DAB Radios now available at Argos (in store) for under £20, but be quick!

MSE_Martin

What's the deal?

For the first time the price of basic DAB radios (digital radios receiving many more stations with arguably higher quality) has dropped below £20.

What are the cheapest available?

(Note as the weekly email goes to 1.4m people, inclusion in it means these are likely to sell-out quickly)

• Argos, in-store £17.49. Argos has slashed the cost of its Alba TRDAB2830 radio by 50% so is now available for £17.49. It has 20 preset stations and works on the mains or batteries. It's not available online, but is in stock across most of its stores. You can check if your local store has it with Argos' reserve and collect tool.

• Asda in-store £18.33, online £25.12. Asda has a no-frills Bush Blue DAB radio for £18.99 with £6.79 delivery if you get it online. Unfortunately I have no confirmation of in-store stock levels, so call your local Asda to check.

• Currys £24.99 instore, £27.98 online. Currys has a Matsui DAB radio for £24.99 if you get it i-nstore - or add £2.99 for delivery online. Though if you reserve it online and pick it up in-store there's no delivery.

• Ebuyer portable DAB £29.68. Refurb. Ebuyer is selling a portable One refurbished DAB for £29.68 including delivery. It's portable although being refurbished means it's probably got a slight scratch or is a returned item, but eBuyer states it's as new with all manuals, updated software and a one year warranty. Plenty are in stock.

SPOTTED A CHEAPER ONE? PLEASE CLICK REPLY TO REPORT IT IN THE THREAD BELOW.

What is DAB?

Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) is the freeview equivalent for radio, with transmissions offering an arguably higher quality of radio (better than AM certainly). It also eliminates the need to manually tune a radio signal which makes it easy to find the stations you want.

Compared to listening via FM, DAB also enables double the amount of stations to be listened to for free. Unfortunately coverage isn't fully available across the UK, so first check you live in an area that'll receive digital radio before parting with your cash.

For those who have read discussions about the end of DAB and its replacement by DAB+ the global standard; don't worry. This hasn't been agreed and if it happened would take many years.

Martin

P.S. Thanks to moneysaveruk for posting the Argos top spot in another thread.

frmarcus

As always, there are genuien bargains cheaply available; but we do have to be wary of 'cheap' goods. 'Which?' reports that the Alba, above, has terrible sound quality - so it's not the bargain it seems as is to be avoided!

Lord_Gardener

We've got a DAB radio (Pure One) and it sounds great, but didn't I read somewhere that the spec was going to change and current 'radio sets' wouldn't be able to be used for the new spec in the near future?

cedge

I believe it will take years to agree a specification, carry out the necessary checks and introduce it therefore current ones are safe for now.

roddydogs

Lot of us got one for a Tenner a few week ago!

Lord_Gardener

cedge wrote: »

I believe it will take years to agree a specification, carry out the necessary checks and introduce it therefore current ones are safe for now.

I hope that's correct - I thought it was only going to be a couple of years!

stamford

roddydogs wrote: »

Lot of us got one for a Tenner a few week ago!

And it's on now and works very well !

replinco

Lord_Gardener wrote: »

We've got a DAB radio (Pure One) and it sounds great, but didn't I read somewhere that the spec was going to change and current 'radio sets' wouldn't be able to be used for the new spec in the near future?

Hi, there was an item about this on "Working Lunch" on BBC2

Nothing will be changing in the UK. The other DAB radio format is used in other parts of the world, (I think Europe, but don't quote me).

No doubt there will be a peeing match as to whether one is better than the other, but there are no plans to change the UK specification.

NMarshall_2

These radios are being dumped because they will NOT be compatible with the new Global DAB standard, so could become very quickly unusable. There are NO technical issues left to resolve and you have to ask why manufacturers are making expensive changes to new sets if there is no likelihood of the DAB+ spec being adopted.

As to Martins comments about quality, I'm afraid that he spoke too quickly - because of greed over licence revenues, the Government sought to maximise frequency sell-off income by heavily compressing signals to allow several channels to use the same frequency - the result is that almost none of the DAB signals is broadcast in stereo, and although the pops and crackles might have gone, the sound is like something coming out of a bucket, with the higher frequencies non existent.

This is NOT progress, I'm afraid.

If you want an impartial view, this is what Which says:

What will happen in DAB+ replaces DAB?

If the broadcasters and regulators dropped DAB in favour of DAB+ it's unlikely that current digital radio owners would be able to upgrade their model to receive the DAB+ signal.

However, it’s likely that if DAB+ were adopted in the UK, there would be a period when the two digital systems would run alongside one another. This would allow some stations to be broadcast in the new format and some in the old, which would give listeners time to switch to the new standard.

New digital radios, due out later this year, will be upgradeable to the DAB+ and this is certainly something we'll be looking for in our tests.

Is it worth buying a new digital radio?



Don't be put off buying a DAB radio

If you're planning to buy a new digital radio, don't let the news about DAB+ put you off. Our discussions with broadcasters and regulators indicate that there is currently no deadline in place for the wholesale adoption of DAB+.
This may not please everyone, as the current DAB standard has its critics. Despite its popularity, there are concerns about the sound quality of DAB radio.

Broadcasters use compression techniques to reduce the size of the DAB signal, which inevitably leads to some loss of sound quality.

We think the main advantage of digital radio is more station choice. If you have concerns about sound quality, we advise you to buy a Best Buy model that can receive an FM and a DAB signal.

wlcnetwork

From where?

roddydogs wrote: »

Lot of us got one for a Tenner a few week ago!

greymatter

We have a DAB radio but often get 'station unavailable'.
The 'analogue' set has no problem though.

Same with the tele. The range of available channels changes from evening to evening. No problem with the analogue settings though.

Is this progress?

No, it is not.

It is another UK con, where a dictatorial governement treats its citizens as gullible bumpkins.
The phrases spin and stealth taxes come to mind.

So, once the full switch over takes place and the DAB broadcasts fail we will be left with nothing to see or listen to.

Mmmm, could be good!