Who's listening to FM Tonight? What tuner?

Listening to Merry KINKmas on KINK-FM 101.9 Portland, OR. Currently playing Santa Claus is Coming to Town by Bruce Springsteen.

Modded Sansui TU-717 tuner -> Thule Audio IA100 integrated amplifier -> KEF 104/2 Reference Series speakers.
 
I had a dear lady friend over Christmas Eve to cook and share dinner. I had "Dinner Jazz" playing from Abu Dhabi Classic FM, my favorite program. I texted the DJ with a request and a dedication.

A bit later the DJ put on my request "Tea for Two," sung by Frank Sinatra and Dinah Shore, and announced "This is for Emily from Joseph," my lady's eyes started to twinkle and she gave me a big kiss.

Try that with Spotify!
 
97.5 WWWV Charlottesville, Va from Nokesville, Va.
Sansui 350A and 300 ohm antenna. My outdoor Ham antennas don't have the directionally or perhaps too much coax loss.IMG_20180104_000908.jpg
 
I was listening to classical 90.5 out of Mid Michigan most of the evening... the PD6's are pretty good for some Classical music
 
97.5 WWWV Charlottesville, Va from Nokesville, Va.
Sansui 350A and 300 ohm antenna. My outdoor Ham antennas don't have the directionally or perhaps too much coax loss.View attachment 1080868
Yeah, I find that my folded dipole antenna (300 ohm) from RadioShack beats most indoor antennas I've tried, even if I have to use a balun (300 ohm => 75 ohm) for modern receivers with no 300 ohm feed.
 
Yeah, I find that my folded dipole antenna (300 ohm) from RadioShack beats most indoor antennas I've tried, even if I have to use a balun (300 ohm => 75 ohm) for modern receivers with no 300 ohm feed.

For some reason, in my use, I personally find that rabbit ears work better than the dipoles.
The ability to play with the orientation really helps to increase signal strength.
They are NOT an attractive addition to room decor, but form follows function.
 
For some reason, in my use, I personally find that rabbit ears work better than the dipoles.
The ability to play with the orientation really helps to increase signal strength.
They are NOT an attractive addition to room decor, but form follows function.
Couldn't agree more. Currently, my rabbit ears are perched on a stack of books atop a 6' bookshelf,with the ears spread out just below and almost parallel to the ceiling...because that seems to be the only available spot where any station below 5-bar signal strength will come in with a tolerable amount of static. It's bad when I live exactly halfway between the two transmitters of the local NPR affiliate & can't get above a 3-bar reading on either frequncy.
 
Listening to jazz on my local public radio station, WHRO.
Sherwood S7100-A receiver, driving little JBL J50 bookshelf speakers.
Presently the antenna on this system is a piece of speaker wire with one lead attached to the receiver and the other wrapped around the doorknob.
It's working well enough.
The little Sherwood has a fine tuner in it.
 
Last edited:
All night to classical NPR station over the little moewillis-modded Sony HD in my sig system. SQ better than most streaming stations I find.
 
I've been using a Hitachi FT-8000 for the last couple of years. Last week I installed this "omnidirectional" antenna on the ceiling in a closet near the tuner. Huge difference in reception from the dipole I'd been struggling with. The antenna is advertised as "omnidirectional," but there is one direction in which the gain falls off some. The tuner has a neat "multipath" button, which mutes the regular signal and allows only the multipath reception to come through. (Not sure if I'm using the terminology correctly, but you get the point.) I was able to rotate the antenna to minimize the multipath and I get a nice strong signal on all the stations I listen to. Stations are WCWP, a college station a few miles away with a very weak signal. I'm close to the edge of reception here when I'm in my car, but this antenna pegs the meter (err... lights all the LEDs). Also listen to WFDU / WNYU (shared frequency for Farleigh Dickenson University in NJ and NYU in NYC), WKCR (Columbia University), WFUV, WNYC, and one more who's call letters I can't remember.

The antenna was very inexpensive on Amazon.

IMG_2524.jpg
 
Tonight’s project, Sansui 7070, Bob Seger, Turn the Page, 105.3 The Shark
 

Attachments

  • 174EB6FE-D782-4454-93E3-BBAB257EDC82.jpeg
    174EB6FE-D782-4454-93E3-BBAB257EDC82.jpeg
    109 KB · Views: 13
I see that the nice Pioneer SX828 I just fixed up has a nice FM tuner. I tried it but it does not play music :( Got so annoying, I had to shut it off after just a few minutes.
 
Listening to KNKX 88.5 Jazz from Seattle/Tacoma on a SDRplay RSP1A using SDRuno.
 
how do you like the SDR? how does it compare to say the sony xdr-f1hd (if you have used one)?

SDRs in general, combined with the right software, are pretty darn amazing devices but the RSP1A is actually audiophile quality IMHO. It is probably the first affordable 14 bit reciever and with the free software becomes a very powerful radio wave capturing device. If you have a difficult channel to lock in, if this little guy won’t do it, I don’t know what will. The sound quality is also very dependent on the quality of your DAC which is required to process the signal once it becomes digital. The Sony xdr is a fine hybrid digital tuner but not as versatile without the computer SDR application. SDRs are 100% digital in signal processing and require a computer and digital analog converters. Also, the Sony is limited by its own internal converter which probably does not compare to the DAC you may already own.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom