table radio review

1. Posted: Aug 2 2008

   I had read reviews of most of the high-end table-top radios with CD - Bose, Cambridge, Polk, Tivoli and a few others. No iPod connection required for me, though it has a line-in. The radio does AM/FM, CD (MP3), USB Flash (though it sticks out the front) and up to 2GB SD cards. I ripped my CD collection to high quality 320kbps - just over 2MB per minute. I bought a 3-pack of 2GB SD cards and each 1 holds about 15 hours of music. The sound is fantastic and as good as any mid-priced stereo receiver/speakers. It fills a medium size room loudly and at soft "talking party" volume, it fills a large room with excellent sounds. 1 nit - The unit must be controlled by the remote. The front knob only does on/off and volume. The remote is a small flat device that needs to be within about 10-12 feet of the radio and pointed straight towards the front. Highly recommended.

2. ( 1 of 1 found this review helpful ) Posted: Jun 22 2008

   I bought this radio for my kitchen, which is a high traffic, high use area. It has great sound but the features are the real sell. I was frustrated because most everything out there was focused on the iPod which I will never own. Also, most of the CD players will play mp3s but not wma format. My collection of thousands of songs are wma. This radio plays mp3 and wma formats from 3 different sources (USB drive, SD card or CD). It also has an aux jack so I can plug my (non-iPod) player in. Now, my kids and I can each have our own music on whatever media we like and just plug it in. On top of all this, it has RDS (Radio Data System) that tells you the names of songs and groups from radio stations that participate. I have always loved this feature on my car radio. Now for the downside. All the functionality is on the remote. All you can do from the radio is power and volume. I would have liked a little more functionality available on the radio. Also, there does not seem to be a way to make it so the RDS display is the default. I have to hit the mode button when I switch to a station that supplies RDS. This radio is a little pricey but well worth it and much less expensive than the Bose Wave radio that has nowhere near the features.

3. Posted: May 7 2008

   This is one sharp looking radio...it has a beautiful symetry about it....& yes, it sounds as good as it looks....so good it seems there is only one thing this Sangean cannot do that full size stereo systems can....& that is produce sound at levels that will distort your perception of time & space....& you know what?....i have outgrown the need for such things & am perfectly content to listen to music at decible levels that are comfortable to hear....in this Sangean, less is truely more....the WR-3 is packed with features i may never use, but it is great to have them anyway....love the blue info display....& how it "says" hello when you boot it up....i have parked this under the wide screen on the wall in my modestly sized living room, & it is accusticly & astheticly perfectly suited for the room, it looks so good it competes with the tv at being a focal point of attention....reception in both AM & FM is excellent & the remote is nice too, one glance is all you need to get it set up in seconds...the cabinet is heavy & sports an excellent finish....one complaint i have though.....is that stupid sticker they put on the FRONT of the unit...which, if they were considerate enough to have used a label that does not leave behind glue residue....would not have been a problem....but they were not considerate, & it is a problem, as it does leave behind a sticky, hard to clean mess right on the front of your new radio....how freaking lame!.....a minor point but worth noting non-the less.....the WR-3 is a unique peice of sophisticated, fine fidelity furniture that i highly recommend to all in need of such.

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1. Posted: Oct 3 2007

   I want to buy this product and have followed it from Amazon to Country Home Products to the Crosely website. On the Crosley website instead of vague information regarding the "antenna" it explains the necessity of purchasing either an XM mini tuner to play XM (as well as getting a subscription to XM) or ordering another product an XM Mini Tuner and Home Dock. This explicit information should added to both this website and the Country Home Products website. Otherwise purchasers will not get what they think they paid for. All of these items are on back order according to the Crosley website and no date is given as to when it should be available. I am disappointed but want to order this item. No it is not portable and light. I want something that I don't have to build but can simply attach a tuner and go after getting the subscription. This looks like it.

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1. Posted: Feb 6 2008

   This will be just a brief review, and only of the Sirius part of the radio - I haven't used the AM/FM part. The radio is small, and beautiful, and has absolutely terrific mono sound. (For a bedside/bedtime radio I see no need to buy the extra speaker for stereo sound.) With Sirius of course you get whatever music/news/talk you'd like. I'm using it exclusively for the 3 classical channels (and maybe the 24/7 All Elvis All The Time channel every once in awhile). (XM also has 3 classical channels, later on when Sirius & XM merge there will probably still be 3 classical channels). The programming is very good. However, there are a few flaws to be aware of with this radio. The biggest flaw is a direct result of the design - internally this is a digital satellite radio bolted on to Tivoli's standard analog radio: The remote control doesn't control volume! Amazing limitation! The remote does have a mute function. Also, it has a very limited "sleep" mode - only 20 minutes, and to get it into that mode you have to traverse the menu system - impossible to do from across the room with the remote because you can't see the menus from that distance. Also worth noting: I am using an external antenna (the "SIRIUS Outdoor Home Antenna", bought from [...], very easy install) and the signal cuts out once in awhile - this may be due to some large trees in the line-of-site to the satellite sometimes block the satellite. Yet the signal strength meter shows "3 bars" (of 9) for the terrestrial signal - I live in Seattle where Sirius apparently has ground repeaters - so why should it ever cut out due to not seeing the satellite? Still, I'm very happy with the radio. 5 stars for sound + looks, then subtract one star for the annoying lack of volume control on the remote.

2. Posted: Aug 9 2007

   great if you have line of sight to the north otherwise you wont get a signal.

3. ( 5 of 5 found this review helpful ) Posted: Apr 24 2007

   I have no doubt that one reason for the slow adoption of Satellite Radio by consumers is the lousy hardware. I mean, what are they thinking? The collection of products for both Sirius and XM looks like the over-designed, comic book props in Star Wars movies. They're totally dysfunctional. Nothing as elegant as an iPod, with the possible exception of Pioneer's portable radios for XM. Even the car radio's are clunky. The Tivoli Model Satellite is the one exception to the ugly, under-performing Satellite Radio rule. The sound is about as good as it gets. Indeed, almost too good since it really points up the excessive compression used by both satellite and commercial FM broadcasters. You won't notice this difference until you play an uncompressed CD or MP3 file from your iPod through the AUX port on the Tivoli. Wow! What an amazing sound out of such small speakers. And I don't even have the subwoofer speaker accessory. The Sirius section works great. It's easy to program. It's got a great "Memo" feature to capture the name and artist of 20 songs you'd like to look up later. I did invest in a serious outdoor Sirius Antenna prior to the arrival of the Tivoli, so it was just a matter of plugging it in. The FM and AM sections worked fine without any external antennas. It's impressive that they include a serious external AM antenna - something I haven't seen packaged with table radios since the 1970s, and then only expensive "audiophile" models. As noted by others, the Satellite and AM/FM functions aren't at all integrated. This is basically the Tivoli Model 1 with a Satellite function tacked on as an afterthought. The huge, bright, multi-line display is awesome at providing all of the information you want at a glance, with a minimal amount of annoying left-to-right scrolling. While the display does automatically adjust to ambient light (a feature that can be turned off and on) it may be too bright for the bedside table for some people. The Tivoli Model Satellite is to radio what a beautiful 52" flat panel plasma display is to HDTV. It's the best audio you can get for satellite, possibly short of a console deck connected to studio monitors. But, again, given the various compression artifacts on Satellite radio (and the compression is often horrible on talk-only channels) this may be about as good as you dare get. Unless you have space limitations, it's kind of a waste to spend so much money on a radio only to have mono sound, so plan on buying the (right channel) speaker for stereo. I have no problem that they didn't include a CD player. An integrated mechanical device would only shorten the useful life of the unit. As just a radio it should last 10-20 years if you're trying to justify the high price tag. Will Sirius be around in 10-20 years? I don't know. We also hear talk of HD radio coming to AM/FM (but then we've heard about HDTV for 20 years too and it's still not here). At this price point, it would have been nice if there's been a time-shift feature, sort of a digital VCR (DVR) feature to record shows you want to hear later. The remote is pretty awful for such an expensive radio, it's just a cheap "membrane" type remote. Inexplicably I got a real remote with my Kenwood Sirius car radio (what good a remote does in the car is beyond me). Let's hope with the merger of the two satellite services they make more of an effort to create better looking, more functional hardware AND clean up their sound quality. I'd rather they have half as many channels with better sound and produce better programs that are re-run several times a day.

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1. Posted: Aug 1 2007

   My elderly mother lives in an assisted living community and has lost most of her eyesight to macular degeneration. Finding electronic equipment she can successfully use is a problem with SO MANY gizmos cluttered with small buttons for controlling everything. I searched for literally YEARS for a reasonably priced, well made table radio for her (one that she could actually use). The tiny picture available here suggests that the big white button on the dial actually turns the AM/FM tuner and I was delighted to find when I opened the box that it does indeed control the tuner. In fact, it gears down so that you get really fine tuning for radio stations (you turn the dial all the way around about 4 times when going from the lowest end of the dial to the highest end). It also comes with a tuning light that turns green when you have the signal at the best strength. The volume knob is also simple to operate. The built in mono speaker has good sound and nice bass. My mother is thrilled!

2. ( 1 of 1 found this review helpful ) Posted: Jun 2 2007

   As radio, the CX-166 does well on AM, but the FM circuitry is not up to decent standards and an antenna wire dangling somewhere is necessary. It labors even to pick up FM signals from radio stations within 25 miles. It comes with a single USB thumbdrive input slot for users carrying their MP3 or WMA tunes in the root. It does not support separate folders for different music genres, nor does it allow for even random playing. Each time you choose the USB mode, it starts from the beginning and you must push a tiny hard-to-press button to skip to the next, or go back one at a time. While in USB mode, there is an annoying low-frequency hum from the speakers, but not in either radio mode. I do appreciate the analog tuning dial for AM/FM radio station selection, and also like the analog volume control, rather than stepped button pushes. The turn switch to choose between OFF-USB-AUX-FM-AM is very stiff, however, and the knob is small.

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