Hello,
Though I don't have much to compare my (recently acquired) PL-880 against, the last month of operating it has exceeded my expectations and I consider it money well spent. The FM is excellent, AM isn't so bad and now that I've built a milk crate tuned loop to supplement it is fantastic, and on shortwave it seems sensitive enough. The autoscanning is handy, though I find it overlooks a bunch of stations and I've taken to spinning the dial. People complain about the sync function: I've never used sync before the PL-880, and while I've found it provides some bogus glitchy output on very unstable transmissions, it has made listening more comfortable for those signals with medium-strength and a bit of noise. The SSB is easy to use as well.
My other two radios prior to acquiring the PL-880 are a KX3 and GP-5 SSB. Once I started into SWL in earnest, I found the GP-5 was easier to use but easily overloaded, whereas the KX3 allows for top-tier control (EQ, filtering, noise blanker and noise reduction) but isn't quite as ergonomic to carry around and stick to the end of a wire. And it doesn't have FM, or built-in AM antenna, or any antenna for that matter. Also, the speakers on both are not very good for enjoyable listening.
I find the PL-880 fits a niche between them both, and am impressed with the fidelity from the speaker.
The major complaint I've seen from others and agree with is the exceedingly slow attack time on the AGC. While it doesn't bother me so much on AM SW, listening to SSB chatter becomes a chore with the constant jackhammering at the beginning of sentences.
Since I've received the PL-880 I've found the magic of radio I've been missing since my 80's childhood, and have been staying up later than I should to DX AM and scan the SW bands. I unreservedly recommend it.