Rating: 
Summary: If You're Serious About Shortwave, This Is The One For You.
Review: The Grundig Satellit 800 combines top-notch performance with ease of use, and a price that can't be beat. A superb performer on shortwave, this radio will allow you to listen to all of the major shortwave stations, and also bring in many of the smaller, lower-powered, and harder-to-hear stations. This unit has superb audio, good sensitivity, and mulitple selectivity settings. Another plus is that the radio is easy for beginners to figure out, yet has enough features (memory presets, timers, scanning functions) for fussy listeners like me. Nice big digital display and controls, too. Though nominally a portable, it's one big, butch radio: as big as a microwave oven and absolutely eats batteries. You'll want a permanent place in your home for it, and mostly run it off A/C power. If you live anywhere other than the eastern part of North America or Europe, you will need to put up an external antenna. It's well worth it, though; with a proper antenna this radio will bring you the world. The FM tuner is very good; mediumwave AM performance is also better than average, although there are other models you should consider if long-distance AM is your primary interest. Airband reception is only fair; I don't know why it's a feature of this radio. The Sat 800 did have some quality control problems in the beginning (2000) those seem to be resolved now. For this price, you will not find a better performer on shortwave. If you spend any time at all tuning the shortwave bands, this is your radio.
Rating:
Summary: Great Shortwave Performer
Review: This is a very good shortwave receiver but somewhat difficult to review since it may be viewed differently depending on the user--where they live, primary usage, etc. If you're really only interested in AM or FM, I'd consider it way too expensive. FM reception is incredible but it's not stereo--it's mono unless you plug in stereo headphones. It's not particularly good for pulling in distant AM signals--without any external antenna, my GE Superadio pulls them in just as well (although not any better). However, I bought it primarily for shortwave and it just flat out shines compared to the portables I've used.
It is designed to use either the supplied whip antenna or may be hooked to external antennas. I have only used the whip so I cannot comment on external antennas. The reception out of the box with the whip is the best I've encountered and I live in the shortwave challenged American West. (Unlike Eastern USA, we have trouble pulling all but the most robust signals in the West.) Weak signal sensitivity is excellent. The synchronous selectable sideband (which I've not had before and now I wouldn't waste money on a radio without it), adjustable bandwidth, AGC, and bass/treble controls really allow you to "clean up" the signals and the large speaker and included headphones provide very good audio--it's not nearly as tiring to listen to as those tiny shortwave portables. (Ditto on AM.) Also, I should note that I live in a framed wood house--shortwave is tougher to pick up in brick or metal buildings.
The air band and SSB both work well but I haven't listened to them much since my interest is primarily AM/FM/Shortwave. However, if you're interested in airport traffic or hams, it performs very well.
The controls work very well--ergonomically correct and easy to use even with my big hands and fingers. Solid craftsmanship and workmanship on my unit--no slopping fittings or loose knobs.
Some drawbacks: it's more a tabletop than a portable. (Think two shoeboxes end-to-end, filled with rocks--that's the size and weight.) I don't like the "outboard" transformer brick that runs the AC power--would have preferred it built into the radio. And it does not have "station seek" or scanning feature which even the cheapest portables have and are particularily useful for shortwave. (It will scan the settings put into the memory--memory holds 70 settings.) These are relatively minor quibbles--all in all, it is an excellent radio.
One final note: I was somewhat reluctant to order from Amazon because I was worried they wouldn't package it well for shipping. (In the past, I've had some articles arrive without adequate packing.) Not a problem--the radio retail carton was enclosed in heavy corrugated shipping carton wrapped with plastic bands and that whole package was enclosed in another shipping carton with plenty of "air pillows" all the way around. Everything arrived in excellent condition.
Rating:
Summary: Nearly Perfect
Review: What you have here is a general-coverage shortwave receiver that approaches, or perhaps equals, the performance of communications receivers costing twice as much or more.
The 800 meets the dictionary definition of portable, because it has built-in antennas and can run off its internal D-cells. But the truth is, it's luggage-sized. It's also hard on batteries. Feel free to lug it out to the back yard on a summer evening, but don't think you're going to be operating it like a real portable.
In fact, you might be cheating yourself if you did. It works well using its own built-in antennas. The fact that the FM-Shortwave telescoping whip is about the biggest, beefiest one I've seen no doubt helps here. AM performance on the internal antenna is, ehhh, OK I guess; not as good as the GE Superadio that costs a tenth as much. But this set is designed to be able to use, really use, a good external antenna. It really lights up when you do, on AM as well as on shortwave.
Sound quality is good, and there are jacks for an external speaker if you want to go really high fidelity. The controls are large and easy to operate. (With a radio this hyooooooge it would be a crime if they weren't!) It has three bandwidths. The filters seem well-chosen and act like they're good quality. The synchronous detection, which lets you lock in on one sideband or the other of a shortwave signal instead of the whole signal, is wonderful for avoiding interference from adjacent, strong signals; just pick the sideband away from the interfering signal and hear its interference drop away. Often right down to none.
I've had mine for a couple years now, I think, and if anything I like it better now than I did when I got it. I wish they'd decided to make it a bit smaller (and they could have, since the Drake SW-8 upon which the Satellit 800 was based appears to have been less than half as big). But that's not enough to make me lose any of my fondness for this fine radio.
Rating:
Summary: Grundig Satelitt 800
Review: When I first obtained this radio I was skeptical based on its shakey start (the first batch of units had problems). I am a fussy customer and I have a fascination with portable high quality radios. I also own a Satelitt 700. The sound on the 800 is a little fuller than the 700. The 800 is huge, and heavy, and not, truly portable. The manual tuner can be used without muting the amplifier which is very helpful on SW. The FM tuner pull in stations from out of my market area and sounds great for a radio. The volume can be turned up almost all of the way without distorting the speaker. The FM sound stacks up with any other radio I own, including two Panasonics with huge 6 1/2" speakers.
The tuner is very easy to program and use. Stations are just a push of a button away. Although this radio is manufactured in China, it is of very high build quality. Remember when transistor radios were first built in Japan and we-all questioned that? Well, the Chinese are building good stuff! I truly enjoy listening to this radio.
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