all the technical attributes, as they have been pretty well covered.
First let me say I really enjoy this radio. I have always liked this size of radio, you get a descent size speaker( = good audio), generally you have buttons and controls large enough to make operation easy, and the radio is stable when sitting on a table.
Shortwave is very good, as good as my 1103, SSB is great, allthough I dont use it much but I did want the capability. Mostly I listen to AM radio and the 2100 excels at that. It is just a great radio for whatever your use.
The 2100's size, audio quality, and sensativity remind me of my Satellit 400, and since they dont make those great Grundigs anymore we can still have something that performs very much like it. Did I say it was a great radio? :)


73's
KC7JBB
NWLORAX Rating: 2008-11-20
Amazing for the Price Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I took the plunge this month and bought one via eBay. The receiver has very low noise, at least on battery power. The FM has a bit of noise, but that is likely because Bremerton (QTH) doesn't have many Seattle broadcasting towers pointed in this direction. I dx on the bcb with a passive external tuned antenna (DE-200, I think). The number of stations I can pull in is extensive-Colorado, Utah, California, Manitoba, Oregon, Idaho and hopefully one day, some Japanese or Korean dx. Short wave is very good, slightly more sensitive than my DE1103, I think, and the external BFO (also by Tecsun/Redsun) has finer tuning than the 1103. The RP2100 is a table top sort of radio, and can't directly compare with the 1103, which fits into a pocket. The only things that could make this any better would be a 2.4 KHz and a 500 Hz filter for ssb and digital mode reception.
AE6RQ Rating: 2008-07-25
Great value Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I just purchased this radio for $60 and had a friend carry it back from China after a business trip.

Pros:
Very good sensitivity on shortwave and Medium Wave (AM). This radio is far superior comparing whip to whip with my Sony 7600G, and Grundig YB 300PE. I have yet to try it on a long wire.
No muting when tuning
Nice filter bandwidths (someone else said they were 10 KHz and 5 KHz which seems reasonable)
Very responsive Bass and Treble controls
RF Gain control
Very good AGC
Very good audio quality
Local/DX (attenuator presumably)
External antenna connectors
Slow and Fast tuning speeds with "Qtune" which allows push-button jumps to the beginning of the next short wave band segment


Cons:
No SSB - Easily resolved for about $12 and a little soldering fun from TenTec: http://radio.tentec.com/kits/fun/1050

Very annoying tuning bleeps/pops across about 1/2 of the total bandwidth of the radio, and occurring on every tuning increment.

Rather odd memories



Summary -
As much as I hate the tuning bleeps, the sensitivity, selectivity, audio quality, and cost of this radio make it a winner in my book. It is far more enjoyable than my Sony 7600G which has just never really impressed me a lot, even with the synch detector. If you purchase this radio, be sure to join the Yahoo group to find out how to turn off annoying key and end-of-band beeps among other things.


Note this radio is the same as:
http://www.eham.net/reviews/detail/6603
http://www.eham.net/reviews/detail/6603

73,
Dave