The Grundig Satellit 750 is an AM / FM / SW / Airband desktop portable capable of ssb/cw as well. It retails for around $300 U.S.
This is my second purchase of the radio. The first one I had was so sub-par in performance that it met it's end at the recycler's about a year ago. A year passes, and I miss the little thing so much that I cross my fingers and try another one. Got a good one this time!
This radio is pretty well reviewed elsewhere, so I won't rehash everything about it, just the things I like. Again, unit-to-unit variances mean your mileage may vary.
This new unit is like an entirely new radio where everything works within reason.
No power supply hash or noise when using external DC! Amazing! I was expecting the worst. Still, I run it portable from batteries - but instead of 4 D-cells, I'm using rechargeable AA's inside D-spacers since it seems to draw so little current during use. Sure, I could use my Icom R75, but it draws about 10 times the power. I do small-scale solar as another hobby, so the small current draw for the Grundig was another reason for the re-purchase.
With headphones attached, I notice only a very tiny amount of antenna-effect when dx'ing FM, so my cure is to wrap about 4 turns of the headphone cord (actually a small extension cable) around a Radio Shack 273-105 snap-on ferrite. Most people won't notice, but I'm looking for it now. The headphone jack still feels like I'm breaking it when attaching a plug. Noticed that FM mode allows for the 10/20 db attenuator, but not the rf-gain pot. No biggie. And on FM you can change the bandwidth - but 99.9% of the time I use the larger normal bandwidth for FM.
HF/SW operations are just fine for what this is. SSB ops still done the same typical way: BFO at 12 oclock for USB, and 1 oclock for LSB. Allows one to tune through the bands in 1 khz increments and be very close to the correct freq all the time. Small bfo adjustments ok, but if you go past 11 or 2 oclock with the bfo, it is probably best to reset the bfo and retune the dial. Personal way of operating obviously.
Same flexible attenuator setup for strong-signal handling. 10/20 db fixed and rotatable pot. I'm no stranger to operating with the RF gain control, but my old one was so bad that even this was too much to bear. Either Grundig improved the line, or my old one was just faulty to begin with - hard to tell.
Weighted tuning knob is actually tight! My old one was clearly very loose, and required me to pull it off, remove the felt cover, and torque the nut on the encoder shaft a bit. Oh happy day! Still, I avoid putting vertical pressure on the knob by not using the finger dimple and tune via the knurled threads and the fast tuning option / keypad when necessary. As before, because of the weight of it, when transporting it by vehicle, I store it face up - or remove the knob altogether.
MW rotatable bar antenna works! My old one was tweaked. Prior to recycling, I broke it open only to find that they used a pretty normal ferrite inside, and only using about half the length of the housing. I wish they would put a monster ferrite inside, but then again, Grundig sells an accessory tuned-loop for more hard-core BCB dxing. I don't think I'll be taking a hot x-acto knife to mine to mod it for a bigger ferrite as it works ok as is.
S-meter is the same old eye-candy. Kind of wish they had an external jack to make it easy to hook up something even bigger.
Memory storage / pages / banks is very cool. However, unless there is some magic I'm missing, I cannot get it to scan the memory channels. Ok, the usefullness of this is questionable as it is a timed-scan and not rf based - changing channels every 5 seconds. Load up a page with 12 frequencies, and have it take a minute to get back around to your first memory? Heh, not useful, BUT for monitoring maybe only two or three HF channels on a dedicated page, it might be ok - at least for me. Not a showstopper, but if anyone knows how to do it, let me know.
Speaking of not being a scanner, this unit works GREAT on Airband! My older one had a major loss of sensitivity above 128 mhz, so I was unhappy as that meant that about half the airband was usefull to me. This unit however, works very well on the entire Airband. I use dedicated scanners for Airband, but this is a real treat to do it the old-fashioned way if you don't mind sitting one one frequency. To hear the full fidelity of airband transmissions (good OR bad!) helps put you in the cockpit. I typically run the squelch just barely above the noise, even though there is a gentle background wash heard if I get close. Then BAM! Room-filling fidelity of the pilot and even background alarms/alerts/prop noise in the cabin. You don't get that from a scanner. Before the 750, I used only scanners on airband, so this type of operation seemed a bit cheezy at first. Then you warm up to it. Then you realize the difference between radios and scanners. Your Dad or Grand-Dad would approve wholeheartedly.
WARNING! If you do adjust the squelch, especially if you run it just a little bit beyond the noise, but not fully squashed, and return to HF operations, do not forget about it! It will seem like you have attenuation on when you don't obviously, and since the squelch is not the on/off type, but the older audio based (like old cb's) units, you might be scratching your head when HF signals are a bit distorted while trying to rise above the squelch setting. Harder to explain than perform.
One nice thing is that if you choose slow tuning for Airband, you can tune off frequency to compensate for tower drift, or moving a little bit away from a noise source by 1 or 2 khz. I'm not sure if the radio is actually able to fully tune the rf-deck between the typical 25khz segment channel spacing (even though the display says it does in slow mode), so that would be something to test for those who live in areas that use 8.33 khz spacing. There doesn't appear to be any System Code Setting for 8.33 khz.
There is no bandwidth choice when using airband - wish there was! It would make more sense to allow for a narrower bandwidth choice here when dxing weak airband sigs, than on FM for example.
And, the FM external antenna jack works for Airband as well - makes sense since it is just above the FM band. But, check this out - I put an airband-specific Maldol AL-500H whip on a right-angle bnc adapter into the FM antenna jack, and it worked ok (internal collapsed). However, the built-in whip, when extended only 4 or 5 segments, actually worked better. Adjusting the built-in whip to only 4 or 5 segments even worked better than when fully extended. Tune in a local ATIS station and you'll see. Makes me wonder how much isolation there really is between the internal/external switch.
I didn't do much with Long-Wave - although I guess I should be chasing some of the last remaining CW NDB airband beacons there! Need a real antenna for that though.
HF antennas while portable - so many ways to go I won't even touch that here, except to say that a modest improvement can be had by doing nothing more than attaching about 3 - 4 feet of wire to the ground (black) side of the 500 ohm jack and letting it hang or lay out flat when using nothing but the internal whip. The guts of the box don't make a great RF ground. Stick it in the spare compartment when lunch is over.
Don't break the vertical whip! Yes, there is a hinge at the bottom of it, but it is a tight pull straight up to get the hinge out in the open. Don't manhandle it out - firm but gentle is key, and pull on the fatter sections!! Note that the top is a plastic cap, so don't clip extensions to the plastic cap. Man, those last two segments are really thin so be careful there too if you clip anything on it. I'd say use the external jack even if you are more or less duplicating the small whip and placing it near a curtain or something - that whip wants to bend at the end if you put stress on it. The beefier whip from the S350/S450 series should have been used here, so just be careful.
I'm extremely happy with this NEW unit. Reasonable performance all around this time.
This is my second purchase of the radio. The first one I had was so sub-par in performance that it met it's end at the recycler's about a year ago. A year passes, and I miss the little thing so much that I cross my fingers and try another one. Got a good one this time!
This radio is pretty well reviewed elsewhere, so I won't rehash everything about it, just the things I like. Again, unit-to-unit variances mean your mileage may vary.
This new unit is like an entirely new radio where everything works within reason.
No power supply hash or noise when using external DC! Amazing! I was expecting the worst. Still, I run it portable from batteries - but instead of 4 D-cells, I'm using rechargeable AA's inside D-spacers since it seems to draw so little current during use. Sure, I could use my Icom R75, but it draws about 10 times the power. I do small-scale solar as another hobby, so the small current draw for the Grundig was another reason for the re-purchase.
With headphones attached, I notice only a very tiny amount of antenna-effect when dx'ing FM, so my cure is to wrap about 4 turns of the headphone cord (actually a small extension cable) around a Radio Shack 273-105 snap-on ferrite. Most people won't notice, but I'm looking for it now. The headphone jack still feels like I'm breaking it when attaching a plug. Noticed that FM mode allows for the 10/20 db attenuator, but not the rf-gain pot. No biggie. And on FM you can change the bandwidth - but 99.9% of the time I use the larger normal bandwidth for FM.
HF/SW operations are just fine for what this is. SSB ops still done the same typical way: BFO at 12 oclock for USB, and 1 oclock for LSB. Allows one to tune through the bands in 1 khz increments and be very close to the correct freq all the time. Small bfo adjustments ok, but if you go past 11 or 2 oclock with the bfo, it is probably best to reset the bfo and retune the dial. Personal way of operating obviously.
Same flexible attenuator setup for strong-signal handling. 10/20 db fixed and rotatable pot. I'm no stranger to operating with the RF gain control, but my old one was so bad that even this was too much to bear. Either Grundig improved the line, or my old one was just faulty to begin with - hard to tell.
Weighted tuning knob is actually tight! My old one was clearly very loose, and required me to pull it off, remove the felt cover, and torque the nut on the encoder shaft a bit. Oh happy day! Still, I avoid putting vertical pressure on the knob by not using the finger dimple and tune via the knurled threads and the fast tuning option / keypad when necessary. As before, because of the weight of it, when transporting it by vehicle, I store it face up - or remove the knob altogether.
MW rotatable bar antenna works! My old one was tweaked. Prior to recycling, I broke it open only to find that they used a pretty normal ferrite inside, and only using about half the length of the housing. I wish they would put a monster ferrite inside, but then again, Grundig sells an accessory tuned-loop for more hard-core BCB dxing. I don't think I'll be taking a hot x-acto knife to mine to mod it for a bigger ferrite as it works ok as is.
S-meter is the same old eye-candy. Kind of wish they had an external jack to make it easy to hook up something even bigger.
Memory storage / pages / banks is very cool. However, unless there is some magic I'm missing, I cannot get it to scan the memory channels. Ok, the usefullness of this is questionable as it is a timed-scan and not rf based - changing channels every 5 seconds. Load up a page with 12 frequencies, and have it take a minute to get back around to your first memory? Heh, not useful, BUT for monitoring maybe only two or three HF channels on a dedicated page, it might be ok - at least for me. Not a showstopper, but if anyone knows how to do it, let me know.
Speaking of not being a scanner, this unit works GREAT on Airband! My older one had a major loss of sensitivity above 128 mhz, so I was unhappy as that meant that about half the airband was usefull to me. This unit however, works very well on the entire Airband. I use dedicated scanners for Airband, but this is a real treat to do it the old-fashioned way if you don't mind sitting one one frequency. To hear the full fidelity of airband transmissions (good OR bad!) helps put you in the cockpit. I typically run the squelch just barely above the noise, even though there is a gentle background wash heard if I get close. Then BAM! Room-filling fidelity of the pilot and even background alarms/alerts/prop noise in the cabin. You don't get that from a scanner. Before the 750, I used only scanners on airband, so this type of operation seemed a bit cheezy at first. Then you warm up to it. Then you realize the difference between radios and scanners. Your Dad or Grand-Dad would approve wholeheartedly.
WARNING! If you do adjust the squelch, especially if you run it just a little bit beyond the noise, but not fully squashed, and return to HF operations, do not forget about it! It will seem like you have attenuation on when you don't obviously, and since the squelch is not the on/off type, but the older audio based (like old cb's) units, you might be scratching your head when HF signals are a bit distorted while trying to rise above the squelch setting. Harder to explain than perform.
One nice thing is that if you choose slow tuning for Airband, you can tune off frequency to compensate for tower drift, or moving a little bit away from a noise source by 1 or 2 khz. I'm not sure if the radio is actually able to fully tune the rf-deck between the typical 25khz segment channel spacing (even though the display says it does in slow mode), so that would be something to test for those who live in areas that use 8.33 khz spacing. There doesn't appear to be any System Code Setting for 8.33 khz.
There is no bandwidth choice when using airband - wish there was! It would make more sense to allow for a narrower bandwidth choice here when dxing weak airband sigs, than on FM for example.
And, the FM external antenna jack works for Airband as well - makes sense since it is just above the FM band. But, check this out - I put an airband-specific Maldol AL-500H whip on a right-angle bnc adapter into the FM antenna jack, and it worked ok (internal collapsed). However, the built-in whip, when extended only 4 or 5 segments, actually worked better. Adjusting the built-in whip to only 4 or 5 segments even worked better than when fully extended. Tune in a local ATIS station and you'll see. Makes me wonder how much isolation there really is between the internal/external switch.
I didn't do much with Long-Wave - although I guess I should be chasing some of the last remaining CW NDB airband beacons there! Need a real antenna for that though.
HF antennas while portable - so many ways to go I won't even touch that here, except to say that a modest improvement can be had by doing nothing more than attaching about 3 - 4 feet of wire to the ground (black) side of the 500 ohm jack and letting it hang or lay out flat when using nothing but the internal whip. The guts of the box don't make a great RF ground.
Stick it in the spare compartment when lunch is over.Don't break the vertical whip! Yes, there is a hinge at the bottom of it, but it is a tight pull straight up to get the hinge out in the open. Don't manhandle it out - firm but gentle is key, and pull on the fatter sections!! Note that the top is a plastic cap, so don't clip extensions to the plastic cap. Man, those last two segments are really thin so be careful there too if you clip anything on it. I'd say use the external jack even if you are more or less duplicating the small whip and placing it near a curtain or something - that whip wants to bend at the end if you put stress on it. The beefier whip from the S350/S450 series should have been used here, so just be careful.
I'm extremely happy with this NEW unit. Reasonable performance all around this time.
