From: jcarroll@ferris.cray.com (Jeff Carroll)
Subject: Casio PR100 - review
Originator: jcarroll@ferris
Organization: Cray Research, Inc.
Date: 23 Dec 92 00:55:40 CST


I bought a Casio PR100 this evening for $37.49 at GI Joe's in Beaverton, OR.
It's on sale, marked down from $49.99 - a pleasant surprise, as I was prepared
to pay $50 for it.

Since I don't have the first post on this beast at hand, I'll recap briefly.
The PR100 is a digitally synthesized AM/FM/SW receiver with built-in alarm
clock. The shortwave section of the receiver is split into two bands: one
runs from 2.3 to 6.2 MHz, the other from 7.1 to 21.85. It is Chinese-made,
but I'm not in a position to comment on its similarity or difference from
other low-price Chinese portables.

By the time I got the batteries in it, it was past the evening prime-time
programming, but I can report BBC, VOA, and DW loud and clear in 49m.
Just like my DX-440, it's helpless for SW against a steel & concrete office
building and the emanations of a Sun workstation, but I am sitting here
listening to quite impressive S/N performance picking up classical music
on the local NPR affiliate (FM mono only).

It seems to be quite sensitive - possibly more so than the DX-440. It seems
at least as though the AGC has a noticably greater dynamic range. I'd
conjecture that its self-noise floor is higher, and I've noticed that I
have to be careful how I hold it (touching the whip is not a good idea)
lest I more closely couple the guts of the radio to the antenna.

The whip is pretty short, and I've noticed that performance improves when
the radio is placed upon a metallic surface. There's a jack for a 6V external
supply (not included), but it seems to work just fine off the 4 AA batteries
that it takes to drive it. The tuning increment is 5 kHz; no SSB, no BFO,
no knobs. There appear to be 5 presets per band. As long as the frequency
you want to tune to is in one of the standard SW bands, you can count on
the scan algorithm (which kicks in when you hold down the tuning buttons)
to get you there; otherwise you have to stop the scan and manually increment
the tuner over the band edges. The only big downside I see on this radio
so far is that 5 presets might well not be enough in the SW bands.

The package seems sturdy enough - the battery cover is kind of flimsy,
but that's an extremely common malady, and I've seen worse. I'm a little
more concerned about the keypanel, and I'm not going to cannibalize my
new radio to find out what's under the hood, but suffice to say that
the keypanel could be fairly described as "cheesy". My gut feeling is
that if you keep the radio clean and dry, it'll be well-behaved, but
only time will tell.

It can't be a dual conversion receiver at this price, but that only means
that I won't get the irritating birdies that I get in my DX-440
from multimegawatt FM transmitters overloading the first IF. It's
not quite pocketable, but it'd fit easily in a "fanny pack", and it
can't weigh more than two pounds.

I had quit taking my DX-440 on the road because it was too damn heavy.
Now I have a new road radio, and it's difficult for me to imagine that
having somebody like Casio producing a product of this quality at this
price point won't have dramatic consequences on the other players in
the portable receiver market. It's gonna be awfully tough for Panasonic,
Philips, Sony, etal to charge $200 for a radio when you can buy this for
$40.

Jeff Carroll
carroll@herndon.cray.com