Benutzer-Werkzeuge

Webseiten-Werkzeuge


en:icf-7600

Sony ICF-7600

Manufactured by Sony, Tokyo.

With the ICF-7600, Sony presented an innovation in the field of portable world band receivers in the year 1978 - until then, potential buyers imagined a powerful world band receiver to be a large portable radio with two carrying handles, and turret tuner was the technical state of the art.

The small Sony model set a new standard with its pocketbook format and the band spread dials for the shortwave bands. With this model, the model designation 7600 was introduced for the first time. Sony used the number 7600 in combination with different letters for different sets, this created some confusion in the following years.
It was not until two years later that the set had to face serious competition in the form of receivers from Panasonic and the Grundig Yacht Boy.

Variants

  • ICF - 7600, the Japanese original version, VHF range 76 - 108 MHz
  • ICF - 7600 W, the international version with FTZ-compliant VHF range 88 - 108 MHz

Sony ICF-7600

Technical data

Power supply

Dimensions

  • 120 x 80 x 35 mm, weight 0.5 kg

Accessories

Sony ICF 7600

Operation

The Sony set with its black plastic cabinet with its 120 x 80 x 35 mm has roughly the dimensions of a pocket-sized book, with its weight of 500 g, can easily be carried along on trips.

The left half of the front panel is taken up by the speaker with its flat design. Most of the right half of the front panel is taken up by the dial window with the vertical band spread dials for the 75, 49, 31, 25 and 19 shortwave bands and auxiliary dials for mediumwave and FM printed directly on the cabinet. Below the dial window are the range keys for short- and mediumwave and the FM boradcast band; a slide switch below the corresponding dials selects one of the 5 shortwave bands. This arrangement was later copied from Sony in numerous travel portables; the analogue small travel portables from the discount shop can still be operated in the same way as the original ICF-7600.

In the middle between the speaker and the frequency dials are the slider volume control and a switchable tone control; in contrast, the later Grundig sets, for example, had a real tone control.

The tuning knob on the right face of the set has no backlash, and the Sony set achieves a tuning accuracy of better than 25 kHz in the bands.

On the left face of the set there is a 6 V power supply socket and earphone tape jacks. At the rear, the 4 UM-3 mignon cells are inserted.

The operation is without any difficulties: After the radio is switched on by pressing the SW key, the desired shortwave band is selected with the slide switch and the radio can be tuned. In the 49 m band, 50 kHz takes up 8 mm, so theset can be tuned to 10 kHz, in the 19 m band 100 kHz are covered on 8 mm, so the dial accuracy in this band is inferior. When the radio was developed, the technology was an innovation: apart from commercial sets, only the heavy sets from Sonys CRF series which had a turret tuner, the Grundig Satellit receivers or the Nordmende Galaxy sets offered a reasonable dial accuracy. In domestic radios which covered shortwaves, usually several shortwave bands were covered in one range over a few millimeters with a correspondingly poor accuracy.

Technically, the single conversion superhet has some weaknesses, mirror signals of high power stations can appear within the broadcast bands, the dynamic range is moderate. However, Sony has demonstrated what was possible in the realisation of a miniature single conversion superhet and Sony has solved this task brilliantly.

Today, I consider the ICF-7600 or its international variant ICF-7600W to be a collector's item. On the second-hand market, similar sets with double conversion technology and also simple PLL synthesis radios can be purchased for the same price on the used market.

Technical principle

Single conversion superhet, analogue.

Components

The set is equipped with semiconductors.

Technical documentation

Development

Further information

en/icf-7600.txt · Zuletzt geändert: 2021/04/22 22:07 von mb