[Elecraft] K3 for SWL?

[Jim Brown]

On Thu,2/2/2017 8:45 AM, Ron D'Eau Claire wrote:
> The K3/K3S with the KBPF3A makes Broadcast Band DX-ing interesting too. I've
> been doing more of that since the SW broadcasters (other than religious
> stations) have largely shut down.

If you already own a K3/K3S, adding the KBPF module makes it a 
spectacularly good general coverage radio. But I wouldn't buy one, or a 
KX3, only for that purpose. Rather, I'd grab one of several very nice 
SDR receive-only radios in the under $200 class. The SDRPlay1 goes for 
about $130; the slightly updated SDR2 about $150. There are several 
others. Feed your computer audio to decent speakers or headphones and 
you're good to go. Depending on which of several free software packages 
you choose to use with it, these radios can be set for pretty wide IF 
bandwidth, so you can get as much audio bandwidth as they're transmitting.

I'm a jazz fan, and listen to jazz stations streaming on the internet. 
About 5 years ago, I bought a dedicated internet "radio" from C Crane. 
It's been a winner. Looks like a small table radio, comes with a remote 
control. I feed it to my living room hi-fi, and also to a Part 15 
"trucker's modulator" set to 87.9 MHz that pumps it around the house and 
to the shack.

There are tens of thousands of streaming sources, most of them run by 
over-the-air broadcasters, but many that are internet only. As others 
have noted, the big shortwave stations we all grew up with have mostly 
gone away.

73, Jim K9YC