AEG E800/2

Thanks to a fellow ham radio operator here's the first report on the AEG E800/2 on the internet. He gave me his E800/2 for testing for 2 weeks. At this point, many thanks to Paul, HB9MFD.

Virtually nothing is known about this professional receiver. According to my knowledge it was offered on Ebay only once. And that's it!

The E800/2 is based on the well known and sought after E1800 receiver series. So why an E800/2? For some simple monitoring tasks, such as e.g. the interception of voice communications, the E1800 was simply too expensive. Not every agency was ready to spend around 50'000DM for such a device in those days. Considering that a monitoring site was using several, perhaps dozens of these receivers, one can imagine the tremendous cost it must have caused. That was the reason why the E800/2 was developed. A slimmed-down version of the E1800, so to speak. The E800/2 cost around 32'000DM. It is not constructed in a modular fashion, so it weighs only about half of the E1800/3. It consists of only two large circuit boards, a linear power supply, and a control unit which is bolted to the front panel. This corresponds to the conventional construction of a amateur radio receiver. Also some electronic downgrades were performed which were not important for use. For example a slower synthesizer because the E800/2 was not used for direction finding. Also the number of control elements was reduced. The RF gain control and the BFO control have been omitted. The control of these functions is taken over by a "magnetic snap" VFO tuning knob.
All this could make you believe that the savings lead to a reduced reception performance. But far from it! The reception performance is nearly identical to the E1800/3! The large signal handling capability still had to be very good because the E800/2 was used in large transmitting / receiving stations.

The E800/2 is very easy to use. Actually, almost the same as the E1800/3. Like its big brother, the E800/2 has no tools on board to fight noise. The reception quality is nearly the same as for the E1800/3 System. On usual SWL antennas the E800/2 works without any problems. Using  manual gain control will be of advantage. It will reduce noise and make listening more enjoyable. Used like that the E800/2 delivers great audio! One point should be mentioned here. The AGC of the E800/2 is more suitable for voice reception than the E1800/3! It is not as fast as the E1800/3.
All in all a great receiver! The E800/2 is more suitable for the SWL compared to the E1800/3. But only in one regard! The repairability! It is built like an amateur radio receiver and much easier to repair. Unfortunately, the problem is the availability of parts. Should the receiver fail, you will have similar problems as with theE1800/3.

My tip: professional receivers are for professionals :-)

posted 18.05.2014

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