An Excellent Simple AM/FM/Shortwave Receiver, This little radio Sony ICF-SW35 Digital Tuning World Band Receiver is an excellent starter or second shortwave receiver. It is also an excellent portable AM/FM radio. Like most Sony radios, its music sound quality is, frankly, just adequate, but for listening to news and talk, which is what most shortwave listeners do, its sound quality is really fine and very clear.
The radio has very few features. For example, it has no direct-entry keypad, nor does it receive SSB (Single-Sideband) transmissions used by Hams. It is strictly for listening to local and world broadcasts. Some may regard this as somewhat of a liability but, for one just starting to use a shortwave receiver, this relative lack of complicated features can be a boon. And remember it is not features that make a receiver good or bad but, rather, performance.
And it is in performance that this Sony radio really shines.
It is quite sensitive using its telescopic whip antenna and it is very selective. (Adding a $15.00 wind-up antenna Sangean ANT-60 Short Wave Antenna, clipped to the whip antenna, improves reception, though it's not absolutely necessary.) Its image rejection characteristic (the ability to ignore harmonics of radio signals which can interfere with the true station on the frequency to which you are tuned) is, in a word, superb, better than that of any other compact shortwave receiver. Its overall reception performance is at least equal to or, in the overwhelming majority of cases, is actually superior to that of most shortwave receivers costing up to $150.00.
While others have written here that it is difficult to learn to operate this radio, in actual fact, it is not. You must read the instructions. Sometimes you have to re-read them. Many people just will not do this - and, for them, the radio, especially the usage of its memories, will indeed be difficult. But for those of us who do read manufacturers' instructions, there will be absolutely no problem operating this receiver to full advantage and learning how to do it very quickly. Literally, a child, or even a very old person, can do it. It's that simple to learn and use.
It is manufactured in China. Most Chinese-built radios, for example, Degen/Kaito, Sangean, and Eton/Grundig models, have variable quality control, mediocre in fact, more often than not.
Excellent (4.25 stars), simple, starter am/fm/sw SONY radio with 50 memories, I needed a relatively small AM/FM/SW easy to use starter radio to be used during travel and have compared several portable receivers including the Kaito KA11, Grundig G6 Aviator, Grundig YB-550PE, Grundig eTraveller VII, Kaito KA1101, Kaito KA1102 and the Eton E100, Redsun RP300 (Crane SWP), etc. I am still not completely done with all my evaluations, but I definitely think that the SONY ICF-SW35 radio is a great, very excellent receiver! I am extremely impressed right out of the box how well it performs even for quite weak signals with both very good sensitivity as well as selectivity.
PROS:
1) A dual conversion, PLL (Phase-locked loop), fully digital worldband radio that comes with a cloth slip case, carrying strap and a readable manual.
2) Excellent weak signal reception on ALL bands (am/fm/sw). It really performs very well!
3) It has a fine and useful tone switch (Music/news) with stereo through the earbuds as well as a continuously variable DX switch (RF gain attenuator). This "tone" switch works well on FM frequencies.
4) Keyboard lock switch and backlight control (with 20 second duration with a yellow-green backlighting evenly illuminating the display).
5) Three tuning methods are available including fine and coarse tuning (in 1 or 5 KHz steps) and including an automatic scanning tuning system with up/down search keys, but there is no direct frequency entry keypad, etc.
6) Very high quality and very readable display with icons for indicating low battery life and a signal reception TUNE icon that works extremely well, etc. Clock time (indicated when the unit is off) and station frequency are not displayed simultaneously.
Did Short Wave not work or was there Rocket Science involved?, (What's this?) Radio recieved in good order. Appeard to be a solid piece of equipment.
The FM did not seem to bring in much in my small town with 20+ FM stations.
The memory sets were a pain to figure out, so was just setting the clock and such.
What I bought it most for was the Shortwave. It did not receive but some weather and one or two other SW signals. The manual completly stinks. It is a shortwave radio and has very little to no info on SW stuff. There are multiple SW bands, but it does not tell you nor can you easily figure out how to move about them.
Great product, (What's this?) I bought this radio for one of my customers and he was totally satisfied ! He has been telling me about it since. Not only does it sounds great but at home (Trinidad) it is twics as expensive.
Fair Radio with Tin Speakers, I've had my Sony SW35 for five years and while its reception is better than most analog radios and is not much bigger than a CD jewel case, I can't recommend it. First, its five layers of magazine presets are counterintuitive and require a lot of practice and constant references to the user manual. Second, the speaker is almost useless, a piece of tin that has no business being on a 75-dollar radio. Third, for the same price you can buy a far superior Degen 1103 or its clone the Kaito 1103, which has a better speaker and stronger reception. If you want to spend a little less and get good reception with an analog instead of the more expensive digital you might take a look at the Tecsun BCL 2000, or its more expensive clone, the Grundig S350. I've tried many radios, own several, and can assure you that for digital PLL synthesized dual-conversion radios, you can't beat the Degen 1103 or its twin the Kaito 1103 (both around 65-100 dollars depending on where you buy them).
It was rather fair product, (What's this?) It's happened that the radio arrived when it was in our aria snow storm.
SW channels are hard to tune, (What's this?)
Multi-band receiver delivers quality reception across the globe.Headphone jack for private listening and improved sound clarity in noisy environments.Memory scan and ATT control finds the best signals fast.50 memory presents allow quick access to your favorite stations.Compact design with built-in speaker is perfect for travelers..
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