Another clock radio bargain

borosteve_2

I believe the comments were directed towards me. I
didn't read the original post correctly and thought
it contained a link to ebay for what i presumed was
o.p's radio they were trying to sell. Thats why
they got a bit upset I think. SORRY again! though Im
less sure what "post count" is about? There's no
prizes awarded for more posts as far as I know???

Roger_Rampant

As well as being part of the Roberts 'Set For Life' range, it is also a dual alarm device (which I need), a feature you tend not to find on cheaper units.

I have never heard of this company, and it just looks like any other cheap crappy clock radio to me. My first reaction was "why on earth would anyone pay that much for a cheap-looking crappy clock radio like that?", there was nothing in the original post telling us why this manufacturer or this clock was special. If it was Pure DAB maybe, or something I've actually heard about before that commands a premium price, fair enough. It doesn't look like a designer radio to me...

But I'm happy that you found what you consider to be a bargain, and I'm grateful that you took the time to share it. As 4 people have said thanks for you posting it, presumably some others were more appreciative of what a bargain it was than I was

bluenose1

I bought one of these for my son at Christmas. Much better than other clock radios in that price range. n

bluenose1

I bought one of these for my son at Christmas. Much better than other clock radios in that price range. No fiddly tuning in as automatically displays the time when turned on. Also with dual timer the alarm can be set for a different time - handy for the weekend lie in.
Roberts is an excellent make.

Don't know whether it is just me but I have an intempo dab radio and I never seem to get agood quality reception on dab. I mostly listen to FM.

consumermonkey

As I said in previous posting, ROBERTS is a top radio manufacturer far far better than most of the brands you see on the newspapers every day.

They are often not mentioned because usually they are quite expensive. Always on sale on posher department stores. However with the advent of the DAB's and the £100+ radios they once needed to listen to them, People are more used to paying a little more for something (Just like hoovers before they went dyson - since dyson introduced his £100+ cleaner, all the cleaners are ridiculously expensive)

s-j-cooper_2

I can't believe people have never heard of Roberts! They have also won awards for their DAB radios recently.

Lütz_Pangaloo

Well postie brought it at 3:30pm yesterday according to the card he left - nobody home then so I've just been to the post office to collect it; not bad delivery on their 5 day service.

First impressions are good - when you plug it into the mains it scrolls through to the correct time from 12:00, then does the same with the date and year. I thought it got it's time signal from Rugby (it's got a little 'AutoSet' icon with a radio dish on the front), but it looks like the time is set in the factory and maintained by the backup battery - it's a big CR2032 button cell with an estimated life of 5 years (mine has '06' printed on it). There is the provision to set it manually - I gave it a tweak (it was a couple of minutes slow). The built in calendar must be pretty sophisticated - it will supposedly auto adjust for British winter/summer time too.

The radio was the biggest shock - at first I had trouble tuning it, the FM scale seemed wrong. Then I realised it was pulling in about twice as many stations as the Sony it replaces! Even the slightest nudge of the tuning wheel seemed to find a different station, but when you get hold of the one you want, there's no interference. The aerial is just the standard length of wire, but there's virtually no hiss present on FM. I haven't tried AM yet - again, it's a pity LW is missing.

I've always regarded Sony as a good brand, and only ever bought their clock radios, but they have an irritating habit of not fitting them with a battery backup and I got fed up with having to reset everything if the power went off (the last one had a digital tuner, and that lost all it's presets too). So I chose the Roberts specifically for what they call it's 'Set For Life' feature, but it's been a nice surprise to find the radio performance is much better than the Sony too.

Best £11.98 I've spent in a while. If the offer is still on get yourself one.

BustaUK

Yea, i too thought that the "set for life" feature and the "Auto set/radio dish" icon meant it got its time settings from the atomic clock broadcast, so was initially disappointed with it as that was one of the main deciding things that persuaded me to buy it. Kinda misleading from my point of view.

Other than that, the rest of the device and the price makes up for it, it has great radio reception and the sound quality is reasonable too for this kind of device. As is the dual weekday/weekend alarm settings, very useful, alltho a 'Saturday only' weekend alarm mode would have been nice too.

All in all, it's a very good quality item and I'm sure it'll serve its purpose well into the future.

Regards

Lütz_Pangaloo

BustaUK wrote: »

Yea, i too thought that the "set for life" feature and the "Auto set/radio dish" icon meant it got its time settings from the atomic clock broadcast, so was initially disappointed with it as that was one of the main deciding things that persuaded me to buy it. Kinda misleading from my point of view.

Yes, I was also quite taken with the idea of having a 'radio controlled' clock (I've never had one) but it seems they can be problematic if reception is poor. I read a post by one chap who has a few and now has to take them into his attic to set them, because Rugby was switched off at the end of March and the signal is now broadcast from Anthorn instead!

So I'm quite glad the Roberts is standalone wrt time.

simate

Lütz_Pangaloo wrote: »

Yes, I was also quite taken with the idea of having a 'radio controlled' clock (I've never had one) but it seems they can be problematic if reception is poor. I read a post by one chap who has a few and now has to take them into his attic to set them, because Rugby was switched off at the end of March and the signal is now broadcast from Anthorn instead!

So I'm quite glad the Roberts is standalone wrt time.

Sounds good lol. Considering they are meant to be a good make they don't sound all that, best £11.98 I saved in a while lol.