DAB delight: digital radios under £20, plus top big brand deals

Former_MSE_Lawrence

What's the deal?

There are some Christmas-cracking (ouch!) deals available on DAB radios at the minute, with budget models available for £20, plus one swish £95 model reduced to £40

Where?

• The Cheapest: Alba TRDAB2810 DAB with FM Radio £19.99 delivered. We've featured a slightly cheaper DAB radio before, but this one manages to pack in an FM tuner too, so you get the best of both radio worlds. The only thing that lets it down is its in-built speaker, which is a mite tinny, but still fine for speech-based shows. It's also at Amazon, so again you'll pay £6 extra if you want it in time for Christmas.

• Cheap with an alarm clock: Goodmans DAB Alarm Clock Radio £19.99. If you're looking for a DAB radio for the bedroom, this egg-shaped alarm clock radio ought to do the trick. For the same price as the one above, you can order this direct from Goodmans, although it won't be delivered until after January 17. It has two alarms, 10 DAB presets, and last station memory, and is currently half-price. Thanks to Blueroo for spotting this one and posting it below.

UPDATE 19.12.07, 9.09AM. The Philips DAB radio price has increased to £39.99 - still not bad, but not quite the MoneySaving deal it was previously.

• The Smartest: Philips AE5900/05 DAB clock radio £29.99 delivered (Was £95). This Philips desktop radio certainly looks the part, and has lots of up-to-date features. It's available from Amazon, but if you want one in time for Christmas you'll need to pay an extra £6 for express delivery (Available until 8am on Dec 22).

UPDATE 19.12.07, 9.09AM. Sadly, Argos has increased the Sony DAB radio price to £39.99 - so it's not nearly as good a deal as it was previously. I'm leaving it in in case the price drops again soon.

• The Big Brand: Sony XDRS50 Compact DAB radio £24.99 in-store (was £50). This little Sony box can be operated by batteries or the mains, and has full auto-tuning ability and a headphone socket should you come over all anti-social. It's available half-price at Argos, and you can reserve online to collect in store.

Seen these cheaper, or a better deal? Post it below and I'll add it in.

Anything else?

In case you're wondering, there are four main things that make DAB digital radio better than the older FM standard:

More Choice: The FM band can only host a very limited number of stations compared to DAB, which already has dozens.

Easy Tuning: With digital you don't have to worry about numbers- you can just look for the name of the station you want to listen to. This user-friendlyness makes it ideal for the elderly.

Better sound: Digital isn't prone to the same hiss in the signal that FM suffers from, so provided you listen on good quality speakers and get good reception you should get a better, cleaner sound. This isn't always true however, as it depends on how compressed the digital signal is before it reaches your set, but stations with heavy compression are the exception rather than the rule.

Extra Features: Most of the players above feature scrolling text, meaning that you can find out useful info (eg. about songs/artists) while you listen.

bearfreeman

While DAB seems a good idea, it's an old standard and has already been superceded by DAB +. DAB radios will not be able to receive DAB + broadcasts. Like Freeview, DAB digital radio can only have more stations if it reduces the bandwidth of other stations = lower quality. Indeed, fm radio can have better quality than DAB because of this. Another digital standard, DRM, will eventually digitalise all the 'am' broadcast bands; that's long, medium and short wave, and DRM may even be adopted by the fm band.

From Wikipedia:
The DAB standard was designed in the 1980s, and receivers have been available in many countries for several years. Proponents claim the standard offers several benefits over existing analogue FM radio, such as higher-fidelity audio, more stations in the same broadcast spectrum, and increased resistance to noise, multipath, fading, and co-channel interference. However, listening tests carried out by experts have shown that the audio quality on DAB is lower than on FM due to the fact that 98% of stereo stations in the UK, Denmark, Norway and Switzerland (which are the only countries where DAB sales have taken off) are using bit rates levels that are too low.[2][3][4]
An upgraded version of the system has now been developed, called DAB+. The new standard, the full details of which were published in 2007, is not backward-compatible with the original standard. The vast majority of existing DAB receivers and those on sale in the shops will not be able to receive DAB+ radio services when they are launched; however, a range of DAB+-upgradeable receivers are now available in the shops. Several countries are expected to launch DAB+ broadcasts over the next few years, including the UK.

Lakeuk

bearfreeman wrote: »

While DAB seems a good idea, it's an old standard and has already been superceded by DAB +. DAB radios will not be able to receive DAB + broadcasts.

Don't worry about the possibility of DAB being supersided by DAB+, stations broadcasting in the UK on DAB will continue for quite some time and there are currently no plans to broadcast any stations in DAB+. It's taken DAB 15yrs to get to where it is

bearfreeman wrote: »

Like Freeview, DAB digital radio can only have more stations if it reduces the bandwidth of other stations = lower quality. Indeed, fm radio can have better quality than DAB because of this. Another digital standard, DRM, will eventually digitalise all the 'am' broadcast bands; that's long, medium and short wave, and DRM may even be adopted by the fm band.

Incorrect, DAB gets more stations when ofcom allocate more frequencies like those that channel4 will launch the radio stations on next year. DAB is ever popular with 5million+ radios sold by June2007, but the big problem facing DAB is that advertisers are unwilling to advertise on DAB which is resulting the in the commercial stations changing their line ups, there are rumours that oneword, core, life will stop broadcasting and ch4 are rethinking there starting lineup of stations for next year

annahavana

Sony on Argos link works but when you add to Basket the price comes up at £39.99. Anyone else get that?

MiserlyMartin

I don't care how cheap DAB radios become, I would never buy one as they are inferior to Analogue radios. The sound quality from the DAB transmission is awful low bitrate MP2 compression and no DAB radio can reproduce it to sound as good as FM. Theres a nasty metallic sound to DAB and it lacks top end. DAB radios are only really useful in a kitchen or environment where the terrible sound quality won't be noticed.

You don't get hiss on FM provided you have a decent signal but on DAB when you lose the signal you get a nasty burbling sound like you are underwater.

I wouldn't have a DAB radio if somebody paid me to have it.

petermcuk

Care is required with DAB. I live in Redditch in Worcestershire and the signal is very poor. Also, I don't like the fact you have to use the aerial. Which usually ends up pointing in an inconvenient direction!

Many people don't realise a large number of digital stations are available through their cable network (channels in the 900s). If this is fed through a stereo you don't even need to have the TV on at all and the sound is much better than portable.

Hope that helps someone!

Jefft_2

I believe the Intempo TRS 01 DAB does have an FM tuner.

Jefft_2

MiserlyMartin wrote: »

I don't care how cheap DAB radios become, I would never buy one as they are inferior to Analogue radios. The sound quality from the DAB transmission is awful low bitrate MP2 compression and no DAB radio can reproduce it to sound as good as FM. Theres a nasty metallic sound to DAB and it lacks top end. DAB radios are only really useful in a kitchen or environment where the terrible sound quality won't be noticed.

You don't get hiss on FM provided you have a decent signal but on DAB when you lose the signal you get a nasty burbling sound like you are underwater.

I wouldn't have a DAB radio if somebody paid me to have it.

I thought this when I first bought a DAB radio. However after taking it back and buying a PURE ONE I found the sound quality was on a par with the Sony FM radio I had replaced. Since then I have bought 2 Intempo DABs the sound quality on those is also very good. I have not experienced the issues you refer to and I am extremely fussy about these things. Perhaps you had a duff one?

Jefft_2

annahavana wrote: »

Sony on Argos link works but when you add to Basket the price comes up at £39.99. Anyone else get that?

The original post says INSTORE. Perhaps it is an instore special.

EliTom

Jefft wrote: »

The original post says INSTORE. Perhaps it is an instore special.

Yes this will be an instore price.

To add to the list I got this DAB radio from Argos for £24.99 instead of £59.99 - less than half price

Philips Sports Gear Radio with 1GB MP3 Player



http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/5005718/Trail/searchtext%3EPHILIPS+DAB.htm?storeId=10001&referredURL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.argos.co.uk%2Fstatic%2FProduct%2FpartNumber%2F5005718%2FTrail%2Fsearchtext%253EPHILIPS%2BDAB.htm&jspStoreDir=argos&referrer=COJUN

AirCooledHeaven

MiserlyMartin wrote: »

I don't care how cheap DAB radios become, I would never buy one as they are inferior to Analogue radios. The sound quality from the DAB transmission is awful low bitrate MP2 compression and no DAB radio can reproduce it to sound as good as FM. Theres a nasty metallic sound to DAB and it lacks top end. DAB radios are only really useful in a kitchen or environment where the terrible sound quality won't be noticed.

You don't get hiss on FM provided you have a decent signal but on DAB when you lose the signal you get a nasty burbling sound like you are underwater.

I wouldn't have a DAB radio if somebody paid me to have it.

So tell me where do I find Planet Rock, XFM, Virgin Radio, BBC R5 etc etc on FM?

One mention of DAB and all the 'audiophiles' jump on their soapboxes slagging it off. DAB was never intended as a 'CD quality' source, it was intended to provide a wider choice of stations. For that it should be applauded.