I am not sure if I am doing something wrong (being a newbie) but when listening to a particular AM station, using the whip, I get a signal level of around 4. However, when I plug the Ant 60 wire antenna (that came with the radio) into AM External Antenna port I lose the signal entirely. Moreover, it does not appear I can get any signal the Ant 60 regardless of the band/frequency.
Any help appreciated. Thanks
The 909X is pretty similar to the 909 / DX398, which I own.
If the 909X's external antenna jack is wired similarly to the external antenna jack on the 909 (and it probably is), when you plug an external antenna into the radio, it switches off the internal loopstick.
The rest of the time (nothing plugged into the external antenna jack) the radio gets the MW/AM band signal off its internal loopstick antenna.
You are going to get much more gain on the AM band from the 909X's internal loopstick than you will off a short wire antenna like the one I'm sure came with the radio (I haven't seen an Ant 60, but unless it's over 100 ft. long, it won't be much use on the AM band).
This is why you are getting more signal without the external antenna plugged in: it's just not as efficient an antenna at the long wavelengths required for MW reception -- the radio's internal loopstick is designed to work well on MW.
If you want to DX the AM band with your 909X, either use the internal loopstick (i.e., no external antenna), or get an external loop, like the Select-A-Tenna or Eton AN-100 -- a tunable loop you sit next to the radio, which boosts the signals that way.
An external wire will do you no good on the AM band / MW band unless it's at least 100-150 ft. or more, because of the resonant wavelengths required.
I don't know why you would have trouble hearing SW with your external antenna, unless it's propagation. It's possible there is something haywire with the external antenna jack -- but Sangean has a pretty good rep for quality.
