Just How Terrible Is A NEW Portable Radio??? 

I'm going on 78 years old, and still have my very first JC Penny transistor radio that I received as a Christmas gift when I was in 10th grade. I found the hiding spot and had my own batteries that I substituted so I could play it pre-Christmas.

As I become an old man, having reached the top of the hill, that being 70 I am now coasting down the other side, hitting 71 last month. I have been going back to my old favorite things, one of them being radios. I purchased one of that brand radios, but with FM Stereo and MP3 as well as Bluetooth and Shortwave and found the set very nice and it sounds wonderful to my ancient damaged ears from years of listening to loud rock and roll as well as the sounds of battle in Vietnam back in 1970-71. Well that set got me into others, Back when I was in Nam, I had an Hitachi AM/FM/Cassette recorder that I used both for entertainment and communications making cassette tapes and sending home to my wonderful wife who was rather pregnant when I left her for the war, and gave birth when I was half way through my tour. I went home when she was to have the baby, and while I was gone some thief broke in and stole my radio. Man I was pissed and began looking for another. I found one on Ebay a couple months back and had to have it. When it arrived (as is not working) I hooked it to my power supply and gave her 6 volts, she came to life. All the switches and controls were very corroded but my cleaner took care of that, and by god she worked once again. Now back when I was over there, I was on tower guard one night up a 40 foot steel tower, I was manning the M-60 and spotlight while my partner was supposed to be sleeping. I had my radio tuned to AFVN listening to rock and roll, my partner got up and bumped the radio sending it over the side, she landed in the white sand that surrounded the tower and was left with some distinct dents. The one I got off Ebay had the exact same damage. Now I doubt it was the SAME set but it sure does look like it. Having the set again really brings back memories. Oh I did buy another small radio by your manufacturer, this one Mono but with duel speakers that give it a very nice sound, it has digital display as well as an MP3 player built in. Both of these sets take Nokia rechargeable cell phone batteries and seem to last a long time. To add to my collection I bought one of those one chip MW/LW/SW/USB/LSB all band radio in a nice solid aluminum case with a color touch screen display the 3.5 inch, then found a cheaper board only for under half price with a smaller screen in a kit form and built it up as well. Now if I could just get my outdoor antenna setup I would be ready to go. Oh but my very favorite set is the lattest purchase from Odesa Ukraine an OLD (USSR built) AM/SW set. It was sold as is but just needed one capacitor replaced and she is running again. MAN is that set sensitive, and while all the Newer sets have SW on them, the old russian one is the only one that really tunes in Shortwave at night!

I remember a tiny schematic was glued to the back cover on my transistor radio. As a matter of fact, every electronics equipment such as TV's, radio's, stereos, tape recorders, test equipment that I bought in the 60's and 70's came with the schematic. Even appliances like refrigerator came with a complete schematic.

When the vintage radios appeared, I had an instant and realistic memory of the *smell* of those old radios: metal and plastic, strongly so, very distinctive. It was so realistic, I would call it a re-experience, like it was under my nose, up close, though it's been decades since I physically experienced that scent.

Thank you for not allowing those horribly annoying mid-roll ads that the geniuses at RU-vid insert at the worst possible places.

“Turn it in reverse before turning forward to prevent double threading plastic.” This is such a simple yet important thing to learn if you intend to fix stuff. As a technician, this is 2nd nature to me but I shared it with a friend once who happened to be an ER Nurse who went on to show it to the rest of the staff at a major local hospital. This simple thing ended up saving them somewhere between 50 and 100k a year for replacement optic assemblies on their microscopes. They’d change magnification lenses not knowing this and strip the aluminum housings out requiring replacements routinely.

It's a shame I'm only just discovering you. I absolutely love how I can hear the passion in your voice as you talk about things.

Came for the UFO's. Stayed for the radio! Love ya, Fran!

Radio has played a profound and amazing role in my life. As a little kid, I had an uncle who was a real serious antique radio collector. His basement was full of them, and he knew most everything about how they worked and how to repair them. This influenced me considerably, and I ended up building my own crystal sets and staying up late at night and getting up early in the morning with a long piece of wire running out my bedroom window to listen to "mysterious" signals from around the world. As fate would have it, at age 14 I ended up working at the local radio station doing a teen show once a week for high school kids in the middle of Iowa. Within a year of my starting this, the program director of the station took ill and had to quit, leaving them short-handed. I had progressed enough by then to largely fill the gap created when the guy left, and by age 15, I was working full-time during the summers and part-time during the school year at the radio station. This continued until I graduated from college. I had been contacted by WHO, the biggest radio and TV station in the state, to be hired on as their weather man, but by then had decided on a science career and headed off to graduate school at the University of Iowa. While there, I studied and obtained an Extra Class Amateur Radio license, and this was a hugely gratifying hobby and added immensely to my electronics knowledge, enough so I eventually went into the biomedical electronics field which I recently retired from. It's funny what can influence a little kid and ultimately determine his destiny. Radio started me on my path, but frankly, given the way things are these days, I never listen to the radio or watch TV anymore. I guess I've seen and heard too much and have bigger frish to fy. Many thanks.

My mother still own a beautiful Grundig Yaughtboy from the 60's. It has a wooden front, a gigantic telescopic antenna and sounds better then anything that you can buy today.

I have great memories of holding a very small sized radio in my hand listening to "I wanna hold your hand' or Washington Senators baseball games. It was magical back in the early 60's.

I can't believe how things have changed in the last 20 plus years. When I opened my granny's radio, I had sweats of anxiety thinking I won't be able to fix it because of the complex things inside.

Aha! I know this radio chip! @ 7:19 you say that chip marking is washed off, but one can barely make out on the video that it's KT0936M, made by chinese company KTMicro. It's a completely digital tuner with internal VCO, clocked from a PLLed watch crystal, with digital signal processing, ADCs and DACs. Apart from markings, what immediately gave it away to me is that unpopulated 8-pin IC footprint near it, that's actually for I2C EEPROM so that internal CPU of the tuner could read configuration other than default from it on startup. Otherwise, without all the digital bells and whistles, it could be hooked up to a bunch of pots and switched resistors to make up any kind of simple AM/SW/FM radio. It doesn't have smooth tuning though, you can sorta hear it mutes while stepping through channels, that's because tuning resistor doesn't go into VCO, but rather into ADC which is read by internal CPU, which then, in turn, adjusts VCO, and most likely keeps audio muted while frequency is out of lock. Greets from Russia :)

When I was a kid (born in 62), we could do so many things with old radios. We could modify them for shortwave, or modify the FM tuner to receive the aircraft band (by removing the AM rejection circuitry and taking a few turns off a couple of coils or pulling a rotor or stator off an air-gapped variable cap. You could learn a lot about electronics back then by tinkering. Now you open a radio and there's one chip. How are kids supposed to learn anything?

That tip on self tapping screws was worth the price of admission!

Thanks Fran. I have followed you for years. I will keep my old transistor radios. Most are 60-80's vintage and they all still work fine. My favorite radios are still old tube radios. They can be a challenge, because of capacitor issues in the units in the HV supply.

I recently reviewed this model (the Retekess TR604) and discovered that if you carefully position the tone control switch so that it rests on the contacts in the middle between the high and low settings, you can get a medium tone setting.

I bet someone though they were an absolute genius for making that rotating switch design.

I love the old vacuum tube AM/FM radios. Such a mellow sound to them.

She is the sweetest most delightful eccentric genius you could ever hope to encounter..

PCB bearing for turn knob switches: I can not unsee this!

Thanks for the self-tapping screw tip! Never heard that one before but makes total sense.

Well done! I am a 44 year woman with Autism and Aspberger Syndrome. I have fixed my Mom 's RCA stereo system that I had broke almost two years ago, and had decided to rewire the speakers back together. Unfortunately, both speakers had one of those stupid little small black connections you can only plug into, the back of the stereo system. RCA was pretty cheap in it's set up back in 2012 or 2013 when, I got it for her as a Christmas present. I had only wished when I had reconnected the speakers together, I had only one small black tiny black connector since, I was unable too rehook up the other speaker. I had to rewire the speakers to another speaker and used the only one connector for both speakers to work. I had use paper boxes for the speaker covers and labeled them as RCA speakers since, one of them was missing and had to throw it away. Thank you for posting a video, it was awesome!☺

What I love Fran is hearing you sing "In my lab ....is where I work ....!" Its hilarious and cute !

Glad you are back!! Somewhat unrelated, but this reminded me of an old "pen radio" I got as a kid from the back of a comic book. I waited weeks for that thing to arrive and it was an old passive crystal radio. For some reason I remember clipping it to things that were grounded like water pipes. I have no idea how they worked but it was fun for a few days. Cheers.

I remember plastic was heavier and sturdier when I was a teenager in the 80's. That radio looks like it would shatter if you drop it.

The offset knob to linear switch thing does have an advantage in keeping mortal enemy dust out of the switches. I like it.

The radios we find at Walmart are cheap trash. I miss the quality sounding boom boxes. I admire your interest and skill in this field of radios. You are a true definition of a beautiful woman! Awesome channel! There must be some small companies that still market quality components radios out there some where! It's sickening to see the demise of quality products (demise of our country too). Everything sucks Look at our cars of today with plastic like bumpers. So many car fires too. I never saw so many cars catching fire. I'm rambling on too much here. Miss the older radios which were many times better than the crap we see on the shelves today! Blessings Always Fran!

You seem to have a bit more of a delicate touch with the items on your bench than the other channels I’ve been watching ( BigClive, AVE, ElectroBOOM). Kind of soothing not having the explosions, fires, and general mayhem. 🤠

In other news: You can still buy portable radios.

That was most enjoyable, since I spent some 40 years repairing all types of transistor (and tube!) radios, as well as hi-fi & stereo gear. I still remember being delighted when I found a "cheap" set that was well-designed and well made (which made them so much easier to troubleshoot & repair.) Thanks for the blast from the past!

The "rotary" dials are to deceive people into thinking there are fully variable controls (eg the tone).

Good job on the blues riff, “At the lab”. You got some chops! Great tone. Keep it up, Thanks!

I appreciate the extent they went to make it feel like a classic analog radio (aside from the tone control.) It could have been a pocket calculator kinda thing with LCD display and rubber keyboard-type PCB buttons and no rotary knobs to speak of.

Thanks Fran. Nice Vid. I find it very relaxing to watch your electronic autopsy and escape for a while. Good tip about the ubiquitous self-tapping screws and plastic cases! I hadn't thought about that - reverse first, then forward. And never over tighten ...

A view like that vintage unit you showed us with the 365 uF variable tuning capacitor, and the A.M. and F.M. I.F. strips is exactly what started me on the road to my electronics career 59 years ago. I was fortunate to know somebody who explained to me how the radio signals were converted to sound. The wonders of it all! A transistor was somewhat of a mysterious device when everything still used vacuum tubes. Semiconductor theory was very different from vacuum tube theory or so it seemed at the time. Thanks for sharing with us. Cheers!

Fun video, thanks Fran. You have nice filming, and I love your commentary. Another thumbs up.

I refer to these as "City Radios" because after just a few miles from the radio transmitter they are useless.

We're glad you don't run ads Fran ... thanks for the entertaining content

One of the best radios I had was one I pulled out of a 1958 Chevy. It had tubes and the power supply had a vibrator. It pulled in stations better than anything I've ever seen since. Even my DX-160 couldn't compare. That radio kept me up many late hours into the night listening to stations all over the country.

Fran nice thumbnail, very nice picture and you look well. Always superb content - long live Fran Lab

I collect and restore late 50's and early 60's transistor radios. Back then they sold for several days worth of salary, and were built accordingly. Many of these still sound great after 60+ years! Were I work now, we use SDR radio chips (Software-defined radio?) which work great, but have even fewer parts then that radio, and are very boring to look at! I like the big caps, IF cans, discrete transistors, transformers, all that stuff. (And a few of the hybrid radios, with submini tubes for the RF circuits, and transistors for the audio!) This radio actually sounded ok for a modern cheapie. Most are far worse. Tho they often don't handle strong/many signals well. (Tuned circuit? What's that?) I like my oldies...:) Thanks, Fran! stay safe! Stu

Thank you Fran. Yes, the evolution of these products is interesting. The early transistor radios were very packed, a challenge to the designers to fit all in a palm sized case. Keep up the good work!

"Reverse before going forward method..." That is brilliant! Thank you for teaching me something new. Peace.

Thanks for your comment on the reverse-twist first step of the process of re-threading screws into plastic. I try to teach that process to all the kids at "take apart" parties.

I remember a cafe in the late 1970's. Their "boom box" radio had in raised letters "1000 mw". Yes the "mv" was a very small font.

You're having a BigClive moment 8:15 as a mechanic, I would backspin nuts and bolts until the threads seat to avoid cross-threading when tightening

I love figuring out how things work by taking them apart. Glad i found your channel! :-D

Yet another good video, and a cup of coffee, that made my day 😊 why have you started shaking so bad, are you okay ?

I've noticed that for what is unknown to me that it seems almost impossible to by a basic AM. FM that even functions adequately.

I love the intro with that crazy letter display machine. I think repairing that thing was the first video I saw of Fran's.

.... just found your channel today.... and sub'd instantly after you showcased some of your vintage radio collection.... I've been tinkering with radios most of my life.... and it pleases me watching others get just as enthusiastic about radio as I am....

thanks for the self-tapping screw tip. i've been doing this sort of thing since i was a ten year old in the late 70s and this is the first i've heard of that

Fran! - I thought it was just me that loved and appreciated the masterpieces that were the old transistor stuff!, thank you. I collect all that stuff too... 'Super Hetrodyne', etc, still excites me... As for that steaming pile of horse manure you stripped down... BIN. Thanks again, Mike Hughes, MKH Engineering

I learn something every time I watch one of your videos - Thank You for your clear explanations. Kudos!

The most sympathic Presentation i've ever seen😘 And the Knowledge of Fran is absolute obviously👏👏👏⚡

Looks like they tried to make it resemble a GE “Super Radio”. I bought one of those about 20 years ago. While they weren’t hand crafted like sets of years gone by, they were supposed to be some of the last radios with the sensitivity and sound quality that the discerning listener would value.

Digital Signal Processor DSP-based radios , especially the “ analog dial” type, tune differently - they “Step-Tune” in increments. And act differently, as stations do nod fade-away. Once the signal drops too low , the radio looses the lock on the the station and you get nothing. It’s strange. It’s been a while, glad to see you in your “new” Lab. 📻🙂

This was a great idea to do this kind of tear down. Thanks Fran!

WOW. That's an original 1979/1980 TI calculator behind you on the desk. I had one of those when I was a child. The numbers were red.

I bought the smaller version of that radio that has a 18650 cell. in my opinion works well enough to keep me entertained while at work.

Cool radio station that, love to see that band play live some day. ;o) Cool video Fran. Out of interest, is the audio any better on high tone through decent headphones or an amp?

New subscriber here. Really enjoy your videos. Honest & you definitely bring us all your knowledge. Thank you so much.

Your suggesting to turn screws counter-clockwise until they "drop" into the thread is something I have wanted to share forever... thanks for getting that out. Subbed. Keep rocking...

I have one of these and I am pleased with it, it tunes in well and I leave the tone on low. Plenty of volume for me.

Imagine the meeting. The engineer and the marketing peep. Marketer: "We want knobs - it'll look cool". Engineer: "OK".

Thanks a lot miss Blanche for your information about this radio model! I am a radio shortwave listener from Brazil and it is pretty good to learn a little more!

Very nice video indeed. Interesting what the innards of new radios look like nowadays. I like the Texas Instruments calculator on your desk....sure brings back memories.

Love the video and love old radios too.. Im a old Ham Radio Operator so i do have apreciation for the well built radios. you are my kind of girl!! Keep up the good work.

I had to laugh when you turned it on and your own music was playing

Hi, Enjoy your show! Very well presented n explained compared to many others I watched. Shows you know the design n construction evolution very well from the early days of transistor radio! Rgds! Tony. 👍👍👏👏👏

I love watching you do what you do. I wish more young people knew useful things such as that...

Regarding adverts. I, and possibly many others use ad blockers which stop the ads. I don't have a problem with you having as many ads as you can to keep going. You need to think about this as we need you on here for a dose of sanity! I would rather you had mid video ads than not be on RU-vid at all. Even without an ad blocker, I`d be happy to put up with ads in the middle of your vids as it keeps a revenue stream for one of the better channels to survive. Put the ads in Fran!!!

Interesting clip, I thought they were as simple as that. The sound quality might be acceptable, but the older transistors were more sophisticated and had much better reception.

What a coincidence, youtube recommends me this 2 hours after I open up my own radio. I have a Tecsun PL310ET one of the buttons was not very responsive, so I opened it up. Very simple circuit, (but the performance is worth it) It has one board for all the important circuits, a main chip, and everything, Another board for the buttons, display, and tuning controls. They probably split the board just to make the radio smaller. Everything is arranged so efficiently inside, like a smartphone, (not THAT compact, but still) I don't see much of wasted space. I just blew Air on everything, cleaned the buttons with some alcohol, and closed it right back up. Interestingly, it has a tiny button cell inside, which is specifically there to keep the radio alive even if you remove the AA batteries. So you don't lose all the EPROM stuff...

Cool channel, just found it. I'm subbing! That's hilarious the build of this thing!

I enjoy vintage audio equipment as well!

I love all these vintage electronic stuff and your amazing channel came across !! I used to manufacture guitar tube amps and I loved it. And it is indeed almost impossible to find a brand new radio set with air gap capacitor for tunning, wich is terrible. Congratulations for your amazing channel!! cheers from Brazil!!

Thank you for respecting premium youtube subscribers and not inserting in video ads. THUMBS UP!

Fran, another great video! It was fun to see the take down of this radio by someone who knows what the components do. Fun to watch too. Thanks!

VWestlife reviewed this radio not too long ago. Personally, I'm not a fan of the digital step tuning from newest radios.

I was coming of age when transistors were coming of age. A 8 transistor AM radio was a BIG deal. I remember trading a week of babysitting the neighbor's brats in exchange for one.

A very honest and to the point video, thanks. Carlos (Sydney)

You are so nice and so clever. I like that. And the "Outro" was fab Fran. Thanks baby!

I still listen to my 70 Panasonic panapet 9 volt daily. Still works great after 50 years.

"In the lab... yadda yadda yadda"

I love your videos so much. I'm a ham radio geek so I was giddy when I saw this one's description.

I'd never heard that back then forward trick! Thanks for sharing!

You put your own music? Ain't you awesome! :)

Nicely done Fran. The idea of “converting” a PCB mounted slide switch into a rotary control switch is a very old idea. General Electric started doing that back in the 1960s. Sadly, today’s radios are just an afterthought. If they can receive a few “flamethrower” local stations, it’s good enough. Back in the day, even when outsourcing, a company still wanted the build quality of radio to reflect their corporate reputation.

Noticed your TI-30 on the bench... real piece of history! Thanks for sharing!

Thank you! This gives me a lot to think about before my next portable radio purchase.

The most surprising thing about that radio is that it still uses a string-powered tuning indicator!

I’d love to see a video of you improving this radio/tone control

Thank you. Please keep reviewing radios and letting us see what's inside. Few reviewers open them up.

I've also always used that "reverse before forward" method. You can feel the screw drop into the thread. Pretty satisfying.

i never really appreciated my old transistor (as a kid) until now.

Very good video. I had not seen the inside of a modern radio. In the old days, changing the battery allowed one to see the innards. Not today. I wanted a new, small AM/FM radio for emergencies. After much searching, I found recommended the Sony ICF-S10MK2. I paid all of $12.49 for it. The sound quality was as expected for the "pocket" radio that it is, but the receiver was good. This was more than adequate. I bought 4 more for family and friends over the years. Just checked on prices. I guess they are no longer made. Well, anyway, this is one "new" radio that for all of $12.50 has reasonably good reception and sound for its intended purpose. Now, I am curious just what Sony has to replace that model? I do like the older radios and the warmer sound. Thanks for the video! Amazing the difference between then and now.

Our family radio in the 1960s and 70s was a Bush TR82C. Miraculously it survived my regularly opening it up to ogle and poke at the waxy discrete components as a electronics-obsessed youngster.

At first glance, I thought your shirt had a Heathkit logo. The battery in the first radio, reminded me of a battery I would buy for my grandma's radio. I think it was 45 volts. A Simpson 260 used the same battery