The alarm clock does just fine for the price. We take it on the road when travelling since it is compact and realiable.
Showing posts with label flip clock. Show all posts
Showing posts with label flip clock. Show all posts
Elgin #3502E Travel Alarm Clock
The alarm clock does just fine for the price. We take it on the road when travelling since it is compact and realiable.
Jensen JIMS-182 iPod MP3 Docking Speaker Station Dual Alarm Clock Radio
- Play and Charge Your iPod Touch, iPod Nano, iPod Classic, iPod (5th Generation), iPod (4th Generation), and iPod Mini (iPod not included)
- Auxiliary Input Jack with Cord Included for Connecting Your iPod Shuffle, MP3, or other Digital Audio Players
- Multi-Function White Backlit LCD Display
- Built-in AM/FM Stereo Receiver
- Alarm Clock with Snooze - Wake to Gradual Light, Radio, Alarm, or iPod
Nice small footprint
Nice design
Good radio reception
Works on batteries
Cons:
Cannot use it with protective case on Ipod touch (unless you don't use the attachment and risk damaging unit and ipod)
When alarm turns on to radio you only see radio station and not time
LCD is a bit too bright to have it facing your bed at night
Although good for its small size, the audio is a bit weak.
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This product was great! It was exactly what I needed (something to wake me up to my music and to play my iPod without draining the battery). Less than two years after I bought it, the snooze button quit working. I can push it all morning, but it never snoozes. So if you are looking for something to just listen/wake up to without a choice to snooze, I would purchase this dock.Read Best Reviews of Jensen JIMS-182 iPod MP3 Docking Speaker Station Dual Alarm Clock Radio Here
I recently received this item from Amazon , service was exceptional as always ......... product was not !Sound quality is pathetic . I didn't expect concert hall performance , but thought it should sound better than the transistor radios I had as a kid .
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Very disappointed in this i pod dock. I bought this for my daughter and after a couple weeks it just stopped working. Luckily we were still within the 30 days for a return and Amazon was wonderful and we had a new one the next day. Hopefully it was a fluke and the new one will continue to work fine.
NEW JENSEN JCR-222 AM/FM PROJECTION ALARM CLOCK RADIO (PERSONAL AUDIO)
- .6" GREEN LED DISPLAY.
- 120 ADJUSTABLE PROJECTION OF TIME ON WALL OR CEILING.
- ROTARY FRONT CONTROL FOR TIME & ALARM SETTING.
- AM/FM RADIO.
- WAKE TO RADIO OR ALARM.
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Creative Zen Vision 30 GB Multimedia Player Black
- 30 GB multimedia center holds tens of thousands of photos, up to 120 hours of videos, and 15,000 songs
- Stunning visuals with the 3.7-inch SharpPix high resolution 262,144 color screen with transflective technology
- Plug&View CompactFlash card slot lets you quickly transfer and view photos from your digital cameras in crisp thumbnail galleries
- Built-in FM radio and Recorder
- Supports MPEG-1/2/4-SP, Windows Media Video (WMV) 9, Motion-JPEG, DivX 4 and 53, Xvid-SP3 video formats, and MP3, WMA and WMA with DRM autio formats
I will break down Pros / Cons / General Advice / Why Creative over an IPOD.
OK ... giving this 5 stars, not because it is perfect ... only because *all things being equal*** it is best in its class.
Pros
SMART drag / drop (which is HUGE if you were an 'old time original napster dude, where you downloaded everyone song you ever wanted, and still have the collection). SMART means this ... if you drag / drop music, pictures and video in one folder, it will ask you if you want Creative to put the files into the appropriate folders. And it does this well. Nice feature, if you have digital pics, and digital movie footage (from the same camera, in the same folder) ... you don't have to do the sorting yourself ... as it handles it for you.
long battery life
nice little speaker for 'preview' without having to block out the rest of the world with your headphones (useful if you
are sharing family pics w/ your kids and don't want to depend on the headset)
nice HD screen BIG screen
nice wow factor
beautiful design
HUGE format replay support (like AVI, which none of the other players support, even the Vision M). AVI for me is huge, because I take a lot of digital camera movie clips, which are in AVI format. I wanted to be able to play these back, without having to convert, and this unit handles it.
removable battery
option for EXTENDED 28 hour battery life
fm, voice recorder
tv outputs
Can manage with what ever software you so desire ... (see cons on IPOD below).
Cons
had to reset unit (remove battery, put battery back in) as the unit froze on me within 72 hour period (however, it is
possible that I had a corrupt MP3 that caused this ... and I did fill it up to 30% capacity and did a lot of moving of files
around. Like any hard drive file system, this can cause some confusion to the underlying OS, so I am less concerned about
the freeze problem ... but will be keeping an eye on it)
headset does not make sense ... should have come with a right angle plug (minor, and a $20 fix ... just buy a pair of nice
headphones). The plug and its location is prone to become damaged (as it is right by the finger controls, and sticks
straight out ... very annoying). I replaced with a nice pair of Philips right angle plug headphones, which comes with a wind
case, for easy travel (without the tangle).
like everyone said about the screen ... it is tough to view with 2 eyes ... let me explain ... (which by the way ... if
you change the underlying skin to SILVER, versus the standard DARK BLUE, you will be in much better shape). Now, for the
explaination ...
If you look with your left eye only ... you will notice a sweet spot when viewing. At that sweet spot, the picture will look
like a picture ... when out of that sweet spot, the black becomes 'shiny'. Now, when you are infocus with your left eye,
close it, and open your right eye ... you will notice that your right eye sees the pic a bit shiny. If you adjust the view
angle with your right eye, your left eye will see that bit of shinyness ... and so, on. I am NOT sure what the folks of
creative were smoking when they designed this screen, but it is tough on the eyes. NOT NOT NOT designed to watch a move, but
definately has the WOW factor, because when you look at it, at a glance, the screen is NICE, almost HD.
If you use polarized lenses, when you are driving, don't even think of looking at the screen, because you wont see
ANYTHING. Somehow, the polarization cancels out the view ENTIRELY. Not sure why, but it does. (Despite the screen flaws,
expensive (but only $80 more then the Vision M, which is a nice alternative, but does not have the replay speaker, the bigger screen or the extensive format repaly support.
General Advice
Don't rely on MP3 tagging, because your songs will always be out of order. Create Playlists ... this way you can go to your
group of songs and can pinpoint any song you want in SECONDS, versus having to sort through incorrect Genre, mislabeled album
titles, etc. It comes down to this ... label your songs yourself, don't depend on these unreliable MP3 tagging services,
which will completely destroy the existing tags on you songset. I have a huge collection of howard stern comedy clips, and
mp3 autotagging had these songs in ballet, soul, etc. And the funny thing is that these services claimed to have completed
100% accurate tagging to my songs. B*&&S%$!. Stick to your own labeleing, and use playlists. I had over 1300 songs
organized in about 1 hour.
Why Creative over an IPOD :
OK, here is why. IN MY LIFE, I purchased 5 songs through IPOD. Notice the workd PURCHASED, meaning I OWN THEM. Would you
believe that when I went to play those songs on another computer, I WAS REQUIRED TO LOG INTO ITUNES, to ACTIVATE THE APPROVAL
OF THOSE SONGS BEING PLAYED!!!!! Is that insane? Talk about big brother keeping tabs on the S&#! I purchased. I hate to
say this, but APPLE is for people that don't have brains. They are for people that don't want to think, and don't care to
ask questions, and don't care to understand. For those ... there is apple. For everyone else, CREATIVE understands your
personal needs, and also has a talented bunch of engineers that understand what an enthusiast REALLY wants. The CON however
to buying the Creative is that you will have to use 5% of your brain. If that is OK with you, then this is the device for
you. If you don't want to use your brain, and want APPLE to do all of the thinking for you, buy an IPOD ...but beware when
you 'upgrade your computer', and APPLE says there is a limit on how many computers you can play your 'PURCHASED' songs on.
ALSO, why this over an IPOD :
built in speaker
nice HD screen, especially if you are a PROUD parent, and want to keep every digital picture of your kids in your shirt
pocket, as well as your full MP3 list.
TV output, to share slideshows with your family
EXCELLENT support : Creative picked up the phone BEFORE I purchased the product, as well as after I purchased the product.
BOTH times, I was treated fairly, respectfully, and was helped. STELLAR.
bad replay support on the IPOD, as it isn't a generic multimedia device.
IPOD doesn't have FM tuner, doesn't have voice recorder (which is awesome by the way), doesn't have TV output, doesn't have removable battery
With IPOD, you better love ITUNES, because you have no choice but to be married to it. Not very American, is it?? Kind of like a fixed marriage. With the Creative unit, you can use what ever you desire (its own software, drag / drop within windows, Mozilla firefox, Windows Media Player, etc.)
Got to go folks, there are probably more items, but my fingers hurt from too much typing.
Buy Creative Zen Vision 30 GB Multimedia Player Black Now
Creative nearly hit bullseye with this device. It's perfectly sized, easy to use, and has plenty of capacity. Images are crisp and colors rich, but the unit falls just short with a narrow viewing angle and sluggish navigation.First, the bad. The screen is uncomfortable to watch head on. The left tilt helps but it's still not satisfactory. In addition, my unit has several tiny starlike specs that distract me from my movie. Compared to my HP iPaq, the unit takes time to boot and navigation is much slower. Finally, I don't understand their claim to support a variety of formats. For some of my movie clips, like from my digital camera, I can play them right away on my PC on Windows Media Player 10 but have to go through a conversion process to play them on the Creative. And the conversion lowers the quality of the file.
Now for the good. 30GB holds a lot of portable movies. Navigation is a breeze. The sound is wonderful and the screen displays color beautifully, with sharp clean images. The file management software is straightforward. The unit is well constructed and feels good in the hand.
Now for a word about getting content onto your portable video player.
There's always CinemaNow. But if you want to watch the DVDs you own, you've got to rip. Creative includes Video Vault demo software to help get your movies portable, and it's pretty good. I prefer it to the software called "DVD to Pocket PC" because it's more stable. The downside is it creates much larger files (an average movie is 600MB rather than 300MB).
To get DVDs onto the Creative using the demo software, you have to
(1) rip the DVD into a file format the demo software will accept (I use DVD Shrink freeware)
(2) use the demo software to convert that ripped file (2-5GB) into a portable movie file (400-800MB) to put onto the Creative. This step takes 1-3 hours per movie, so I run it overnight.
To get TV onto the Creative, it's helpful to have a Media Center PC with a DVR. This way you can move recorded TV shows to the Creative and watch them on the go.
Yes, this is all very time consuming work, but no different than ripping your CDs to create an mp3 music library. Using this process, one snag I haven't figured out yet is how to get my 16x9 (and wider) movies to play in the correct aspect ratio on the Creative Zen Vision. It ends up being slightly stretched top to bottom. Thankfully, the stretch isn't so bad.
For me the results of all this digital transfer are worth the effort. It's a blast to have this on a trip. The Creative Zen Vision is a pioneer product and a fun toy for the electronics enthusiast.
update: I solved my 16x9 problem. The full version of Video Vault software (whose demo is included with the Zen Vision) has an option for 4:3 or 16:9. This is the best program I've found for converting movies into portable-sized files.
Read Best Reviews of Creative Zen Vision 30 GB Multimedia Player Black Here
I started looking at items like this one because I wanted a device I could use to store my photos while traveling without lugging a notebook computer around. When I picked this one, I think I made a great choice.Mainly, in this review, I want to address some misconceptions found in other reviews. First, the screen: The viewing angle is not an issue at all. I was amazed to see what is said in some of the reviews. It is a one-person device, but I can move my head several inches in any direction without problems. The screen is amazingly sharp and clear, and easily visible even in bright sunlight.
Second, you CAN use this as a removable drive. You simple set that up under the extras menu, make sure you have navigated to the removable drive screen on the Vision, and then plug it into a computer. It will come up as a removable drive under My Computer. It works fine. All I had to do to find out about this was read the manual.
It also works fine to store my photos. It's easy, fast, and SMALL, being about the size of a deck of cards. The 30 gigs is enough space for even a pretty long trip, and I take a LOT of photos with a 7 MP camera.
I had no trouble transferring my movies to this, either. I have a very large collection of DVDs, and I wanted to be able to watch them while traveling. I am using a program called Magic DVD Ripper to convert them, and it is easy. It does take about an hour for my computer to do the conversion.
The battery is removable, so you can, if you like, carry a second one. Try that with an Ipod.
All in all, I haven't found much of anything to complain about.
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Negatives:Three hours with video and nine with audio, about 30% less than Creative claims.
Microsoft Windows XP is required; while Creative wisely chose to stop using Microsoft Media Center, they added the XP requirement...a bad move.
Creative software is required for installation AND all file transfers, this cannot be used as an external USB harddrive.
Viewer is required to look directly at the video screen, the viewing angles are extremely narrow. Also there is no color adjustment or antireflective coating.
Positives:
Large screen in a small magnesium-encased unit weighing only 8.3 oz
FM radio and recording, mp3 playback is excellent. (No line-in audio or video recording.)
VGA Video looks great on the display (if angled correctly) and through the tv output.
Removable Lithium-Ion (Double-life battery available)
Customizable EQ Equalizer settings include eight presets as well as custom 5-band EQ sliders and a bass booster.
Overall:
The best for now, but limited by its requirements.
I tend to travel a lot. I usually lug around my digital Rebel and take a lot of pictures. A 6.3 megapixel camera tends to fill up memory cards quickly. On my last trip I brought along my Zen Vision and used it to back up my digital pics right from the CF card. I didn't need to carry around my laptop to download the pictures, and I only had to bring two memory cards with me. My back appreciated this change.
The built-in screen far surpasses my expectations. It will not replace a laptop screen for some applications, but the resolution is FANTASTIC.
I already used the Creative MediaSource Organizer to manage my music collection, because I had a Zen mp3 player. This software is superior to the offerings of any other vendor I am aware of. It's neat, fast and powerful. It's multiple panes and intuitive interface make it easy to organize and transfer content.
The Media Explorer is used to transfer pictures and video. The transfer is amazingly quick and painless. When viewed on the Vision's screen, the video is bright and clear. The pictures have excellent contrast. I wish there was a rotate feature so that portrait-oriented photos could take up the whole screen. Then again, I haven't read the manual yet so maybe that feature is there somewhere.
The interface used to navigate between the photo, video, music features is ridiculously easy to figure out (like I said, I haven't read the manual yet and I have used all the features successfully).
One previous reviewer implied that you cannot charge the Vision with a USB plug only. This is not the case. The unit comes with a charger that can be plugged in to a standard wall outlet. However, the Vision will also charge while connected to your computer with the included USB cable, even if if is not plugged in to the charger. If you travel with a laptop, you don't need to carry your charger. I find that plugging in the Vision to a USB port will fully charge the device in a few hours a bit slower than if you plug it in to the charger.
When at home I plug the Vision in to a Bose Wave Music System. The combo is absolutely amazing. It fills my apartment with fantastic sound, and there is no need to mess around with CD's. It's nice not having to have my computer connected to the speaker system to listen to MP3's.
One reqret I purchased a white unit. In retrospect I would have chosen the darker color. The white unit tends to stand out while watching movies in dark environments like an overnight flight.
RCA RP5600 SmartSnooze Dual Wake Digital AM/FM CD Clock Radio
- Wake to Radio, CD or Alarm - This feature gives the user the choice of waking up to the alarm, a favorite radio station, or any track of a favorite CDTop Load CD - This unit has a top load CD door system for
- Nap Function - Allows the user to set a quick alarm for a short interval of sleep without disturbing the alarm settings
- Programmable Snooze - Turns off the alarm or radio for an extra 9 minutes of sleep or can be programmed for 1-30 minutes; you can snooze up to 2 hours
- Dual Wake- Individual wake time indicators allow for two different alarm settings for two different users.
- Digital AM/FM CD Clock Radio with Backlit LCD Display - This AM/FM CD clock radio has a 0.9" blue LCD display for easy readability
FEATURES This alarm has a decent amount of features for the price. One of the complaints I read in other reviews is that you cannot choose the CD track on the alarm function, it would just wake to the first track of the CD. This alarm allows you to set the track, wake to the radio, or to a buzzer. It also has two wake settings, adjustable "snooze/nap" time and gradual wake alarm (starts soft and increases over 30 seconds). It also has "sleep" mode which allows you to listen to the radio or CD with an automatic off so that you can still wake to the alarm in the morning. It has a back-up battery which allows it to run off the battery in the event of a power failure. The display has a bright (which is blue and clear enough to read from a distance) and dim (which is nice and muted and doesn't light the whole room). It was more compact in size than the Sony model that had similar features (and a bit cheaper too).
**Now one of the main complaints on this model is sound. I think people have an unrealistic idea of what a $25 cd alarm sound should sound like. For a cheap cd alarm radio, the sound is actually pretty good. The radio reception is good, and yes you can hear the CD spinning especially during track change, but let's face it... You are not spending the $100+ that great sound systems like BOSE cost. If you are looking for exceptional sound quality you are going to need to fork out the extra money to buy a higher end model. Even RCA makes a higher end model that I'm sure has improved quality of sound.**
My only wish on this alarm is that it have the smart-set technology which automatically sets your alarm after it has been unplugged or loses power. Other than that, this is a great alarm for the money!
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Okay, one would think that the CD spinning up would not be louder than the music, but it is loud enough to wake me before the music comes on. The unit has a cylinder in the CD cover which sits on the CD to hold it down, and this rotates in a plastic housing, making an amazingly loud plastic on plastic scraping sound. But wait, it gets worse! The CD continues to spin during the snooze period, so you don't hear music, just scraping plastic. And when you look at the display to see how much more snooze (/being annoyed) time you have left, the display is showing the track number, not the time. The thing is a CLOCK radio, it should ALWAYS show the time, especially when you're debating whether to get up now or wait another minute.I received this for Christmas, I'm going to exchange it.
Other notes: The dim setting of the display is still way too bright. You can wake up to any track of the CD, but it would be nice if the thing could pick one at random each morning.
What I'd really love is a clock with a BUILT-IN mp3 player -no moving parts except the switches...
Read Best Reviews of RCA RP5600 SmartSnooze Dual Wake Digital AM/FM CD Clock Radio Here
Two years ago my wife got me one of these for my birthday and I was skeptical. I wanted a clock radio that would play cd's and had even purchased and returned a Sony Dream Machine (Sony you should be ashamed of yourself...it didn't even have a battery backup). After having looked around for quite awhile I sort of gave up and decided to just keep my old radio/tape player alarm even though it didn't have a cd player. I was looking for something with a small enough footprint to fit on my nightstand, something that was easy to use and sounded good. It didn't take me too long to realize my wife succeeded where I had failed. She was pretty happy with her purchase, because after hearing from me about all the things I was looking for, she knew this was going to be a winner. To put it briefly the RCA RP5600 has everything a radio/cd alarm clock should and nothing it shouldn't. If you've spent anytime at all looking around at clock radios with or without cd players, you'll especially appreciate the RP5600. All the switches for setting the clock, setting the alarms, turning the radio on/off, turning the cd on/off, changing cd tracks...etc. are all simple to use, totally intuitive and LARGE. It never ceases to amaze me when well known manufacturers of electronic equipment continue to use those tiny, tiny, minuscule one-switch-does-all control buttons with the indistinguishable detents. The RP5600 has ONE SWITCH FOR EACH FUNCTION...which means no more fumbling in the dark while you're half awake trying to figure out if your alarm is set or not or if you're going to wake to your favorite cd or the alarm or if its even going to go off. Also, one glance at the display will clearly tell you what all your settings are. The sound is much better than I expected and it plays commercially prerecorded as well as recorded cd's. It wouldn't have crossed my mind to write this review, but recently my college bound daughter realized she needed an alarm clock as she headed out the door. You can probably guess who needed to get a duplicate.Want RCA RP5600 SmartSnooze Dual Wake Digital AM/FM CD Clock Radio Discount?
I've only owned it for a few days, but it's working out really nice on my desk at work. It's very compact, takes up very little space, but has a really nice sound from the radio and cd player. Nothing fancy, no bass boost or equalizer etc, but those features aren't really needed, after all this is not a high end product. However, I'm pleasantly surprised and very pleased with the quality of sound. Not to mention the value, I got mine at WalMart for $, usually things cost less at Amazon.com but not this time. Shop around and you can probably find a better buy than the current listing of $ here at Amazon.com on . If my current Sony that I have in the bedroom ever goes out, it will be replaced by this RCA Clock Radio CD Player, it's such a value with great sound and takes up very little space. Great value.birthday. After looking everywhere, and all over Amazon, this was
the unit I decided on. It really is a great clock radio and she
loves it.
As far as the squeaky/scratch noise others here have mentioned
in their reviews, heres the thing, it only make that horrible noise if
you turn on the CD player WITHOUT a disk in it. Once a disc is
put in it is very quiet. As quiet as any other CD player.
The display is large, bright, and a really cool shade of blue. It also
has a dim setting for the display if it is too bright for you. The dual
alarm setting is really great especially for couples who get up at
different times.
The unit feels nice and solid. It does not feel like cheap junk. This
is definitely a PLUS. When I bought this I was under the impression
that the FM tuner was digital. It IS NOT! It is a little dial on the side,
toward the back.
This brings me to the only drawback to this machine. THE QUALITY
OF THE FM TUNER IS HORRIBLE! I can NOT get ANY stations in
clearly on the radio at all. There is a horrible buzz over all the stations.
I don't know what they were thinking when they made the radio part
of the clock radio. Luckily for me, my wife did not want this for the
radio part of it. She wanted it for the CD part and the alarm part.
All in all this is a GREAT CD clock radio and I recommend it to anyone
who is looking for a CD Clock Radio. Just remember that the radio in
it is useless.
Enrock EKMRW10 IN Dash Boat Marine AM FM Radio MP3 Player/USB & SD MMC Card Function
- Electronic Volume/Bass/Treble/Fader/Balance Control - Digital Green LCD Display Panel - RCA Line Output -
- Mute/Clock - Seek/Scan Function - 30 Radio Preset Station Memory 18FM/12AM -
- EQ Preset (Flat, Classic, Rock, Pop) - Marine Coating- USB/SD/MMC Function - Front Aux Input -
- 200 Watts Total output (4 x 50 Watts) - One Pair RCA Line Out- AM Frequency Range: 520 ~ 1710 kHz - FM Frequency Range: 87.5 ~ 108.0 MHz-
- Wireless Remote Control- Dimensions: 7"W x 4.72"D x 1.96"H - Color: White
It gives me so many listening options when were out at sea!
Works beautifully and definitely worth the price!
Recommend A++++
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The unit is louder than my previous receivers and it appears that the materials used to make it will last longer in the harsh marine environment. The unit does come with a remote which works great and is super convenient. I would recommend this unit for anyone who will be using the radio in a marine environment.The unit worked great while in the driveway, then it was eratic with the sound coming from the speaker section of the unit. Doubled checked the wiring & it definitely was inside the unit. Bought this in the early spring & installed it early spring. Return was just not worth the time due to the % of refund limited for the return ( more than 30 days) Would not recommend this item to no one. Look @ other units before you purchase this one.
Yamaha TSX-112RE All-in-One Desktop Audio (Red)
- All-in-one system with bold design and robust sound
- High-grade speaker cabinet contributes to good sound quality
- Offers a variety of listening source choices
- Alarm lets you wake to your chosen music
- The supplied remote control lets you turn the unit on and off, and also select songs from the iPod/iPhone.
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There are lots of desk-shelf top all in one cd/ipod/radio players on the market. Cambridge, Boston Acoustics, Tivoli, and Bose all are players in this popular entertainment category. Having said that, I must tell you the Yamaha TSX-112 desktop audio player is a unit that should be given strong consideration. The unit is well built, and encased in a solid wood frame. The sound is easily on par with the Bose wave system, and unlike the Bose that requires a separate ipod connector to the auxillary port, the Yamaha unit has it built in on top, along with the cd port. At almost 1/2 the price of the Bose unit with the optional ipod dock, the Yamaha TSX is without question a best buy in this category. The speakers provide a deep sound with exceptional bass for a mini unit. The AM and FM reception is about as good as can be expected, and reception quality will of course be contingent on system placement in the house. Poorest reception I found to be in the basement, but I basically use it for music, so it is a non-issue for me. The unit comes in several colors, so I can only say that the traditional black is a sharp looking player. Tivoli, Bose, and BA, can all take you to the $500plus range, so before making that investment, try out the yamaha TSX, and see and hear for yourself, the sound quality that comes out of this unit. The included remote is simple to use, and controls every facet of the unit, including the cd, ipod, and radio. I could not be happier with this new entry into the mini desk top market, and has worked exactly as advertised.Read Best Reviews of Yamaha TSX-112RE All-in-One Desktop Audio (Red) Here
I have been listening to this desktop system for about three weeks now and I am a bit disappointed in the sound of this unit. The bass is flat and not very rich and the highs are not that great either. I have owned several Yamaha receivers over the years so I thought this item would be a safe bet. I own a Bose Wave CD/Radio with the additional iPod dock for my bedroom and was a little sick of that setup, and wanted a device that I could drop in the iPod and iPhone while in my home office. I thought about the Cambridge Soundworks but my current one has had so many software/operating issues that I would not recommend that unit to anyone.In fairness to Yamaha I have yet to find a drop-in iPod dock that really produces great sound. The best is the Bose but you have to spend the extra $100.00 for a stand-alone dock and add extra wires to your setup. Extra wires seem to be a Bose trade off which is why I got rid of my Lifestyle Systemtoo many wires! This Yamaha unit does seem to produce better sound when playing CDs however most folks are looking to get away from CDs or they wouldn't have an iPod/iPhone.
The bottom line is this is just an okay unit. I would be really mad if I hadn't gotten it for a great price due to a sale and some accumulated American Express points. This unit is not worth the original asking price in my opinion. Try to get it on sale if you really want it.
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My knowledge of music is quite limited. My understanding of the science of sound reproduction and transmission is even more limited. I feel embarrassedly dumb in writing this review. But for me, the Yamaha TSX-112RE produces a gorgeous sound in playing CDs and using the radio function of the Desktop Audio. Better than 1/2 the time I play music, I listen to classical music, and classical music when drawn from the Desktop Audio is awesome. And the red color in a huge master bedroom actually works.Save 14% Off
Ordered this product as I thought the BOSE was too expensive. This machine is exactly what I wanted and I like it better than the BOSE. It has the I Pod docking station as well as the USB port, AM/FM and the CD player and a remote all in one. Love it in my kitchen, it doesn't take up a lot of room on my counter, looks great in white and the sound is awesome for a small unit. Don't care for the AM antenna but I don't use it so not an issue. Would highly recommend it to anyone who wants a small, great sounding bookshelf unit for casual music listening around the house, great for the bedroom also as it has the alarm feature.
Blaupunkt Helsinki 220 BT World AM/FM/MW/RDS CD Receiver with Built-in Bluetooth
- In-dash AM/FM/MW/RDS, CD/CD-R/CD-RW MP3, WMA Receiver with remote
- Built-in Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR. Supports HFP and A2DP audio streaming. Pairs up to 5 phones. Accept calls, reject calls and redialing.
- 4 x 45 watts maximum power with two-channel 2V preamp outputs
- One-line 9 digit dot matrix display
- Front panel USB and Auxillary inputs
First, the good. The 420BT maintains the same exact wiring harness that they have always had, and which is fully compatable with the stock VW wiring harness for the 2003 Eurovan (and probably for all VWs and Audis of that vintage.) So, installing it was extremely simple again--just plug and play, and the standard DIN size fits the dash opening perfectly. The drawback for styling on the 420BT is that the front bezel trim ring and the radio face changed from a subdued black finish to a gloss black finish that seems to be made of much thinner plastic. So, while the radio fits well, it now stands out a little more from the other dashboard controls, looking a little more aftermarket than like original equipment. However, Blaupunkt did stick with the same red and blue light combination on the 420BT, so at least that aspect matches our VW motiv well.
The 420BT features that will take some getting used to are the controls. There is a lot of scrolling through menus using the dials to get to functions for bluetooth and audio controls like the fader (which we use a lot in the van for the kids). Even the equalizer functions setup is not all that intuitive. And to go along with all those menus, there is a very prominent (loud) confirmation beep for each button press or scroll dial. Very annoying. The phone pairing and playback setup is also not very intuitive either. And there are some features lacking on the phone and streaming that would be nice, like the ability to control the gain (volume) on the bluetooth device input.
The 420BT's other features will also take some getting used to. The built-in microphone does not have an adjustment for gain volume. It doesn't do very well in picking up voices, and it also doesn't reject car noises very well. It is difficult to hear the driver on a phone call. There is a 2.5mm jack on the rear for an external condensor mic. Apparently, it's not yet being distributed through Blaupunkt as of yet. But when it is available, I think the external Mic will be a necessary upgrade, installed on the driver's sunvisor, and hopefully would improve the telephone sound quality. One other fature I'm not sure of yet is the front USB connection. It has a nice rubberized dust cover, but I fear with repeated use, the cover will break off. What I may do instead is route a USB extension cable through the ashtray to connect to the stereo's rear USB connector, and just not use the front USB connector at all.
There is also a SD card slot for music behind the faceplate. We have not used that, and probably won't use it. But it does seem to be a good feature to have available just in case we ever have a SD card device in the future. I believe that the unit will also control satellite radio unit through the back connectors, though I'm not sure. And, sadly, Blaupunkt deleated the CD changer control inputs on the back, which would have been a very welcome feature for our keeping our venerable old changer going.
Bottom Line, There are some good features on the 420BT and many that will take some getting used to, and also some features that I wish it had. However for a one hundred fifty dollar price point, I would say it is good value for money and does primarily what we intended for it to do as an upgrade with Bluetooth functionality. If it grows on us as we become more familiar with it, we may improve the rating.
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I've owned and have been around Blaupunkt radios for 40 years being in the Porsche and Mercedes business. I was excited to upgrade my old Blaupunkt unit for one with all the latest goodies. The tuner on this unit is horrible, very poor FM reception and no AM. I waited writing this because the only thing worse than the reception is Blaupunkt customer service. I've been waiting two weeks for them to respond to my problem. I reinstalled my old one and am now looking for something else. Oh, if you really must have one I'll sell you this one.I bought this particular model because of Blaupunkt's reputation (I've always wanted one) and it seemed it would be compatible with the Harmon Kardon factory system of my 1995 Saab. The Bluetooth connectivity to my phone and the ability to play from a USB stick were also great features to modernize the Saab.Things did not turn out quite as well as I hoped. In short, yeah, it's working fine on radio and USB, but connectivity to my phone is entirely random and it doesn't turn off when the ignition is off, as the manual claims it should. It also took me a couple weeks to get it installed. Very frustrating.
The mechanical aspects of installation were great the DIN-standard slide mount fitted easily where my old radio came out, the sockets for power and speakers matched my harness almost exactly. I had to bridge the Saab amplifier power-on wire to the antenna power output of the Toronto and that's where the installation problems started. After bridging the amplifier and antenna together, I found that the Toronto was not capable of powering both of them.
Hours of testing and research later, I ended up building a dumb little power reduction circuit so that the Toronto could drive the antenna and amp turn-on circuits. While figuring this out with the Toronto on a bench, I did a little testing to see what it was capable of driving. Not much as it turns out. The antenna and amp turn on circuits together turned out to need about 80ma. The Toronto manual claimed it could handle 150ma, but when I went to see how much it really could take I found that the voltage dropped when it faced a 40ma drain.
Once past the power issues, I looked forward to getting music from a USB drive and so copied a few GB onto a stick and tried it out. "USB ERROR". Dug into the manual. Reformatted drive to FAT32, loaded a few GB. "USB ERROR". Formatted a different stick to FAT32, loaded a few GB. "USB ERROR". Tried a smaller USB stick. Reformatted. Loaded half a GB. "USB ERROR". Eventually, after a second unit gave the same result, I realized that I was loading MP4a from iTunes and the Toronto could only accept MP3. Sure, that's in the manual, on the specifications/features pages, but not on the operation page. And it might be nice to give something more informative than "USB ERROR" since that's simply a lie there's nothing wrong with the USB stick, its just that there's nothing on it that the Toronto can play. "No MP3" or "USB EMPTY" or even no error would be better than "USB ERROR".
My phone is an old Treo 650, solid and reliable, that I've used with Bluetooth headsets and sync to my PC frequently. After pairing with the Toronto, I was able to make one test call and was told that it sounded great on the other end nice though admittedly I was stationary in my driveway. But I've never been able to take a call through it since. It connects and disconnects at random and there's no easy way to prompt it to connect again. There may still be something I'm missing, but it's not documented in the manual and the factory website has nothing to help.
According to the manual, if the car's harness provides an ignition wire that is on only when the car is running, the Toronto will use that as a signal to turn off when the car is off. Never happened yet.
The user interface two knobs, a row of presets/function buttons is adequate. The interaction design button push, knob turning and pushing is straightforward but nothing innovatively intuitive or easy to use when driving. Blue highlights, red buttons, white lettering doesn't really match the decor of my car. Plus the font is just ugly.
So, overall, I'm not super pleased. It works fine in the core areas radio, music but the features around it just don't seem to be ready for prime time. Let's hope they run a rev on the firmware.
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I was looking for a car radio to replace the garish CD player in our '79 Porsche 911. For many years, Porsche used Blaupunkt radios as their original equipment car audio supplier. I was glad to find that Blaupunkt radios are still available, and still look great in a Porsche dashboard. It even has two "knobs" that approximate the Blaupunkt radios of the '60's.It's icing on the cake that the radio not only works well, but it offers current features like Bluetooth and USB audio streaming and telephone connectivity. Both features work well with my iPhone 4, and were easy to set up. I was also pleasantly surprised that the price was so low, as I was expecting to pay quite a bit more for this brand.
Only downside to this radio was that the Blaupunkt-supplied image of the faceplate doesn't really show the finishes accurately. I was expecting an all-black faceplate, but the actual finish is mostly black with a lighter metallic trim piece that surrounds the central display area. I'm getting used to it, but would have preferred all black. Given that this lighter trim fingerprints easily, it's not the best finish for the bottom row of buttons that get used often.
All in all, a great upgrade to our classic car!
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This a very good system, I like the Bluetooth streaming with my Phone 5. I could also plug my iPhone 5 to the available usb port it comes with and have full control of my music. You can also save your music on an SD card chip very cool!!! Many more features to long to list but I would recommend this system.
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I use these ultra batteries with my LED hi lumen output bicycle and flashlights. Most bike lights and flashlights eat battery life at least the hi lumen output ones do like 90 to 220 lumens in this case. The regular AAA batteries drained really fast like 30 minutes or so of use. Unless you have the hi end "CREE" bulbs in your device you should invest in these. For "lo stream" or lo usage devices like your remote control any old battery kirkland or generic works fine life wise but hi usage devices require the name brand duracell types and in this case ultras. Digital cameras also should get ultras in them unless you want to risk a dead battery.
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These ultra batteries are the perfect thing for digital cameras that pull a lot of power, as they do last a lot longer than regular alkaline batteries. Good price.Read Best Reviews of Duracell Ultra AA Alkaline Batteries, 8-Count Package (Pack of 2) Here
Duracell uses same Packaging for these Ultra Advance Alkaline batteries as it does for its Ultra Lithium batteries. This is Marketing trick to confuse the customer. The CR123 batteries Duracell sell which says Ultra on it is a Lithium Battery & does last longer. My Alarm company uses them in their products. But to Label their Alkaline batteries with the SAME Packaging and call them "ultra" when they are NOT Lithium batteries sound like bait & switch to me.. They are just average alkaline batteries with an expensive price on them. Now if you get them at a Big Box wholesale club at a discount, them maybe but if you are buying just too at a Drug store the price is downright OUTRAGEOUS !That is how they make their money...
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I didn't notice much difference (other than price) between these and normal Alkaline batteries. I wouldn't purchase again.Save 29% Off