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

martyw

From past experience I've learnt never to buy anything by Bush, Alba, Goodmans or Matsui. Build quality and lifespan are inevitably poor, and not surprisingly performance too. (You may not realise how poor until for example you hear what good DAB radios actually sound like)

Cheap is just cheap. Read independent reviews (such as Which mentioned above, or specialist magazines) and go for VALUE instead!



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codger

I don't remember the actual lyrics to the song in question, but in Pink Floyd's "The Wall" there's a song about a musician stuck in a hotel room with 40 channels of s*i*e to watch on the TV. Considering that "The Wall" came out when we had only three channels (of quality) to watch in the UK, the song was definitely prescient.

It's also apt where DAB is concerned: our experience has been that our DAB radio picks up far more channels than our analogue ever did. . .

But produces far worse sound quality than our analogue ever did.

Not only that: portability, intended to be the key selling feature of this type of equipment, is a joke -- the radio works (i.e., it gets the channels) in the signal area where we live, the radio doesn't work when we take it on holiday to a cottage we rent in the Yorkshire Dales where the signal is less strong.

Whether a DAB radio is ten quid or a hundred quid, we'd never recommend buying one: a lot more choice, with a lot less sound quality (when compared to FM stereo) is no better than the situation lamented by Pink Floyd all those years ago.

* In our experience, however, there is a way of obtaining superior sound quality from digital audio broadcasting: we're not audio engineers, so have no idea why it works, but. . .

1) Connect your Freeview TV to a little home hi-fi system (because the hi-fi speakers will be better than the telly's)

2) Use the Freeview radio stations.

Compared to the unacceptable sound quality of the DAB radio, digital radio via Freeview is excellent.

But of course, manufacturers of DAB radios are never going to tell you that.

martyw

codger wrote: »

It's also apt where DAB is concerned: our experience has been that our DAB radio picks up far more channels than our analogue ever did. . .

But produces far worse sound quality than our analogue ever did.

Have you listened to other DAB models? Which DAB radio did you buy? What signal strength does it show?

codger wrote: »

Compared to the unacceptable sound quality of the DAB radio, digital radio via Freeview is excellent.

Maybe your freeview receiver/hifi is better quality than your DAB radio..? There's no reason DAB should sound worse unless a) your equipment is poor, or b) your signal is poor. My £100 DAB radio is clear as a bell - no hiss, no pops, no crackles! It got me listening to radio again.



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Spikus_Maximus

I'll second codger's idea - digital radio through any freeview box I've had (a £20 bush box, a BT Vision box or my PC tuner) has sounded better than any DAB radio I've heard - even when run through the same Hi-Fi.

p.s. the song is called "Nobody Home" and there's thirteen channels, but heh - who's counting!!

henryb_2

I'm sure I've heard that before, that Freeview radio is better than DAB (even before you start thinking about speaker quality). I've certainly found Freeview radio quality to be excellent - possibly even better than FM.

- HB

(Discussion of Freeview vs DAB/FM quality: http://www.russandrews.com/article-Better-than-FM-radio-for-free-HFN8Russ.htm)

(DAB vs FM quality - DAB is OK if you listen to Radio 3, apparently: http://www.digitalradiotech.co.uk/articles/DAB-vs-FM-sound-quality.php)

deeor

From a "green" standpoint don't DAB radios consume more power than other types?

G4TED

martyw wrote: »

From past experience I've learnt never to buy anything by Bush, Alba, Goodmans or Matsui. Build quality and lifespan are inevitably poor, and not surprisingly performance too. (You may not realise how poor until for example you hear what good DAB radios actually sound like)
Thanks for the advice about the above manufacturers.....I treated myself to a Goodmans MCD100 "Music Centre".....big wide flat piece of kit....only one tape deck and no CD player....didn't have CD's in those days and it was still in FULL WORKING ORDER when I gave it away TWENTY FIVE years later when I upgraded to a multi CD playing unit with the facility to play my old vynil if required.!!Also, I was told by a TV engineer some years ago that Matsui was a badge name for FERGUSON.....and as such would have the same reliability.....so when I needed a 14" teletext portable for a spare room I bought a Matsui....that was in April 1997 and it is still working as good as the day I bought it with no problems.....I am sitting watching it in the back gorunfd now as I am typing this message and hopefully will get another ten years relaibale service from it.Bush and Alba I can't really comment on too much as I have made a point of avoiding those brands as much as I have Fidelity in the past :)happy listening.Ted

ILikeFreebies

I bought an Intempo DAB radio in Tesco a few months ago for £30, my post is here:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=461903&highlight=intempo

I think it's a quality unit. I've not seen it in my local Tesco recently. The Tesco website has them for under £25 now, but they're currently out of stock. I've seen them in many colours over the last few years, I presume the internals are all the same.

About the freeview radio Vs DAB debate, there are many sattions available on DAB that are not on Freeview, many are local stations ie local BBC radio. Also, how much does it cost to have a freeview box, TV and Hifi all on just to listen to the radio?

I personally held off buying a cheap brand DAB until I found a quality unit on the cheap, that's the reason I haven't bought a 'bloggstec' LCD TV for £400.

martyw

G4TED wrote: »

I treated myself to a Goodmans MCD100 "Music Centre".....big wide flat piece of kit....only one tape deck and no CD player....didn't have CD's in those days and it was still in FULL WORKING ORDER when I gave it away TWENTY FIVE years later

Yup, sadly things used to be built a bit more solidly than todays cheap stuff (not sure that Goodmans would have been considered cheap back then!). Brands have changed significantly - who actually owns them, their price points, where goods are manufactured and of course resultant quality.


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codger

martyw wrote: »

Have you listened to other DAB models? Which DAB radio did you buy? What signal strength does it show?

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Hi: it's a Sony, must be over a year old now, it was if I remember aright £112. Signal strength isn't actually an issue, really, our experience has been that you can either pull in DAB or you can't, reception does seem dependent on area.

It's the sound quality that we've never been happy with: although much depends on the calibre of the speaker built-in to any radio (and with cheap radios, DAB or not, the speaker technology is usually going to be pretty lousy) the Sony's speaker is (or should be / ought to be) good enough. . .

Which it is: when playing FM stereo broadcasts.

'Course, a portable radio isn't going to compare to even a simple home hi-fi set-up (well, providing such a set-up isn't ultra-cheap, with ultra-cheap speakers) so it's at that point where -- in our experience -- the cost equation comes into play: a portable DAB is obviously far more convenient than a non-portable hi-fi system, and so is worth buying. . .

Except (a) portability seems far more dependent on signal strength area than is the case with FM and (b) even when broadcasts are picked up, the audio quality isn't (to our ears) as good as old-fashioned FM.

As I said, I'm no audio engineer. But in our family we've inadvertently finished up with a DAB radio we now use only for FM (so really, there was no point in buying it in the first place) and a TV hooked up to a simple Panasonic home hi-fi system through which DAB radio broadcasts via Freeview are excellent.

It may just be us, but is there a possible scientific explanation for this? (For example, compression is different for DAB than via Freeview?????)

* Spikus: yes! You're right! Thirteen channels it definitely was. :j

I guess in my old age, I've become comfortably numb. . .