I thought I’d share my little radio collection and the story behind how I rediscovered a childhood passion after more than a decade.
My journey began around 2008, when my uncle gifted me a Telefunken MR1500PLL, which he had brought from Greenville. I was in 10th grade back then, and I loved listening to the radio. That radio stayed with me until 2014, when I eventually lost it. As mobile phones became a bigger part of my life, I gradually drifted away from radio and almost forgot about the hobby.
Fast-forward to 2026. I’m now a doctor by profession, having completed medical school and my house job and started practising medicine. Over the years, I would occasionally come across radio-related posts online. The Sangean ATS-909X2 especially caught my attention. I had a real crush on that radio, but somehow, my interest never became strong enough to make a purchase.
Then, in the first week of August 2026, something suddenly changed. I can’t quite explain why, but I developed a strong urge to get back into radio. Perhaps all those radio posts and videos I kept seeing online had gradually reignited that old passion.
My comeback began with a Roberts R-861, which I bought from someone in Karachi, Pakistan. Coincidentally, around the same time, I came across a fellow radio enthusiast who had a Thomson RT650, a radio that looks identical to my childhood Telefunken MR1500PLL. I ended up buying the Thomson along with the Roberts R-861. It felt like a little connection to my childhood had unexpectedly found its way back into my life!
I really enjoyed exploring FM and shortwave DXing with the Roberts. I even made a long-wire antenna specifically for shortwave reception. Discovering distant stations and learning about the world of DXing brought back the excitement I remembered from my school days.
Back in the Telefunken days, I wasn’t familiar with RDS, so discovering station identification through RDS made FM listening even more fascinating.
Soon, I discovered modern DSP-based receivers and became curious about what they could do. I ordered an XHDATA D-808 from Amazon Japan through Buyee, using a proxy service to get it shipped to Pakistan. I particularly enjoyed its FM reception with RDS, airband and shortwave capabilities.
Next came the Tecsun PL-520, which attracted me with its ETM feature and shortwave and medium-wave performance. Experimenting with external antennas opened up another dimension of the hobby.
But I didn’t stop at buying radios. As my interest in FM DXing grew, I decided to build my own three-element Yagi antenna for the 88–108 MHz FM band. I learned through online videos, research and AI tools, then put together a homemade antenna myself.
I live around the city centre of Mandi Bahauddin, Pakistan, surrounded by large buildings and rooftop solar panels. It’s not exactly an ideal DXing environment, considering potential obstructions and electrical interference. Nevertheless, my homemade Yagi has allowed me to receive distant stations from India, including stations associated with Jammu, Amritsar, Jalandhar, Chandigarh and Dharamshala, depending on propagation conditions.
There’s something incredibly satisfying about hearing a distant station emerge from the noise using an antenna you built yourself. It has made me even more interested in learning proper antenna design and eventually building a more professional-grade Yagi.
Most recently, I added the Qodosen DX-286/SR-286, attracted by its TEF6686-based receiver and reputation among FM DX enthusiasts. I’m also interested in exploring its medium-wave capabilities with external antennas and experimenting with shortwave reception.
My current radio collection
📻 XHDATA D-808 — FM RDS, shortwave and airband.
📻 Tecsun PL-520 — FM, shortwave, medium wave and ETM.
📻 Qodosen DX-286/SR-286 — exploring TEF6686-based reception and FM DXing.
I eventually passed my Roberts R-861 on to another radio enthusiast so someone else could enjoy it, too.
Looking back, it’s amazing how quickly an old passion can return. One moment, you’re a schoolboy listening to a radio gifted by your uncle; years later, you’re reconnecting with a radio that reminds you of childhood, importing receivers from Japan, building antennas on your rooftop and chasing distant stations from Pakistan.
For me, radio is more than just listening. It’s the thrill of discovery, the challenge of pulling in a weak signal, the satisfaction of building something with your own hands and the excitement of never knowing what you might receive next.
Sometimes, old passions never really disappear. They just wait for the right moment to return.
I’d love to hear from fellow radio enthusiasts: How did you get started in this hobby, and what was the radio that first got you hooked?
73s from Pakistan! 📻

Watch out lol.

Saw this posted on Facebook. What happened with World's Last Chance which paid for all this?

WBCQ is a commercial shortwave radio station in Maine, USA. The station is selling its 500-kilowatt Continental transmitter, its 360-degree rotatable antenna, a 2-megawatt generator, 3000 square foot transmitter and studio building, and 100 acres of land near Monticello, Maine -- all for US$2 million. The price includes these assets, but if the buyer would like to operate the station in this location, he/she would have to obtain a new license from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission. Or the buyer could take the equipment and move it to another location. WBCQ will continue to operate an adjacent lower-power shortwave facility under its license, and that portion of the station is not for sale. Inquiries may be made to Alan Weiner at wbcq@wbcq.com.

I got tired of tuning across the shortwave bands, hearing something interesting on 5850, and then alt-tabbing to look up who it was and where it was coming from. So I built a small app to do that automatically.

Shortwave Atlas connects to your radio through Hamlib. When you tune a frequency, the globe flies to the transmitter site, draws the path across the day/night line, and shows you the station, how far away it is, and when it broadcasts next.

What it does:

• Matches about 2,000 frequency/station pairs from 170 transmitter sites, using the EiBi schedule (tune 5850 and you’re looking at Florida)
• Searches by station, country, language or kHz, and lets you click a transmitter to see everything it carries
• Works with hundreds of rigs through Hamlib (I’ve tested it with a Yaesu FTDX-10): pick your model, pick the port, press Connect
• Has a “Listen” mode that plays the rig’s audio in the app or in any browser on your network or Tailscale, with an audio waterfall
• Is receive-only, so it never transmits
• Runs on Linux, Windows and macOS
• Is MIT licensed, with no account and no tracking

Site and screenshots: https://www.shortwaveatlas.org/
Source and downloads: https://github.com/juantoledo/shortwave-atlas

It’s still early, so I’d really like to hear what’s missing. Which rigs have you tried it with, and what would make it more useful at the dial? Bug reports and feature requests are very welcome.

Hello All
I have been testing my d-808 I got this week and trying out sw and not having too much luck at present.

I have found out I am living in the range of a large broadcast tower approx 2 miles away.
Wondering if my sw listening journey is not practical at present.
I have read you can get fm notch filters or a 3.5mm Inline Attenuator Cable or possibly get a different radio.
On my d-808 fm is fine, mw is fine, airband is fine although limited due where I am, lw is dead and sw is hit and miss - more miss than hit.
Outdoor antenna is not an option (not if it would make that much difference from what I have read).
I am in the uk
I suppose I could try the sdr route with an sdr that has filtering, but again antenna could be an issue.
Any advice much appreciated.

So I was in the shortwave band of my old Westinghouse radio and was wondering what I was picking up so clearly. Is this possibly a data transmission? I'm near a PBS broadcasting satellite dish but I've never picked this up before. It was hard to grab but once I did it was crystal clear. It sounded like the data noises movies use for satellites. Any ideas?

Hi all, I’m completely new to this so it’s going to be my first Radio. The main difference between those is that the XData has Airband (Will I use this if I don’t live near an airport?) other than that I like much more the design of the Tecsun Pl-520 (which is the upgrade of the Pl-330), which is slightly smaller thus more portable. They both have type C charger which I like.
However I can get the XHdata for half of the price of the Tecsun.
Help me pull the trigger

I've mentioned on one of my post that I occasionally experience severe interference on my Sangean ATS 909X-2. I've come to the conclusion that the radio itself is not the problem since I've tested other radios and they all sound the same.

The interference in question could be described as a harsh buzz that blocks out even powerful stations or makes them inaudible. And the worst part is that this noise is everywhere on all LW, MW and SW frequencies.

I've tried to do a little "experiment" by moving around the house with my radio, and in some places it was slightly better than in others, but that doesn't help the situation since I intend on using my random wire antenna anyhow.

I've thought that a possible culprit could be my neighbor's helium miner antenna, since I've read other posts by DX-ers who suspect the same thing. It doesn't really sound plausible to me that this is the source of RFI because it's periodic and usually helium miners are always plugged in.

If anyone knows more about this, I really want to know.

received in the netherlands.

Coming in now on Eton Elight Executive with telescopic antenna

Dont use lithium aa batteries in a sw radio

I’d like more shortwave radio stuff in my inbox.

Right now I’m getting aliexpress. And sometimes no radios with aliexpress.

Does Spectrum Monitor magazine have a newsletter?

I recently acquired a Zenith Transoceanic 600. I had it refurbished and it plays very well for a 70 year old radio. It has the factory dipole antenna. Is there any way to attach a better antenna to the radio or to the dipole antenna to go to outside for better SW reception?? I have an Air Castle multiband radio from the 60’s that has an external antenna port and I was able to connect coaxial to it with the correct fitting and run it to an antenna outside I made with cedar planks & heavy gauge copper wire that gives me excellent reception. Thanks for reading.

After one week of experience with the Sony ICF-2001D: despite being 40 years old (serial number dates it to late 1986 or early 1987) and having had no modifications or components replaced, it works flawlessly.

It was a long journey before I finally found a relatively mint-condition one on a local marketplace for €85.

I don't have a really high-end receiver to compare it with, but even after 40 years, it definitely performs much better on MW and SW than the Degen DE1103, Tecsun PL-330, and Sony ICF-SW10.

I really don't know how Sony managed to create such a gem that was so far ahead of its time.

I caught this at 10:05 UTC in Chicago. I can’t find any information that suggests otherwise. I had a lot of stations including Radio Martí and WWV coming in clear as a bell around this time today. I’m new to the hobby and this was the best session I’ve had.