Which low price personal radios receive ACTUAL Stereo FM

...as opposed to "two speaker mono" in headphones?

I'm seeing the Sangean DT-180, which is perfect-just more expensive than I was hoping to find.

I pulled the trigger on a similar one on Aliexpress and they did that bait and switch thing where they send you a similar thing that's in the same ad and then tell you to ship it back at your expense, which costs more than the widgetoid's purchase price. The ad said STEREO in the listing and they (I don't think they don't know the difference for a Manhattan minute) said it was stereo when you plugged the headphones in. Trust me, it's NOT FM Multiplex stereo or anything remotely like it. It's flat out "no L-R, R-L in the Edwin Howard Armstrong sense of the term stereo" MONO. Paypal made my purchase good, but I have no interest in repeating the same mistake.

TIA, everyone...

 

They sold out of the one I actually ordered, and just substituted what they had. I checked the order stats, btw. Caveat Emptor, at least for potential buyers in my hemisphere.

 

There are plenty of vintage ones to choose from
http://stereo2go.com/forums/threads/walkman-and-other-personal-headphone-radios.3173/
I'm actually using the Philips I bought for £2 to listen to "Sounds of the 80s" as I type.
Out of the dozen or so I have it is still my favourite with great reception and sound.

Looking at more recent equipment many of the Sony Walkman MP3 players include an FM stereo radio which in my experience works pretty well.

 

Thanks, Longman. I'll peruse the thread. The ones I'm seeing on ebay (okay, EVERYTHING I'm seeing on eBay) now looks pretty hyper-inflated. Good if you have a collection already, bad if you don't. I gave away a number of Walkmen cassette machines (one Sports model I wish I'd kept now that I've learned to change belts on them) that had good FM sections in them. The one cassette machine with FM that I have now (an Aiwa HS-J415) is exhibiting some very weird behavior. On some stations it sounds great. On others, the demodulation sounds off, where the Stereo carrier is too loud compared to the mono signal. Adjustments aren't changing much for better or for worse. It's a bit of a mystery. I have an FM signal generator and when I send signals through it it seems fine. But OTA, it's a little wonky. The cassette section sounds good. Simpler to just buy a radio, I think.

 

OT self-hijack:
I don't have a lot of experience with Philips electronics (although I was friends with a hi-fi dealer back in the '80s who advocated for it a great deal), but I recently pulled the trigger on a couple of pairs of Philips X2HR headphones and they're, to my ears, among the very best cans I've ever heard.
I was so knocked out I bought a second pair. I mean SERIOUSLY, the Bass is nearly dead on perfect, the mids aren't "shouty" and the highs are extended. It's my current favorite out a pretty fair sized collection of favorites. Every time I put them on I think of my friend, the audio dealer from
my college days in the '70s/'80s. He'd be glad I finally came around. RIP, Mr. Badea. : - )

 

How much would shipping be for you on something like this ?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/194788513019
Many of the ones I have bought have been around that price or more, the irony being that the cheapest is my favourite.

p.s. Most of my Walkmans have radios in as well. The most likely problem in a used one is melted belts as opposed to non working electronics.

 

I'll check it out, thanks! Looks like shipping is about $5.00 USD. I was hoping to find one that also has AM, though

 

There were plenty of those for similar prices if you don't mind a scuffed body or paying a little bit more.
Also I wasn't even looking at auctions where you might get. a bargain.

This is my definition of expensive
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/334615320264
But tempting

I'm wondering if someone is trying to flip a unit that went for £20 in an auction a few months ago.
One of those "I wished I'd seen that" things in the eBay completed listings.

 

I see the Sangean DT-180 is now on sale at amazon for $37, which doesn't seem like a crazy-high price. Nobody makes better radios than Sangean right now. They are the SONY of the 2000's. They also manufacture for C. Crane. My Sangean D7 is used every DAY for the past 20 years! I have no doubt that this radio is well worth $37 !!

Second, I'll share my favorite secrets about SONY Walkmans with you. The first design-for manufacturability walkmans were the WM-F31/WM-F41, WM-32/42, WM-F32/F42, WM-33/F42, etc. These 6 walkman numbers (31-33 for cassette-only, F31-F33 for am/fm cassette, plus the 40-series was identical with slightly different badging) were the first design-for manufacturability walkmans. They are all plastic and only have 45 pieces and 3 screws - they mostly just snap together (and snap apart). You should be able to get one in the $20-$40 range on EBay, which is the roughly the original MSRP. You might need a $7 rubber band to fix the cassette mechanism (assuming its not so used/abused that the main cam is split). Consumer reports tested them in a suite of about 30 portable stereo players and the sound beat every player < $100 by all manufacturers (which is amazing!)

EBay search for these affordable high-spec walkmans

This product was kind of a miracle in the late 1980's, 1985-1990, great am/fm stereo (with stereo indicator light), great cassette, and about HALF THE COST OF all other walkmans at the time, and far more reliable. It was the first SONY walkman to sell in a blister pack at drug stores, all previous ones had the Apple unboxing experience (where do you think Steve Jobs got his ideas about unboxing experiences?) I bought a WM-F41 for each room of the house and hooked them up to $50-$80 computer speakers to make am/fm/stereos wherever I wanted them for < $100!!

 

Thanks, systembuilder. I happened across a used DT-180 and it seems to fit the bill just fine. I'm retired, so I have to watch my pennies now more than ever. The initial reason for this thread was to see if there was anything on Aliexpress that was a good known quantity. Their platform is so riddled with misleading links and bait/switch cart add options (so what you think you're buying isn't what you thought and you don't discover it until it shows up and then you get DK'ed by the platform) that I'm writing them off. I found a couple of sellers that are pretty decent with automatic wristwatches, but when it comes to electronics, at least from my place on the planet, I'm done with them as a purchase option. But that said, U.S. eBay isn't far behind. The Internet is now 100% retail, 100% of the time. Inflation's made it worse, but it's been heading that way for a while. The worst example of all is paying more than original MSRP for LP's that have been serially abused and mortally wounded by their various, previous owners. But thanks again for your kind post, I do very much appreciate everyone's helpful advice!

 

You can get this stereo radio with a built in speaker.
I can say the sound is amazing from both the speaker and headphones.
Its also a great world SW radio. Highly recommended.
It is $44 with a coupon now on Amazon.