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Ge transistor radio vintage12/26/2023 ![]() ![]() Removing the back cover was easy…two screws. If you spend some time on eBay you will learn which pictures are truly revealing and which are not. Sadly many eBay photos are less revealing than I would like but that is the nature of the hobby. Reveal the true cosmetics of this unit at all, while my photo was designed to reveal its flaws. Sometimes on eBay even a bad deal can be rectified if you keep a cool head).Īlso notice the eBay photo of my P780D compared with my photo. I was happy with that as I wanted to keep this radio. When I explained what had happened he graciously refunded more than half of what I had paid. I contacted him and I believed him that the radio worked before he shipped it. (Incidentally, the seller was an antiques guy with over 3000 transactions and a very high Positive Rating. Some quick continuity tests revealed three broken traces and when I repaired them (see pictures) the set worked normally. It took me a while to find the cause…a hairline crack on the PCB. But when it arrived it was jammed into a too-small box with no padding around its sides, and although the cosmetics were undamaged, the radio was dead as a doornail when I put batteries in it. It was described as looking almost new and working well. I received a very nice looking “A” version. It also re-enforced my opinions about buying vintage equipment from eBay…expect less than what the description says or you may be disappointed. Incidentally, all four I have bought have been represented as working well and looking great, but all four fell far short of that mark when received – they all needed to be reconditioned or at least repaired before I could judge their true capabilities. Needless to say working on four P780′s has been quite a learning experience. ![]() At its rated current consumption of 25 milliamps (which is playing at a medium volume) a modern set of 6 Alkaline cells will power it for 820 hours! This is one heavy radio, especially when loaded with 6 D cells. Its huge chrome grille reminded me of the cars of that year, in particular our Oldsmobile Super 88. The P780 has a striking physical appearance…something in it brought me back to 1958. I was able to find some at decent prices on eBay and a few weeks later I had my four. I figured if I went through four P780′s I’d likely learn a lot more than from just one. I already had owned the “H” for over a year but decided to get some of the other versions for this report. Also note the audio driver and output transformers are both changed to new values in the H model. It follows the same general topology but with updated components and the additional transistor. A redesigned audio output stage is the major electronic revision. H versions added a 9th transistor…a bias regulator in the output stage. It would appear there were only three major PCB designs, one for models A/B, one for C – E, and one for the H. I eventually obtained several P780′s, and later additional samples of each. I’ll mention some of the differences as I go along. There were primarily cosmetic redesigns later with the name “Musaphonic” on the front panel in models of the P783 and P784 series which are nearly identical to the P780H. The P780 series includes suffixes A, B, C, D, E, and H. I will tell you right here that they absolutely succeeded. GE’s stated goal with the P780 was to design a full-size no-compromise transistor radio that would equal a tube radio’s performance in every area yet still be portable. ![]() Yes, “transistors” were cool and lots of fun but they didn’t sound nearly as good as a typical “All American Five” tube radio nor did they pull stations in as well. General Electric designed the P780 in 1958 at a time when tiny transistor radios were proliferating but their performance was generally well below what we had come to expect from tube radios of the day. This interested me as the original GE SR (aka GR SRI) is one of my reference portable AM radios against which all others are judged in terms of their ability to bring in weak AM stations with low noise and good sound. I did some research and found that some radio buffs refer to it as a predecessor to the GE Superadios. A few years ago I discovered a vintage AM radio model P780 made by General Electric. ![]()
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