Philips DC290/37 30-Pin iPod/iPhone Alarm Clock Speaker Dock (Brushed Aluminum)

• Compatibility: iPod mini; iPod nano 1G, 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G; iPod classic 5G, 5.5G, 6G; iPod touch 1G, 2G; iPhone, iPhone 3G/3GS
• Wake to iPod/iPhone or FM radio with dual alarms; separate weekday/weekend settings
• 10 watts (2 x 5) output power with Dynamic Bass Boost and selectable EQ curves
• Auxiliary input for connecting external audio devices
• Stylish aluminum design for durable good looks

First off, I hate to make a big deal about what may seem trivial to some. But, when spending around $100 for an alarm clock, I expect it to live up to my expectations. This is a great item, as long as you don't care about its two flaws.

First and foremost, whenever you plug an iPod or iPhone in, the clock automatically starts playing music at a high volume. This can get really annoying, especially when you wife its in bed sleeping with your infant son. I had read the directions multiple times. I guess Phillips engineers believes that every time anyone plugs an iPhone into an alarm clock they must want to hear music. Call me crazy, but I sometimes plug my iPhone in at night just to charge it.

The second, and far more trivial issue is the back light dimmer.m every time you plug in an iPhone or iPad it automatically resets to the brightest level. I'm not sure what the engineers were thinking on this one.

I could overlook the issue with the backlight, but the automatic blaring music is just too much. I'm going back to my iHome IP9. It may not look as sleek, but at least I will not longer wake up my baby when I go to bed at night.

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I bought this item to use in the bathroom so I could listen to music and keep an eye on the time in the mornings. The speakers sound really good. But the display is so dim (even on the brightest setting), the clock numbers are kind of small, and because of the mirror finish, the display is not easily visible. The build quality is nice only the top plate and front grill are aluminum.

The first night, I tried it out as an alarm clock. In the morning, my thought was that the snooze button was a little too stiff. The display legibility was not much of an issue when you're that close, but I still wish the digits were a little bigger. I'm making these comparisons to my regular alarm clock the iHome iH9. Another nuisance was that because the alarm buttons are so close to the snooze button, that if you accidentally hit it when the alarm is going off, the snooze button no longer works.

Now it's back in the bathroom, being used as a good-looking music player that's a little selfish about revealing the time.

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I initially got this unit to have an extra place to charge our many iPhones and iPods and to use as an alarm clock. Upon setting it up, however, I was very surprised at the richness of the sound it produced. I am pretty picky about sound quality and I don't really like to play my iPod on anything other than my Bose Sound Dock. Although I wouldn't say it is on the same par with a Bose system, I am very happy with the sound quality of this unit. It's nice to be able to listen to music in another part of the house and to be satisfied with the sound. It isn't tinny sounding and doesn't distort while playing at louder volumes. The ability to charge both iPhones and iPods is a huge plus for us. The FM radio is very nice, too. We often get static when trying to listen to stations a little far away, but this unit brought them in loud and clear. I was surprised. The radio scans for clear stations and you can program several as favorites. I read in other reviews that some people were not happy with the brightness of the display on the clock. I can see what they mean, it is dimmer than most digital alarm clocks. For me, this was not a problem. There is a button to change the brightness to three different levels. It is sort of hard to see during the day, but I don't mind because I use other clocks to tell time anyway. If you would be using this unit as a clock, I you would probably want it to be brighter. I really like the handy little remote that this comes with. You can do everything with it easily, fast forward, rewind, pause, repeat, etc. The design of the unit is very nice looking and attractive. It's a silver color and doesn't stand out like and eye sore in the room. Overall, I'd highly recommend this dock and having tried it out, I'd buy gladly buy another.

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This Philips Docking Clock Radio is a great addition to my iPod/iPhone accessory lineup. To begin, I use this docking station with my IPHONE 4, and it works seemlessly. I could not find any information prior to receiving this radio about if it would be compatible with the iPhone 4, and to my surprise, it works perfectly and I haven't received any "incompatible" errors.

This docking station is quite small. At about 10.5 inches across, 7 inches deep, and around 3 inches high, it's a great size for a bed side table, or even a desk at work, which is where I keep mine.

Volume range is outstanding. I can listen quietly to Pandora at my desk without neighbors hearing anything, but if I need music for a presentation, I can take this into a conference room and fill the entire room with rich music.

I love this docking station. I think it's one of the best on the market. It's sleek, small, and powerful!

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This little clock radio is better than the average ones out there these days. It definitely has its good points but it has a few not so good ones too. The things that I like about this one starts with the sound. It is one of the best sounding MP3 dock/clock radios that I've heard. It has good volume without a lot of speaker rattle at the higher/louder levels. And it has a few pre-set EQ playback options, something that you don't get with very many of these, and has DBB too. And then you have the EQ settings in your iPod too for helping with the sound playback. What happened to radio's having controls that you can use to adjust the sound to what you like? Radios & Stereos used to have at least a Bass dial & Treble dial or High & Low dial sound controls. And the best ones had at least a 3 band equalizer (per side) or up to a 5 to 7 (or more) band equalizer. I haven't even seen one with just the single high/low dial in years. The radio is one of the better ones that I've tried. The town where I live sits down in a pocket in the Colorado Rocky Mountains and I'm almost completely surrounded by high mountains. This makes radios almost useless here since the radio waves cant pass through the mountains. But this one does manage to pick up a few of the stations in the area, a lot more than my expensive stereo can pick up since it won't get any of them at all.

Now for the dislikes; The little remote that comes with this is kinda handy but a little small. Its not really needed except for adjusting the display brightness and isn't really a very good idea in my opinion. That's all everybody needs is one more remote to try to keep track of and as small as it is that just makes it easier to loose it. At least the display brightness is adjustable but it needs to be brighter. Turn it on and it gets a little brighter but not very much. When you turn it off it drops to the medium level by default and you cant see that more than a few feet away. It also has a low level that you can only see right in front of it in a dim room, and then you can turn it off. It can only be adjusted with the little remote so if you loose that your screwed. Because when the radio turns on it automatically goes to the brightest setting and when you turn it off it drops to the medium setting. There's one other thing that I don't really like about it and that's the way that my iPod sticks up out of it. Sticking up in the air like that makes it easy to be hit by something or hit it with my hand when trying to turn the alarm off or hit the snooze. It might take a lot to hurt it but I don't really want to see if I cant break off the dock plug by hitting it accidentally trying to stop the alarm.

Overall its a pretty good little pod-dock/alarm-clock/radio thing. There's some better ones out there but there's also a lot of worse ones out there too. So, with its price and everything else, I'd put it at the upper end of your shopping/compare list if your looking for one of these.