W2VIB Rating: 2020-06-17 Exellent Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. This radio is as good as it gets for a portable. I use it as a table top radio for USB/LSB on 20, 40 and 80 meter ham bands with a 130' doublet antenna from my transceiver tuner. It receives as well as my Icom 745. FM has excellent stereo quality in my headphones. AM is great as i live 100 miles south of NYC but could only receive NYC stations with built ferrite core antenna after i discovered the AM interference was because of switching wall warts on surveillance cameras was the source, once turned off, then AM reception was clear. The manual is hard to understand and i have yet to put frequencies in memory channels so i just enter my favorites manually. Recommend using high dipole outdoor antenna for SSB reception and fine tuning + or - .10 khz for clarity. All in all a great little radio, easy to use but remember any shortwave radio is only as good as it's antenna system. Bob W2VIB

SV1DPP Rating: 2020-04-20 Bad for SSB Time Owned: more than 12 months. My opinion is that it's a bad radio, with leading edge distotion on usb/lsb and a useless "sync". It's a very expensive-very good FM radio.I have one and I am very disappointed.

EI3IBB Rating: 2020-03-03 Bad SSB Distortion. Time Owned: more than 12 months. 5 Stars if you do not listen to SSB 3 stars if you do listen to SSB.



I have hardly used the PL-880 due to the un-natural and distorted sounding SSB and dodgy AGC. I even went to the expense to get the S-8800 to find it was just as bad and it completely ruins the radios for me because I listen a lot to SSB.



Another issue is that the 4 Khz filter does not work on my S-8800 and PL-880.



However the radios are excellent in every other way so if you're really listen to SSB a lot I would avoid the S-8800 and PL-880 and get the PL-660 or PL-680 + SYNC is terrific on the 660. I have the 660 and by far SSB is so much better and a joy to listen to after listening to the 880 and 8800 other than that the S-8800 and PL-880 are perfect for Non SSB use and the remote control for the S-8800 is really convenient.



It's not just the tecsun radios that have the SSB issue, I've heard the eton radios too that have this issue on SSB. Seems it's a dsp issue they probably all use the same chip.



There is one exception, the XHDATA D-808, it has very minor SSB distortion and I can forgive that because it costs a fraction of the price of the Tecsun radios and it's a lot better to listen to and for SSB the sound to me is actually clearer.



The D-808 is not as easy to tune. But it's not bad once used to it.



The XHDATA has good MW reception but it's almost deaf on LW, the Tecsun PL-880 and S-8800 are much better for LW and MW.



Surprisingly, the S-8800 MW reception greatly improves with external antenna connected to the BNC Antenna input.



So, if you listen a lot to SSB like I do the PL-660 has great natural SSB sound, the lack of filtering can be an issue on a crowded band however in my opinion, the perfect non-distorted sound more than makes up for this. If you are on a budget then I guarantee the XHDATA is a fantastic radio for SSB and MW, FM, SW, slight distorted sound at the beginning of SSB transmission but stops during transmission with the tecsun 880 and s-8800 it's bad in the beginning of transmission with slight distortion throughout the rest of the transmission, very irritation if you're a HAM.



Tecsun have announced that the PL-990 and H-501 radios will be the last "high performance" radios from Tecsun. I do hope their SSB performance is much better than the PL-880 and S-8800, it's sad but true. In a few years it probably won't be possible to buy a new multiband radio with SW and it will have to be SDR which needs a computer.



It would be nice to see some portable SDR radios with 7 inch screen and waterfall, buttons and knobs. Telescopic whip, external antenna inputs, good lithium battery and DRM capability.



I hope this information is useful to some.

VE4AMN Rating: 2019-01-31 Truly excellent Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. I have owned a host of small portable radios and this beats all. It is sensitive and selective, plus offers great audio for FM. I am seriously considering building a small TR switch and mating it with a QRP transmitter it is that good.



The battery life is excellent and the USB based charging process is fast.



I have two nits. First the leather case, while of excellent quality could be 1/2 inch larger to accommodate the portable antenna, charging line and earphones. Then the unit would make this a truly portable system.



The manual is poor. When I first switched the radio on, the sync was engaged and the SSB and CW sounded bad. After hunting around on Google I figured out how to turn this function off (which has always been marginal on any small radio I have heard). There are many "hidden" features not covered in the manual, but users have unearthed some really useful tricks. They appear at https://swling.com/blog/2014/06/complete-list-of-tecsun-pl-880-hidden-features/



In short this is a great radio.

N4MU Rating: 2019-01-27 Exceeded my Expectation! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. Got the PL-880 after selling a tuner. Total cost: $24.99! This little gem has truly exceeded what I hoped would be a great receiver. I have had other comparable receivers but sent them back due to "non-performance". I bought it just to listen to the ham bands, especially CW and I have to say it is superb. Of course it does AM & FM but if I want to listen to those I can sit in my truck. The 10 Hz steps do the job very well and it is rock stable. There is absolutely no chuffing even when rapidly changing frequencies. The 500 Hz filter is great for CW!

I don't write a lot of reviews but when something this good comes along folks should know. It's great...did I already say that?

KB3HJK Rating: 2019-01-09 The best portable out there Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. It's incredible. I have owned the 1103, a lower Tecsun, and a few Sonys. The SSB reception is outstanding. The bandwidth filters are excellent. It blows away the radios I mentioned. After researching this and the Sangean 990, reviews pointed me to this. Thank god. Note...this is based on using the supplied wire antenna. I did see a massive difference between the and the whip.

KB0HAE Rating: 2018-12-09 Very good portable radio Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. I already had a Kaito KA1103 (see my review of it). Part of the reason that I bought the Tecsun PL880 is that it got good reviews, and that it runs and charges from USB (5Vdc), using an 18650 3.7V Lithium-ion battery. While the KA1103 is a decent radio, I wanted some of the features that the PL880 has that the KA1103 lacks. I made sure that the radio that I bought had the 8820 firmware, as I had read that PL880s with the older firmware had a few problems that were solved in the newer firmware version.



I have to say that the PL880 had exceeded all of my expectations! It is easy to operate, and works very well. Why I wanted a radio that would run and charge from USB is the availability of solar/hand crank power banks that can charge USB devices. I have paired the PL880 with a solar/hand crank power bank with 10000Mah battery capacity. This will allow the radio to operate indefinitely without an AC power source.

KM4OBL Rating: 2018-08-12 Excellent Performer With Great Speaker and Controls Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. I bought this radio to replace my aging Degen 1102. I had heard of the problems with the SSB AGC on the early PL-880's, and I was concerned that the problems had not been addressed adequately on currently-produced units. I need not have worried. While there are still quality control mishaps possible (my first PL-880 had to be returned due to an off-center tuning knob that didn't rotate smoothly), the 2nd unit is a stellar performer that looks and sounds wonderful.



This is a very attractive radio, with a somewhat retro, classy look. There are separate knobs for volume, tuning and fine-tuning, all of which feel solid and have the right "feel" in turning - just the right amount of resistance.



My PL-880 is very sensitive and selective on all bands, with none of the tuning "chuffing" heard on my 1102. The controls are also more intuitive on the PL-880, with setting memories and getting into SSB being particularly easy. You have to be careful not to press and hold buttons on this radio unless you are sure of the result - because there are "hidden" features that are activated by pressing and holding various buttons. I find the radio a pleasure to operate and tune. You have a wide selection of tuning bandwidths appropriate for each band - although the narrower bandwidth choices can produce a muting effect on some bands, as on other portables. The attractive amber backlight turns on when any button or knob is pushed/turned, and it can be set to stay on all the time or left on the default setting to turn off after five seconds.



The clock is easy to set, and although I have not used the alarm features, they appear easy to set also. The lithium-ion cell used to power the radio operates the radio for a long time - I have yet to recharge it. And the 18650 cell that comes with the radio is not a high-capacity cell compared to alternatives available for under $10 that will power the radio even longer, if you decide to go that route.



I do not detect on my radio the AGC kick-in delay or "wobbly" sound on SSB that were reported on some earlier units in online revivews - everything sounds great to my ears. And the speaker is really astoundingly nice for a radio of this size and price point. This is a huge improvement over any other portable I've had - I'm happy I finally bought one.

OPP4BABA Rating: 2018-01-11 great for the money Time Owned: more than 12 months. I bought my 880 a couple of years ago. I have used it and compared it with my 30 odd other SW receivers..Sound wise it is in the top 5....only one really beats this one and that is the vulnerable old Grundig Professional 600....not much compares to that rig.



I took the 880 to India on my last trip and was really impressed with it's ability to pick up all kinds of stations, weak, strong, close and far....all without issue, all with just a long wire about 8 feet long strung and attached in my closed in balcony. Sensitivity, selectivity are top notch.



Should this one end up being broken from being dropped or whatever, I would get another in a heartbeat.....it is one of the few keepers.



P.S. It is a supreme pleasure to hear all the SW activity on the Broad cast bands still going strong in the south asian arena.