SIHUADON R108 Portable Radio AM FM SW LW Airband Full Band DSP Radio Battery Operated with Headphone Antenna Jack Sleep Time and Alarm Clock 500 Memory Preset for Parents by RADIWOW (Black)

This (R-108) is a small pocket radio but punches well above its weight class. I will be comparing it against my RadioShack DX 375 and my Sangean 818. Sensitivity and Selectivity is measurably better than the DX-375, which is well traveled older radio, probably a $50.00 class radio back in the 80’s. The Sangean is a high end SSB all band SW radio with better than most in class selectivity and rejection, with narrow filters and a good front end for receiving. I like the audio on all bands and its band width is adjustable on MW and SW. It has squelch too. The air band actually is useful and works. 500 memories are great and they are divided between the bands. The buttons are good and the tiny radio even has rubber pads to keep it in place on slick surfaces. Scanning frequencies will take practice and only use the Auto Tune System once per band, as it will erase previous stored memory. This is documented in the well written instructions. ** Hidden preset scan function for SW was found by experimenting. When in a SW band press the 0 (zero) button to jump to the next higher SW international band. Once there press and hold the up arrow button to begin scanning through all the frequencies allocated to SW stations. This is a great time saver and the radio is fairly fast. This is a quality radio, not a scanner and I have enjoyed getting to know it and listening to some far and near stations. I don’t have any need for the LW band so I have left it deactivated. I want to thank the previous detailed reviews, many from hams and SWL’ers like myself. It helped me make a purchase decision. 73, Tim

I bought this for a family member that worked for the USPS so they'd be able to listen to music during their shifts and they couldn't thank me enough for the radio; it was small enough to keep in the truck and loud enough for a radio twice its size. Battery lasts a long time after a full charge and it was super easy to use and navigate. Great product!

By 'market segment' I mean 3"x5" (index-card-sized) 1" deep AM/FM/Shortwave portable radios. By 'market segment leader' I am referring to the 'C.Crane CC Skywave,' introduced in 2014. The Sihuadon R-108 is manufactured by XHData (Dongguan XinHuaide Electronic Commerce), founded in 2015. The company currently uses XHData, Radiwow and Sihuadon as brand names. (Tecsun, also based in Dongguan, appears to be a different company.) From a shortwave-noobie shopper's perspective, there's just not a whole lot of difference between the R-108 & the Skywave: * R-108: Time is 24-hour 'military' format only. Skywave: 12-hour option and 24-hour option for time-formatting. * R-108: (1) BL-5C (a rectangular, old school Nokia phone Lithium battery), 3.7v, 1020 mAh (included). Skywave: (2) AA batteries (not included). * R-108: Micro-USB charging port. Skywave: Mini-USB charging port. * R-108: Battery run time, about 10-12 hours. Skywave: Battery run time, about 60-70 hours. * R-108: Full-sounding, robust speaker. Skywave: Tinny speaker. * R-108: Bright, orange/amber display. Skywave: Dim lime-green display. * R-108: No weather bands. Skywave: Has 7 weather bands. * R-108: No carry case or earbuds. Skywave: Carry case & earbuds included. * R-108: Shortwave range is 1711-29999 kHz. Skywave: Shortwave range is 2300-26100 kHz. * R-108: 500 total presets available. Skywave: 400 total presets available. Of course those with expertise in shortwave radios can surely list a ton of other technical differences, many of which might not even matter to beginning shortwave users. One might be more interested, however, in their comparisons in terms of gain, sensitivity & overall performance. Included accessories: 9' external wire antenna with 3.5mm jack, a 24" micro-USB charging cable, a paper Operation Manual in (pretty good) English & (1) BL-5C 3.7v 1020 mAh battery. The MAJOR COMPLAINT about the Sihuadon R-108, gauged by the statements of other reviewers, revolves around the R-108's RECHARGEABLE BATTERY. That the battery doesn't last long; reviewers reporting that it is completely drained after about 5-8 hours of use. Also that the battery trickles-down to dead pretty quickly when the radio is powered-down. Because the screen's time display stays on anyway. And reviewers report re-charging can be very slow. If the battery dies, btw, the presets will hold, but the clock time is lost. (And the time is also immediately lost when you change-out the battery.) These battery issues comprise the one-star ding. One solution, what I am doing, is to keep a couple of charged-up spare batteries at-the-ready. The BL-5C is a common size and easy to find; XHData vends its own-branded (larger-capacity) 1500 mAh version, a 2-pak, here on Amazon (B0796LK6GY) for just $9 and it has excellent reviews. And I was able to snag a REALLY cheap external BL-5C charger cradle off feeBay. Or I suppose you could just get in the habit of popping-out the battery when the radio is not in use. Either way, one would have good cause to wonder why Sihuadon did not go with AA batteries in the first place. Because in wilderness, emergency and/or survival scenarios, the ability to charge will be at a premium. There are four different brands of retractable/'reel' wire 20'+ external FM/SW antennas available here on Amazon (Kaito T-1, XHData AN-80, Sangean ANT-60, C.Crane) that all look pretty much the same. Reviewers complained about all of them, that they are nearly impossible to retract. So I stopped by Home Depot. I bought 20' of 14 gauge stranded black wire off their by-the-foot reel for $0.41/foot. Plus a 2-pack of small crimp-end alligator clips. Total cost was $11.15 before tax. I found, through another reviewer, that the Amazon-listed GLCON GL-03 Hard Carry Case (B01E70SBB8) is a perfect fit for the R-108. I bought one and it holds the radio, the 9' external antenna, the micro-USB charging cable and even the two spare XHData 1500mAh BL-5C batteries. Happy motoring!

Being an aviation enthusiast, going to my local airport and listening to air traffic control has always been on my list. This radio can tune into those air band frequencies perfectly! The built in speaker is high quality and the ability to plug into an external speaker or headphones via an aux cord is even better! As a beginner in using a radio of this caliber i was afraid it might be too complex but the included instructions are very detailed and go over everything you would need to know about using the radio and it’s many features. It can pick up frequencies from a good distance and an additional antenna can be added for better performance. I have used this radio for everything and the ability to preprogram presets makes saving my favorite frequencies easy to access. I highly recommend this radio for its value and ease of use.

This is a AM/FM/SW [shortwave] radio and good for your bug out bag or for emergency situations....bad storms, EMP attacks, massive power grid failures, simple power outages and so on. I got it and it was a bit smaller than I expected....but filled with features. It runs on a BLC-5 rechargable battery and you can charge it from the included mini-USB cord to your computer, power brick or solar generator. I ordered a couple of extra batteries and a external charger as back up. Sound quality & reception is pretty good on FM band. However, reception is very poor for AM and SW bands. This radio does come with a long wired external radio antenna and just connect it to the antenna plug on the side of this radio.....I will admit that I have not tried SW bands yet since I just received this item a few days ago and I will try it probably tonight if the weather is decent and update my review here for this radio afterwards. But overall, this little radio seems to be pretty nicely built. Prior to reading the owner's manual for this radio, I could really only turn on/off this radio, tune for stations manually and adjust the volume. Things like presetting your selected radio stations, setting the time or the alarm will for most people...require you [and myself too] to read the owner's manual before really using this portable radio. It has a small tiltable stand on the backside and long whip antenna. You can charge this radio with the mini-USB cord and connect it to either a computer/laptop, solar power brick or a solar generator to fully charge up this radio. It uses a BLC-5 rechargable battery and it's included. However, I ordered 2 extra batteries and 1 external battery charger as back up for this radio. AM and SW [Shortwave] radio reception is really awful, but FM reception and sound qualities is without a doubt very good! I'd say if you need a portable radio for power outages or real emergency situations....this would be a pretty good portable radio to get. It has a wrist strap included for easy carrying too. Despite some shortcomings with this little portable radio, I'd give it 3 out of 5 stars mostly due to it being a bit smaller than I expected, smaller buttons on the radio's front and poor AM and Shortwave [SW] reception.

I replaced telescopic antenna to a 27 inch telescopic antenna, which boosted FM performance, a weak FM station showed 2 or 3 signal to noise ratio and when I replaced the antenna to a27 inch telescopic the station jumped to 8 and 9 signal to noise ratio . this Sihuadon R108 beats the Sangean pr d4w in FM performance. This Sihuadon R108 has great crisp sounding speaker, battery life 20-24 hrs on medium- low volume, this radio is extremely tiny that is a pleasure to take anywhere, am performance was very good

Very sensitive radio. All bands work well and are crystal clear. Long battery life, easy to use and sound quality is great.

When you buy a radio device, you expect it to serve you for many years, however, I bought this little one from Amazon in October 2022 and in August 2023, after 10 months the speakers stopped sounding, I complained through Amazon to the sellers, They asked me to do some tests and they ruled that the receiver is fine but the speakers are bad and they offered me $5 to contribute to its repair, simply a shame! The device is good, it has good reception and the sound is excellent, although the battery discharges quickly after about 4 or 5 hours of use and it is a problem to recharge it so often.