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Vintage Radio (domestic) Domestic vintage radio (wireless) receivers only.

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Old 18th Apr 2021, 10:08 pm   #21
Paul_RK
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Default Re: Radio transistor count

Quote:
Originally Posted by Al (astral highway) View Post
Hacker Sovereign, by contrast (to develop my earlier point, post #8) has 17 transistors
Yes - not just from the audio amplifier's relative complexity, but the FM and MW/LW tuner and IF sections are entirely separate using different sets of components. 18 transistors in the Sovereign III, and 14 in the Black Knight which is the same radio less the AM bands: by the early '70s when these sets appeared there wouldn't have been thought enough of a market to justify an AM-only version like the previous generation's RP35 Herald.

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Old 19th Apr 2021, 10:04 am   #22
Hybrid tellies
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Default Re: Radio transistor count

Back in the 1960's A lot of the cheapy sets from the far east were the biggest culprits of over inflating the transistor count.

My Binatone Mustang a small 2 waveband AM radio from 1970 claims it uses 9 or 10 transistors. It is actually a short superhet which uses 6 active transistors with the extra transistors used as diodes in the over complicated and rather poor and appalling totem pole output stage. A further transistor with one leg chopped off is used as a detector diode.

I think was a a rather common selling ploy, or con, used by many different companies back in the day.
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Old 20th Apr 2021, 8:39 pm   #23
G6Tanuki
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Default Re: Radio transistor count

Wiring a less-than-spectacularly-performing transistor as a diode was not unusual; it could be used either as a diode-detector or as a temperature-sensing element in the bias-network of a push-pull audio output stage.

As an example, see http://www.wylie.org.uk/technology/s.../Newmarket.htm

Newmarket never manufactured any diodes, so they strapped the legs of a transistor together and called it a NKT155 diode!

I guess manufacturers using such diode-strapped transistors could legitimately claim them in the transistor-count they advertised on the front of the case.
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Old 21st Apr 2021, 1:11 pm   #24
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Default Re: Radio transistor count

When l was a kid in the 1970's we all had the generic cheap transistor radios that you could buy from the market traders for £2.99

They all looked the same, with many different names such as "Mohan" and "Geeta"

Some had five transistors and some had six. The six transistor ones were considered "better" but l've got a five transistor one in my collection and it performs surprisingly well, at least as well as any other cheap pocket radio of the era, in fact it's better than some of the "good" pocket radios in my collection.
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