Clock Reviews

No deal here.

Played with the display. Really nice. Picks up local TV stations and weather stations. Can record voice memos. Really nice unit.

I spent a lot of time looking on Amazon for a clock/radio/cd device. The dual alarms - both with CD (pick your own track), radio or alarm (which is ding, ding, ding not the type that will sent you into cardiac arrest every morn), semi-forward facing speakers, nap timer, and other features, make this a keeper in my book. I've had it a week (as of 9/18/2003). The unit is heavy, but that enables 1 hand operation of the buttons so the unit stays put. CD sound is rich, however it won't rattle your windows, but in the bedroom we don't want our music to be too intrusive...The radio sound quality is less robust than than the CD quality - that may be my station...The only feature I'd prefer is a jack for headphones (then I could rattle my ears and block out my wifes snoring). I'm very pleased with this buy.

This is a nice clock radio. But it is hard to see at night becaue it sits at an angle. The worst thing is that it does not have a battery backup. Which does not make sense, because the power is going to go out at some point. The best feature is the digital tuner.

TEAC has a winner with this nostalgia radio. How I remember listening to the radio in my youth before going off to sleep. Styling is classic and functions are effortless.

This is a good buy for the price. Had no problems with the clock.Even the recorder works great. Would definitely recommend it.

Bought this Zenith for a friend, who took it to his office. Definitely a conversation piece. Radio works great indoors. Good buy for the price

Mine broke w/in 4 months of having it. The alarm ceased going off when you set it to, and instead began going off at its leisure! Also, the buttons are not that easily mastered. I found myself going to the book every time I needed to use it.

It's hard to get excited about an alarm clock that has to wake you to go to work, but the GE 74894 is terrific. The numbers are large enough that I can see them at night without my glasses. The radio works very well. The dual alarm, time set, nap features are great. I love it that I can change the time for the snooze feature. All in all, a terrific buy. VERY highly recommended.

This is a neat little clock. It is "loaded" with lots of nice features not found on many other alarm clocks. Straight out of the box, you only have to set a switch to your time zone and the clock will automatically set the correct time as soon as you plug it in. It can even be set to adjust for daylight savings time automatically every spring and fall.

The design is rather small and attractive. My only gripe is that the rounded clear plastic housing on the front of the clock can exaggerate glare from lights and windows.

The buttons that would be used every day are large and easy to find, even when still half-asleep. The AM/FM radio sounds nice enough for what it is (a clock). You can set 2 different alarm times, there is a "nap" feature which you can set during your day to allow you to take a quick nap and yet have an alarm go off to wake you if you oversleep that is completely separate from the normal alarms. You can also set that 'nap' time from 10 minutes to 2 hours. And the Grad-U-Wake beeping tone of the alarm slowly grows louder, starting off at a level loud enough to wake light-sleepers and growing until it could wake your neighbors. Oh yeah, and there is a weekend mode so that your alarm goes off every morning during the week but disables itself on the weekends. It doesn't get any cooler than that!

GE has always made very good clocks and this one is the cream of the crop. (Circuit City is very good at shipping your item fast!)

The radio didn't turn on when I plugged it in. Pressing the reset button didn't seem to help. Persistence helped by inserting the plug several times.

I had trouble programming the tuning buttons for preset stations. The instructions do not state that the preset buttons must be held for more than an instant. Persistence paid off---I tried over and over.

If a person has been humbled by years of computer problems, he can deal with the the Sangean RS-330 clock radio. But I wouldn't recommend it as a gift to someone who is not computer literate.

I recall the clock radios of the 1960s, which were fitted with levers as sleep switches. If you were still awake at the end of sixty minutes, you could pull the lever again without turning on the light or consulting a manual. And the simplicity of turning a knob to change stations---priceless.

I own both this radio and its predecessor. Overall, this is one of the finer radios available (and I did a considerable amount of research.) The advantages:

(1) LED, not LCD, display for nighttime viewing

(2) earplug port tp listen in bed

(3) 6 presets for easy switching of stations day or night

(4) does not require battery backup as it has a capacitor to save memory in case of brief power outage (see disadvantages below)

(5) Great Sound. No buzz. (the buzz referred to in another review was probably fromplacing radio too close to a computer, or alarm panel, or similar).

(6) EASY time adjustment. has up and down. No need to go all the way around if you miss your alarm or time setting.

(7) Fairly well built. Takes a knocking.

(8) Plus all the usual other features like sleep timers, snooze, etc...

The disadvantages:

(1) the little buried adjustment knob for brightness is buried underneath and can EASILY be damaged when adjusting

(2) the former model had a better power backup capacitor. It could be unplugged or power lost for an hour and it would remember time and presets. New one is a minute or two.

(3) Actually there are 12 presets for AM and 12 for FM, but there is an additional key that needs to be pressed to switch to those modes. Should have been more straightforward, like pressing the preset twice to activate the second preset for that button. (Proton take note!)

Well, that's about it. Good luck.

While Amazon lists this as a Sangean unit, it is actually boxedand labelled as the more familiar and highly reputable Proton brand,model RS-330. (The name Sangean is nowhere to be found.)

This radio is the perfect solution for those who don't want to spend hundreds more on a Bose Wave, but find very little satisfaction from "plasticky" clock radios with horrible sound, analog tuners, and controls unusable by humans. I looked at lots of "junk" before I bought this. Add the companion RS-332 amplified speaker and you have an integrated stereo clock radio "system" with independent alarms and controls for two sleepers. (Each sleeper is awakened by sound from the component on his or her own side, but in normal listening you have stereo.) In my opinion, the extra speaker is a must; without it, you have one speaker monaural sound.

The radio and companion RS-332 each contain a four watt amplifier and 5 inch speaker, together offering great fidelity. The case and controls are extremely well crafted with excellent look, materials, and feel.

Headphone out, power backup (not via battery but deep capacitor), ramp wake volume, light sensitive auto dim, digital tuning, auxilliary inputs, displayed wake time for two sleepers, sleep timer... etc. etc. etc.

FM reception is exceptional with the wire dipole antenna included. In summary, this thing works and sounds GREAT (especially with the RS-332 attached in stereo) as long as you do not expect to blow the walls out at high volume.

After the warranty period expired I noticed that the device starts "losing" memory -- where you may have started with 15 minutes available for messages it would go down to four minutes, 3 minutes, and now, my machine thinks it is full all the time. I erase all the mailboxes, clear the greeting, all to no avail. I called Panasonic and they give you a reset procedure that simply does not work (hold down mute, hold, and transfer buttons while plugging in then press #3). It has been a horrible experience.

FEATURES, FEATURES, FEATURES. You should give this a try. I have waited for a great phone and it's now here. I got a great price. Going to buy another handset. I Like using belt clip (which is very secure on phone)and speaker phone on the handset when I'm on hold. I just clip it to my shirt and continue my life. You can adjust volume on handset, on base, for ringer and volume for Monitoring answering machine. Which I forgot to turn on.
LOL

Love the NOT TO SHORT phone. I can put it on my shoulder again. Love the light up display. Love the easy menu's. Really love the one touch dial of last 5 calls. Love the Add to phone book.

SPEAKER PHONE IS CLEAR! But callers can still tell its a speaker phone. Haven't needed to use Booster yet. Manual is big help and clear. It's a very attractive phone. I've seen some reviews here that knock the volume. No real problem here. Use it by my computer all the time. No interference.

I wish it could set ring tones for specific callers. That would be very convienient. Especially if it could be set to ring differently for Out of Area or Anonymous calls. Darn telesellers.

I also wish it would learn to fix dinner. Still waiting for that feature too.

...

I bought and tried three different 5.8GHZ phones available on the market... Uniden, VTech, and the Panasonic. The following is what I found:

Uniden
The Uniden looks good, but only performs decently. The handset is a bit big and clunky, and fairly heavy too. The worse feature of the phone is the ear piece. It sounds very tinny and not really that impressive for a phone of this quality and price. It's like talking to someone with a tin can up to your ear... all treble and no bass... doesn't sound natural. Probably the worse sounding ear piece I've ever heard on a phone.

VTech
First of all, it doesn't truly utilize 5.8GHZ technology... it's 2.4 one way and 5.8 the other... so this still can cause problems with outside interference and computer networks. The phone performs fairly well, but there was nothing that special about it's performance or features. A 2.4GHZ phone for more than $50 less would perform the same.

Panasonic
WOW! BY FAR THE BEST PHONE ON THE MARKET. I honestly found no flaws with this phone. Great range (further than the other two), never experienced static once, great sound and clarity from the ear piece, really nice answering machine and caller id features, very clear displays,.. the lists goes on. Just an all around great phone. I'm glad I tested them all out to see what was the best bang for my buck... the Panasonic 5.8GHZ phone blows the other 5.8ghz phones out of the water... it's not even close. If I hadn't tried them all, I may have been satisified with the other 2, but having tried the Panasonic, I wouldn't even consider the Uniden or VTech phones... they are mediocre in comparison to the Pansonic... yet cost the same price.

Go with the Panasonic... I love it. Best phone I've ever owned.

While this CD/radio/clock has some very attractive features, the sound is absolutely awful. It sounds as if the speakers are under water, or, if you've ever had one of those old 9-volt transistor radios, like the bass is turned all the way up and the treble turned off. CDs and FM radio sound muddy and distorted and AM news/talk is mostly unintelligible.

Since there's no way to tweak any settings to make it listen-able, i've returned the Philips and replaced it with a Sony Dream Machine. The Sony takes up more space and looks like a dopey version of a flying saucer, but it sounds terrific. The Phillips has some features i really like that the Sony doesn't, but ultimately, if it doesn't sound good it's not useable. You'd think that if you were making something to play music, the sound would be a primary concern, but apparently not in this case. That's regrettable.

This very compact CD clock radio has some great attributes. The display is large and readable from reasonable angles and is not too bright. The FM tuner is very sensitive, and AM is good as well. The alarms (two) can be customised for CD (with the track you want), radio, or buzzer AND the volume can be varied with a gradual increase to your personal taste/needs.Has a "weekend sleeper" feature, too. The CD will play CD/R/RW and has a quiet transport.
For myself, the lack of a digital tuner and the difficulty using this analog one with it's tiny dial and difficult to access tuning knob was a big drawback. The sound is quite bass heavy (how they managed that with the little speakers!) and rather muffled sounding on FM and CD (I only listen to classical music).
If you listen to pop/lite jazz, AM music and don't change radio stations, this offers great value and flexible alarms.

We've had this unit for almost 2 years now. The brightness of the display is adjustable, and the dimmest setting is plenty dim enough, contrary to reviews that I've read here. The brightest setting gives the room about the same illumination as an Indiglo-style night light.

The sound quality is quite good for a clock radio.

Two problems:
1) As has been mentioned before, there's no battery backup.
2) I haven't seen this mentioned, and it's super-annoying... regardless of the volume setting or mode of the alarm, when you push the button that cancels the alarm, you're treated to a non-adjustable, full-volume BEEP. Want to wake up to a nice, soft alarm an hour before your wife needs to? Fine. Just don't try to turn it off, though, because doing so will wake the household with the alarm-cancel beep. Really, truly stupid.

Other than that, it's a great alarm clock.