'Clock radios' etc

[muzzer]

I'm in the market for a new one. I see there are several all-singing all-dancing machines that do everything short of bringing you a cup of tea...

Does anyone have any recommendations?

I have a fairly good idea what I'm going to buy but am interested to hear of others' experiences.

Thank you.

[Old Grumpy]

Depends what you want from it, obviously, but this comes out well in a Radio Listener's Guide review:

http://www.pure.com/product/twilight-vl-61504/

We do have one and it is quite good in the dark mornings. The sound quality is good too. Controls are a little fiddly, but OK when you get used to them.

OG

[Don Petter]

Depends what you want from it, obviously, but this comes out well in a Radio Listener's Guide review:

http://www.pure.com/product/twilight-vl-61504/

We do have one and it is quite good in the dark mornings. The sound quality is good too. Controls are a little fiddly, but OK when you get used to them.

OG

I have had a Pure Highway in the car for quite a while now, and it works very well, so I would also recommend the make.

Not sure about that visual design though! Ugh! (And how do you pile up your bedside reading books on the top of it?)

[Paul Sherratt]

Looking at that Pure radio, Basil Fawlty's observation to matron spring to mind.

I have a Pure radio with fairly large digital readout. Can't tell if says 5 or 6 with ocular aids. We rely on a cheap thing which has a cock crowing manically complete with Chinese voice. " Seeks Wan " but what can you expect for £15 ?

[muzzer]

I have a Pure Chronos with CD - that's what I'm replacing. The CD player always squeaked and conked out a few months ago. have gone - deep breath - for a roberts 63i thru river ppl marketplace at hefty discount - we shall see.

[Nick Armstrong]

Pure ...I would also recommend the make.

So would I. As mentioned here before, a Pure DAB radio (one of 2 in the house) is the bedside standby.

But a key element for me is the ability to timer-record to a small 'SD' memory card (they cost about £6 a pair), each of which takes about 20 hours of music. Given the lamentable state of morning R3 programming, having concerts, TTN programmes (and Radio 4extra classics like 'Round the Horne') recorded onto these cards means that untoward 'live' radio can be avoided and preferred programmes selected at any time.

However - the model I have (the Evoke-3) has been discontinued and I am on the lookout for a substitute with a similar SD-timer record facility. A radio which had that and both DAB and Internet Radio would be my ideal, but I am not aware that such a thing exists - amazingly.

[Anna]

I have an alarm clock, when it goes off I hit the on button on the Roberts Radio and the snooze on the clock.
Simple, but effective. And cheap.

[teamsaint]

So would I. As mentioned here before, a Pure DAB radio (one of 2 in the house) is the bedside standby.

But a key element for me is the ability to timer-record to a small 'SD' memory card (they cost about £6 a pair), each of which takes about 20 hours of music. Given the lamentable state of morning R3 programming, having concerts, TTN programmes (and Radio 4extra classics like 'Round the Horne') recorded onto these cards means that untoward 'live' radio can be avoided and preferred programmes selected at any time.

However - the model I have (the Evoke-3) has been discontinued and I am on the lookout for a substitute with a similar SD-timer record facility. A radio which had that and both DAB and Internet Radio would be my ideal, but I am not aware that such a thing exists - amazingly.

Can you let us know when you have found such a thing Cals?

I would love to be able to record TTN, for instance, and then listen over the corn flakes, or in the motor.
poop poop !!


(incidentally, how do you select programmes off the card? is there a read out and , or do you transfer to a laptop or something. Basically, could you be more specific , really ? thanks.)

I use a 1986 model casio watch which I bought for £1.50 from a garage which wakes me up with "When the Saints go Marching in! .


No I don't actually, but i did once have such a thing, and lent it to a pompey supporting mate (who needed it to time a game he was refereeing) for a week. he didn't know what alarm I had set. Much hilarity ensued.

[Nick Armstrong]

Basically, could you be more specific , really ? thanks.

I shall make it my weekend mission, if I may!

Just attempting to get the **** out of Dodge!

[teamsaint]

I shall make it my weekend mission, if I may!

Just attempting to get the **** out of Dodge!

Thanks Mr Techno. Brilliant .

leave the work, It'll be there monday.

Does this do it all?

http://www.homevisionuk.com/acatalog/Roberts_Radio_Stream_63i_CD_USB_SD_DAB_FM_RDS_Internet_radio_with_ipod_dock.html

[Nick Armstrong]

Does this do it all?
http://www.homevisionuk.com/acatalog...ipod_dock.html

It would appear to... I'd like to hear the sound it makes. It seems to be 2 years or so old... what surprises me is that there aren't more... Perhaps most people don't want it all...

My discontinued Evoke-3 looks like this:



You see that slot at the bottom in the centre? The SD card goes in there. The red button above allows you to record instantly whatever's playing at the moment. Ditto, the red button on the v useful remote:



If you switch on the radio and you don't like what's playing, the button on the set to the right of 'record' enables you to go to the SD card (also FM and MW which I never use); on the remote, you just hit the little button marked 'SD'.

The tracks on the SD card are just listed in date order so you have to spool through using the ^ etc etc controls. (My only gripe, but I don't know how technically possible this is, would be that when you go back to a part-listened track, it starts from the beginning - would be so good if it could go back straight to where you'd left off, as with podcasts or the PVR under the telly).

The tracks recorded to the SD card are MP2 format, but it also plays MP3. If there's a track recorded off the radio that I want to put on my computer/iPod, I have a USB adaptor (it came free with a 4-pack of SD cards) that allows me to connect an SD card to my computer, copy over the track I want to iTunes, and convert it to MP3 (there's a one-click option on iTunes); likewise, if there's something on my computer I want to have on the bedside radio, I can copy and MP3 track onto the SD card, and it'll play when slotted back into the Evoke-3.

I find it suits me as a system

The timer system works well - you can set it manually, for one record, or same time each week, or each day, or each weekday, or each weekend day... (or you can set it from the EPG display which gives all progs a week ahead)

And within the limits of what one wants in the bedroom (ditto kitchen - there's a second one in there), the sound is ideal - crisp, rich, balanced.

[muzzer]

I wanted to be able to play CDs so I may have sacrificed some functionality but if you go for something with internet radio then I think you will also get in effect an iplayer function - when you tune to R3 for instance you get a choice of programmes not just what's playing live. And will then be able to get TTN later that day.

At first look this Roberts is great, but it is large - about the size of a shoebox - and the font of the display is not especially new. It's found my NAS drive via ethernet. The issue there is the Twonky interface and file structure, but nobody seems to have fixed that satisfactorily.............The sound is very full and at first blush I would recommend it highly. As I said earlier, I went for what is clearly a 'return' to a m a z o n, which just means someone ordered it by mistake. The box had been opened but it's else pristine. 30% off list price. ;)

[Bryn]

Caliban, I too have a Pure Evoke III, plus a Bug and BugToo. I only very rarely use any of them to save to SD card these days. The iPlayer's HD Sound offering is just so much higher quality. However, I would suggest that rather than converting the mp2s to mp3 (with consequent loss of audio quality due to the very different encoding regimes used by mp2 and mp3) you convert to Apple lossless and put up with the greater file size in order to maintain what audio quality mp2 has to offer.

[Nick Armstrong]

Ah! You've acquired the one teamsaint mentioned, in the interval since your first post yesterday? Quick work!

....if you go for something with internet radio then I think you will
also get in effect an iplayer function - when you tune to R3 for instance you get a choice of programmes not just what's playing live. And will then be able to get TTN later that day.

Good point... hadn't thought of that... But I'd still want the ability to retain recordings. I still have the Bolivar / Dudamel concerts, which I attended in the RFH, and which were subsequently broadcast on Classic FM: recording them to SD card, and thence putting them into iTunes and via the MP3 conversion onto my iPod and hard drive, has provided a lot of enjoyment since then, in the car, abroad etc etc.

[Nick Armstrong]

Caliban, I too have a Pure Evoke III, plus a Bug and BugToo. I only very rarely use any of them to save to SD card these days. The iPlayer's HD Sound offering is just so much higher quality. However, I would suggest that rather than converting the mp2s to mp3 (with consequent loss of audio quality due to the very different encoding regimes used by mp2 and mp3) you convert to Apple lossless and put up with the greater file size in order to maintain what audio quality mp2 has to offer.

That is very interesting Bryn - posted as I was working on the last post (inc. interruptions!).

Do you (using Macs) have any way of retaining a permanent copy of iPlayer HD offerings? (Perhaps we should be in touch offline ).

I must explore what you say about Apple lossless. I go for MP3 because I am a technical ignoramus, and also because in the contexts in which I use them, the MP3 files seem perfectly OK from a quality point of view (on the move, in the car etc etc). Is Apple lossless denoted by the suffix .m4a?