The SANGEAN PR-D14 -- an excellent MW DX and Emergency Radio

The Sangean PR-D14 AM-FM Radio, a great performer and great emergency radio -- with FM Stereo through headphones.

Before the Coronavirus slammed us in February of this year, I rediscovered the local Fry's Electronics store, which in the 2010's was THE place to go for electronics, but in recent years has been struggling to survive in an increasingly online retail world. 

To explain this, I need to take you back a few years.

During the 2010's, I rediscovered my radio hobby after several years of not really listening to MW and SW much. In fact, for about a ten year period I didn't DX much at all.

In September of 2011, I finally pulled all of my radios out of their storage closet, and started fixing some of them -- or trying to fix some I didn't end up fixing. :-)  It's also when I modified my GE Superadios slightly -- something I talk about in this blog post:

Interrock Nation: Boosting the antenna circuit of a GE SUPERADIO 1 & 2

To get parts for these projects, I went to Fry's, as our local Radio Shack was closing and didn't have many parts.

I also bought a couple radios at Fry's: my Sangean PR-D5, my Grundig G2, and my Sony ICF-38 -- all of which got heavy use. I bought my now broken Sangean PR-D6 there on sale. I bought a few CDs, blank CDR's, USB drives, a printer for my old computer -- for these things, Fry's was THE place to go. They had a little bit of everything electronic, and they even had a coffeeshop in the middle of the store. Early in the 2010's -- even with the Recession on -- the store was full of shoppers, had loads of employees, and it was always a busy place with plenty of good deals on everything from USB drives to computer parts to phone chargers.

My PR-D14 with its back off -- the radio comes apart very easily -- it's built well, like boomboxes in the 1980s used to be built. There are five main screws, and two tiny ones near the top, that come out fairly easy. There are no user serviceable parts, except maybe the volume control might need a shot of De-oxit in a few years. It would probably be easier to shoot some down the side of the shaft, as I do with my GE Superadios when they need it. I don't like taking apart radios unless absolutely necessary. Too easy to break something.

For a while after 2015 or so, I didn't go to Fry's much. But just before the corona shutdowns in February, I went into the store, and it wasn't the same place. A lot of the shelves were partially empty of goods. It didn't have the same festive, upbeat atmosphere, and wasn't as busy. It was very sad, to the point that it depressed me. It seemed to reflect the general state of brick-and-mortar retail in the US today -- on the brink. They still had a few Sangean and Sony radios for sale, and a few computers for sale here and there in the computer section, and a few TV's in the TV department, but Fry's seemed to have taken a hit -- probably by online purchasing, which has hurt a lot of brick-and-mortar retail.

Along with online shopping hurting Fry's, the trade war with China, of course, didn't help, as they apparently had special arrangements with Chinese suppliers. And the recent Coronavirus shutdowns naturally didn't help their situation any.

ENTER THE PR-D14 -- Like I Needed Another Radio....

All that said, right before the first corona shutdown in my state, Washington, I made a couple trips to Fry's to get some electronics -- USB drives, batteries, and the like. I also checked out their dwindling radio shelf, looking over the few Sangean and Sony models still on display.

The one that caught my eye was the Sangean PR-D14, which looks like a mono version of the famous DXer, the PR-D5.

Now, I probably needed another radio like I need another hole in my head, but I went ahead and got one of the PR-D14's right before the shutdown. It was a way to try to keep myself out of the Corona doldrums, and also give Fry's just a little customer support, because I like the store, and -- after all -- there are people who work there who need jobs, too.

The Sangean PR-D14 runs off a 6-Volt NOISE-FREE AC Adapter or 4 D-Cell batteries. The batteries fit securely in the back of the radio. The top one is a tight fit because Sangean outfitted it with a large, strong spring. Consequently, the batteries don't jiggle around inside the radio at all.

 

D CELLS = GOOD!

When I got the PR-D14 home and I took it out of the box, the first thing that impressed me was that the radio takes D CELLS. When I was younger, during boombox and GE Superadio days, D Cells were pretty standard in radio portables. Now, to see a radio that takes D Cells is a rarity -- probably because the industry is going more towards rechargeables, or they think that radios with D Cells are too heavy.

I found the D Cells to be a great idea. D Cells last longer than AA's in the same radio, which is a plus in emergencies if and when the power is off for any length of time (see my previous posts on power outages and radio).:

Interrock Nation: WRITING IN THE DARK -- thoughts about the power grid

Interrock Nation: A LESSON IN PREPAREDNESS -- 30 Hours Without Power, and a Sony Radio.

And the use of D Cells in the PR-D14 is indeed one of is pluses: a set of batteries in a PR-D14 will last a long time. As my readers probably know, I like to promote emergency radios, being that I live in an earthquake prone area, where they say the power grid may some day be vulnerable when an 8.0 or 9.0 earthquake hits. Such a shaker could take the grid down for weeks, if not months in places. In such areas prone to grid failures, emergency radios -- particularly ones with an AM band in them -- are a good idea.

A couple years ago, I posted an article on why AM / MW radio is important during disasters and emergencies, and it illustrates why a radio with good performance and good battery life would be essential.:

Interrock Nation: AM/MW RADIO AND THE CASCADIA 'BIG ONE' -- The Importance of a Dying Broadcast Band During Major Earthquakes & Other National Disasters

Sangean's decision to power the PR-D14 with D-Cells makes it an excellent choice, not just for emergencies and disasters, but it would be a great camping radio for the same reason, as campers don't always have boxes of batteries handy when out in the bush. The PR-D14's ability to hear distant AM and FM stations also makes it a great camping and travel radio.

For home, plug-in use, the Sangean PR-D14 comes with an interference free AC adapter. Sangean has been able to develop switching power supplies that do not interfere with AM radio reception. I am listening to my PR-D14 on its AC adapter as I write this: there is no RFI interference whatsoever.

HOW DOES IT PERFORM? VERY WELL

After noticing the fact the radio uses D-Cells, the next thing I noticed about the PR-D14 was its relative simplicity of use. The power button is not recessed, like some other Sangean models -- making it more positive to the touch. The tuning is done via an up and down button on the front of the radio -- making for less parts to break. The sole non-button control is the volume knob on the side of the radio, which is easy to find even in the dark.

The PR-D14 will play music off AM, FM, AUX IN, or even a USB stick (the USB port is in the top of the radio). Although most users probably wouldn't play music through a mono speaker (although it's still stereo in headphones) from a USB stick, it's still a cool feature.

The main question many of my readers may be asking is how does the PR-D14 perform on FM and AM? The answer is very well. The PR-D14 is obviously DSP equipped, as nearly all new Sangeans are -- in fact, the radio will put out RF 'chirps' on other, nearby radios when you tune it across the band -- just like every other DSP radio I have does (it's an artifact, not a defect in the radio -- DSP tuners will chirp on other nearby radios).

The Sangean PR-D14 with its back off, where the main PCB, speaker, and controls are located. The MW / AM loopstick antenna is clearly visible at top -- it has a single sense-coil, and is 100mm long (it measures out about 100mm on my ruler). The speaker is capable of handling 3 watts of power -- more than the 1 watt that the radio's audio chip puts out.

100 millimeter MW LOOPSTICK INSIDE

The AM side of the PR-D14 appears to be almost identical with that in the well known Sangean PR-D5 -- the limitation being the antenna length inside the radio. The size of the case indicates that the loopstick is shorter than the PR-D5's 200mm loopstick. From the outside of the radio, of course, it's impossible to tell if the PR-D14's loopstick is a twin coil or single coil (the PR-D5's loopsticks since 2012 are twin coil). 

Taking off the back of the radio reveals that the PR-D14's MW loopstick is about 9mm thick, and measures out to be 100 mm long. It's obviously enough for the radio to pull in DX on the MW band -- largely because of the DSP chip (probably a SiLabs chip) that the radio uses. DSP chips usually make a radio perform very well on both AM and FM.

Either way, my PR-D14 will pull in anything my PR-D5 hears, although the weakest stations are noticeably weaker by a dB or so -- if that.

Still, it's a handy DX radio on MW. Using an external loop with the PR-D14 is a bit easier than it is with a PR-D5. Why this is, I don't really know. It may have something to do with the dual coils in the PR-D5, or some other factor. I use my Select-A-Tenna with the PR-D14 and it responds very similarly to the way an analog IF-chipped radio responds.

The PR-D14's MW Loop antenna with my ruler next to it -- the loopstick measures out to 100mm. I use metric when measuring antennas and other smaller items, as it makes more sense than fractions of an inch. For bigger stuff, like bicycle parts and car parts, I use both systems. Temperature is always Fahrenheit although I post it here in Centigrade for my overseas friends. :-)

Right now, as I finish typing this blog article in my den, I have the PR-D14 playing in the corner of the room. For no particular reason, I tuned it to 1100 KHz, which often is covered in splash on some radios, because we have a local 50 KW station here in Seattle on 1090.

I am able to clearly hear KFAX San Francisco, a religious station, as well as the audio of a station behind it, coming from the East -- the news-talk station in Grand Junction, Colorado, KNZZ, which is about 900 or more miles (1000 km) away. I am hearing the stations with minimal splash.

I also have my PR-D5 fired up, and the two radios are practically pulling the stations in the same. KNZZ isn't a common catch here. And the fact it's coming in on my PR-D14 is an indication it works very well.

One last thing about DXing with the radio -- the headphones work well with DXing. I haven't had the issue with this radio where nearly empty DX channels do not have enough headphone volume, as I got with the PR-D5. If the PR-D14 has drop-down resistors on the headphone circuit, they must have adjusted them a little.

For more on low headphone volume, I posted an article on the PR-D5's peculiarities here, and a possible fix, if your own PR-D5 has low headphone volume on quiet MWDX channels:

Interrock Nation: Fixing the SANGEAN PR-D5's low headphone volume

No such mod is needed on the PR-D14.

CHANGING MW / AM CHANNEL SPACING

Those of us here in the US and most of the Western Hemisphere listen to MW with 10 kHz spacing between channels. I.e., my local stations' frequencies are 10 kHz apart. In Europe, Asia, Africa and other parts of the world, MW is in 9 kHz spacing.

The PR-D14 comes to your country generally programmed to receive MW with the channel spacing in your region. But you can change it fairly easily.

You press the MENU button and hold it. You will hear a soft 'beep'. Then you use the TUNE up or down button to reach "AM 10 Khz" (or "AM 9 Khz" if you're outside the Western Hemisphere). Press the SCAN button. The "10 Khz" or "9 Khz" will flash. Use the tuner buttons to toggle to 9 or 10 khz. Press the SCAN button. This sets the channel spacing. Press the MENU button again. You're set.

Here in North America a lot of guys switch their radios to 9 khz spacing to DX stations from across the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans. If your radio doesn't tune in 1 Khz increments, switching to 9 Khz spacing is a cheap way to DX the overseas channels. You might get splash, or heterodynes from local stations, but you'd get those anyway. I switched my PR-D5 to 9 KHz once to hear the Korean station that sometimes makes it here on 1566 khz.

The changing of spacing on MW is also described in the PR-D14 User Manual, which I have linked later in this article.

FM PULLS IN FRINGE STATIONS EXCELLENTLY

On FM, the PR-D14 pulls in fringe and distant FM stations better than my best analog FM radios, but slightly less than my Grundig G2 (which is also DSP). Why there is a difference between the two radios' reception on FM I do not know. Still, I was able to hear a classic rock station from Vancouver, B.C., Canada (about 130 miles / 200 km away) on my PR-D14 off the whip antenna, and I'd never heard that station before in my life. 

I am not an FM DXer, but sometimes Victoria, B.C. stations come in when tropospheric conditions exist. On rarer occasions, stations from farther away can be heard, but due to local terrain, FM DX is almost impossible. The fact the PR-D14 pulled in a station from 120 air miles away, with a hill in the way, says a lot. The only other time I heard a Vancouver, B.C. station was in the late 1980's when I took my boombox to a distant hillside facing north, where the back of that hill blocked out all the local FM interference, and I was able to hear CBUF, the French CBC station from Vancouver, which was very cool to hear!

Vancouver, B.C. stations are exceedingly rare at my home location, as there is a big hill in the way.

Maybe tropospheric conditions were exceptional when I heard the Vancouver rocker, but the fact I heard a Vancouver, B.C. station at all is an example of the PR-D14's ability to pull in FM.

Although the PR-D14 is a mono radio with just one speaker, through headphones FM is in crisp, clear stereo.

EMERGENCY RADIO? YES

As I noted before, in case of emergencies, a good AM radio is a must. During grid failures, cell systems can even lose power, as some hams noted during the recent wildfires in Oregon. Local FM and AM stations could be off the air. However, not only will AM stations be heard from 100-200 miles away during the daytime, at night skywave reception will bring in numerous stations from other regions, which may be vital for news and information if there is a widespread power outage, as would be expected during a major earthquake -- especially here in the PNW (the Pacific Northwest, for those of you not in the United States), where we have several major faults expected to slip at any time.

So far, I've had my PR-D14 for over eight months and I'm still on the first set of D Cells, and I use the radio for at least 15-20 minutes nearly every day, at least half of that time listening on headphones. There have been a few nights where I left it on while sleeping, and the radio, several months later, is still on one bar for battery power -- the PR-D14 will indeed last a while on a set of D-Cells.

The fact I use headphones a lot is probably why my batteries have lasted so long.

OPERATION IS A SNAP -- INCLUDING LISTENING TO MUSIC FROM A USB DRIVE

Operating the PR-D14 is very easy. The on-off button is not recessed, so it is easy to turn on and off, unlike the PR-D5's concave, somewhat recessed button. The only rotary control is a volume control on the side of the radio. The FM sounds good through headphones (in stereo) and pretty good through the large (4 inch?) speaker. AM sounds good through the speaker, and OK through headphones -- the bandwidth on MW/AM seems to be similar to the PR-D5, maybe 4-5 Khz, which is great for selectivity, but the highs are a little muffled, but not quite as much as my PR-D5.

TEN STATION PRE-SETS -- 5 AM & 5 FM

There are five station preset buttons on the front of the radio which are easy to set, or re-set: you just tune to the station you want, and press a button for a second or two until you hear a beep. That's it.

There are five pre-sets for the AM band, and five for the FM band. When you fire the radio up after taking it out of the box, there are five factory pre-sets for each band, interspersed across the band, although not all the way. On the AM band, for example, the factory pre-sets are 520, 1710, 600, 1000, and 1400. On FM they're 87.5, 108.0, 90.0, 98.0, and 106.0. They're probably set up that way for test purposes. I usually program mine for several favorite stations or channels across each band: my favorite DX and regional channels on AM, and rock, pop, and news stations on FM.

When you take out the batteries with the AC adapter unplugged it will re-set the radio. This also deletes your presets, which isn't that big a deal, being that there are only 5 on each band.

USB JACK on top for MUSIC

There is a USB music play capability I haven't yet used. There is a USB port on the top of the radio, and one of the play options is USB -- you access the USB by hitting the bandswitch button in the top row -- it toggles between AM / AUX / USB / FM. Other buttons on the front select your music folder, and then the music file you want to play.

'POWER FAIL' - Don't Panic -- SHOWS WHEN BATTERIES ARE GETTING VERY WEAK

If you have low batteries, like mine are right now (I'm still on the first set, and they're finally down to zero bars -- the radio still is working, though...), when you hit the bandswitch, it will go to USB and then you may get a "POWER FAIL" warning on the radio's display. The radio then powers off. Then, if you hit the power button, it will toggle to USB, AUX, and FM as per usual. Apparently the switching function requires a little more power, causing the "POWER FAIL" warning to show up whenever your batteries are low enough, or it's just a software glitch that occurs when batteries are low.

It doesn't disable the radio, however. The radio will still operate normally. In these cases, when you see the "POWER FAIL" occur when toggling from band to band, just hit the main Power button and you're on your way to FM. Or use the AC power adapter.... Or, change the batteries. :-)

All the radio is doing is letting you know that the batteries are low for some functions. Although it hasn't happened to me yet, I'm sure that the POWER FAIL warning comes on when the batteries are too low to operate the radio, and it probably cuts the radio off.

AUX IN for MUSIC and RDS

The PR-D14, just like the PR-D5 and other Sangean radios, has an AUX IN function, which uses the mini jack on the side of the radio for playing music off of a tablet computer, MP3 player, or cell phone.

LCD PECULIARITIES; FM-RDS 

The only negative in this radio is that the LCD display turns into a clock after a few seconds when you have tuned in a station. They do this because a lot of people apparently like their radios to double as clocks... and also it's to save power in some way. With the PR-D14, if you have been DXing and listening to a frequency, and temporarily forget which channel it was, you glance at the dial and you'll just see the clock.

But all you have to do in such cases is just press the "INFO" button near the tuner button, and the LCD lights up and the frequency reappears for about 7-8 seconds.

Also, although the PR-D14 has RDS, the RDS doesn't stay up long enough to scroll to ID song titles. :-( This is unusual, because the PR-D5, which also has FM-RDS, keeps the RDS scrolling for as long as you are tuned to the FM station.

The LCD light is helpful, and has two separate delay times: if the radio is running off of batteries, the light stays on for about 2-3 seconds; if it is plugged into the AC adapter, the light stays on for 7-8 seconds.

DIFFERENT VERSIONS? OIRT / JAPANESE channel capability on FM

According to the Sangean website, the PR-D14 is capable of OIRT / Eastern European FM reception, and also reception of the Japanese FM band, which goes lower in frequency than the FM band in the rest of the world.

The PR-D14 User Manual (which is available on Sangean's website here: UM_20121106_3A81VU100000A_PR-D14USB_GB_R1.pdf (sangean.com), shows how to switch the FM band to 64-108 MHz if you want. It's fairly easy, by using the INFO button, SCAN button (a small button next to the tuner button) and Tuner button.

I have mine set for 64-108 MHz just for the fun of it -- it's useless, of course, as not even the best of FM conditions are going to bring Japanese or OIRT / Eastern European FM stations here. It might be a useful function if you have a PR-D14 and either live in those areas, or travel there.

You can also switch the FM channel spacing, something I've never done. And, finally, you can force the PR-D14 to receive FM in Mono, something I've also never done. The way to do this is in the User Manual linked above.

A GOOD OVERALL DX AND EMERGENCY RADIO

But, overall, for a carry-around AM/FM radio with stereo headphone and DX capability, and good battery life, the PR-D14 is hard to beat. There aren't a lot of portables available today with good reception and good battery life combined -- and increasing numbers of portable radios have rechargeable batteries, which is a wash if there is an extended power outage. I know there are battery packs one can buy that will recharge rechargeables -- but in my view it's much cheaper and easier to buy a few spare sets of D cells (or AA's if you radio uses AA's) and keep them in a drawer somewhere.

I know as the years progress the idea of listening to radio on an actual radio seems more and more passe, and I understand that. Still, radios have their uses, and many of us who are GenX and older (I'm in Generation Jones) still think of "radio" as something you get from a plastic box with a dial and speakers on it. And for such people, the PR-D14 is a worthy addition -- for hearing music or sports when out in the yard, camping, travelling, or otherwise when the power is off and your cell service and internet is dead.

The PR-D14 is moderately priced, easy on batteries, sounds good, and is easy to use. If you're into radios, it's well worth it to check the PR-D14 out. You probably won't be disappointed.

AS FOR NON-RADIO TOPICS....

In other news, life is carrying on in 2020. I have been loaded with work at my job, and have recently been taking care of a family member full time. I have been practicing my slide guitar playing, which takes my mind off of a) politics, which we are inundated with here in the US, and b) life in general, which really has had few bright spots as of late.

I'm looking forwards to Halloween, although I still have to clean up and decorate my front yard, and wonder if we'll have any trick-or-treaters this year because of coronavirus.

Here is hoping that those of you who are reading this are coming through the Pandemic OK and your year is at least passably palatable.

Until next time, Peace.

C.C. 10-9-2020

Naturally, it took me a while to get this article published on my blog. In December I added the photos of the outside and inside of the radio, and accompanying text.

Right now it appears we are headed for another corona lockdown, even though a vaccine may be available later this month, and more available in January. Work has slowed down at my job, so I've been doing a lot more things at home, and concentrating on my writing hobby. 

The weather here has been dreary -- cold, generally, and rain. The past couple nights have been warmer, though, which is nice.

I probably won't put up Christmas lights or decorations this year. I'm just not enthused about the holiday. My hawthorn tree might get some lights, and that's about it. Right now a glowing Halloween pumpkin still sits in the tree. :-) 

I'll end this post with a pic of my two grey kittens which I got in late September, 2011 -- about the time I rediscovered my radio hobby. The one on the left is Pudge, who died on November 15th. The kitten on the right I named Fluffy. She is doing OK.

Peace.

C.C 12-10-2020

ADDENDUM, April 2022 -- POWER BUTTON ISSUE:

I have been using my Sangean PR-D14 as a kitchen radio for the past year or so, usually leaving it on 24/7. I started noticing an issue when turning it off -- instead of the radio turning off, the radio would tune down a frequency. I'd press the POWER button again, and it would, once again, tune downwards one channel.

After a couple months of this happening fairly frequently, I pulled the battery and pulled the AC plug, and re-set the radio. The first time I did it, I didn't allow the radio enough time without power for the re-set to work. The second time, it reset fine, and the power button glitch disappeared, and all was normal again. :-)

The key to knowing if the radio re-sets properly is when you plug the radio back in, all the characters on the LCD readout will light up and you my hear a 'beep'.

This is very similar to the POWER Button issue I encountered with my Sangean PR-D5, and I would bet that this issue sometimes occurs on other Sangean radios.

Sangean's radio operating firmware seems to have periodic button glitches. Even my PR-D18 (a small, almost pocket sized, decent DX-er, grey radio) has exhibited this issue at least twice, as when I hit one of the volume buttons once to turn down the radio, and it sent me to the alarm-setting function instead. A second press of the volume-down button worked properly. This has happened twice, actually. No big deal, but...

Sometimes the button scan function on these Sangean radios glitches. Usually a reset will clear it all up if it persists.

I have a blog article on the Sangean PR-D5 Power Button issue here.:

Interrock Nation: How to quickly fix a SANGEAN PR-D5 Power Button malfunction -- and other easy fixes

ADDENDUM, March 2023 -- more on the Power Button Glitch:

I still have the issue at least every other time I power off my PR-D14, only it will tune UP one channel instead of down one channel. No big deal. Radio works fine otherwise. It's my 24/7 kitchen radio, and sometimes I'll check DX on it. 

It's powered up all the time, via the AC adaptor that came with the radio, so that's probably one of the reasons it can glitch.... as I explained in the linked article up above, it seems that having the radio powered up all the time can cause the microprocessor to glitch eventually, and the solution is to remove all power, let the radio sit for 20-30 seconds, and then power it back up. I still think PR-D14's are well worth the money. PR-D14's are good DXers and work well as kitchen radios and the like.