Radio Reviews

What's so great about this CD player for me is that it is by far one of the most sturdy, rugged players in the market. I'm a klutz, and I've dropped the thing upwards of 20 times from some pretty high heights over the past year that I've owned it and it still works as well as it did when I first bought it. The thing is like a friggin' rock.

The fact that it has BOTH and FM and AM band is great, given that most players offer only FM. For a news/talk radio fan like me, that's important. Other features, like the G-Protection that ensures that the CD will never, ever skip because its jostled, or the fact that it's designed so that the entire player can be operated with your right hand make it one of the best CD players I've ever owned.

This is the ultimate portable CD player. Genius design.

For CD play, this gadget uses G-Protection anti-skip technology. I have yet to hear a skip while doing any activity. There are two settings: Low for better sound and high for better skip protection. Personally, I cannot detect a difference.

This thing even has FM and AM! And it works as well as I anticipated it should. Presets galore.

Going beyond radio, Sony stuffed in weather band. Just hit the WB button and you have 7 channels of weather band. This is great for traveling.

Going beyond weather band, TV signals can be picked up with this thing! Just hit the TV button and you can hear 12 channels (2-13) of television! Now you can hear the audio of your favorite show from anywhere.

Sony combines a CD player, AM FM receiver, weather band, and television audio receiver all in one. If you were to purchase all these devices separately, you would pay hundreds!

Included is the usual features such as the hold switch, volume, headphone jack, etc...
No line-out port, but those are unnecessary anyway.

But Sony didn't stop there. This bad boy is water resistant - having a rubber seal going all around. Combined with the metal latch, this is perfect for jogging. The lid is not going to open accidentally like with other players. All the openings (phone jack and power) have rubber coverings, making it completely sealed.

This thing kicks out major bass. With 3 settings, it's more intense than with other players I've owned.

Probably the best thing I like about this is the hand strap on the back. You can slip your hand in and go for a walk without worrying about it falling out of your pocket.

While it's on your hand, your thumb is right next to the joystick, which can be easily moved to change tracks or turn on/off the unit.

Now you may notice the absence of a "resume" setting. This unit has an automatic resume feature. Turn it off and it starts right where you ended when turned on, unless, of course, you open it.

Included are small headphones that fit right in the ear. I don't like them. I don't know why Sony put them in. They have ok sound, and they don't stay on the head very well. But you will never buy a CD player that comes with decent headphones. It's like the law of electronics. Buy the S2 headphones that go behind your head. The style matches the player and they sound great.

This is also great for the kids for those long trips. With so many features and receiving capabilities, it will keep them occupied for hours. Battery life is very long and the unit is built with sturdy construction.

It may be a bit pricey, but who cares. Buy it. I love it, you will too.

This is the best Cd player I've own! You can listen to the Radio, PLay cds,
Even listen to TV Stations! The "Sony D-FS601 S2 Sports CD Walkman Portable Disc Player" is the best birthday present!

First of let me state that I have been seriously considering XM radio for about a year and a half now.

When I first started researching the service I was put off by the high entry level costs just to get going. By that I am referring to the Tuner... the Main CD/Radio player..antenna installation etc. By the time I was finished adding everything up I was looking at about 800 to 900 dollars.

So I just stopped thinking about it until last November when Delphi released the Roady their all in one receiver. Let me tell you, this little silver bullet is everything and more than I expected.

It comes packaged with everything you need to have XM radio up and running in literally minutes. The package includes a cassette adapter for those of you that have that seldom used device in your car or truck.

For those of you who can't utilize that feature you can use a FM wireless adapter that is included for free currently through July 2004 through many retailers.

The sound quality for the Roady will vary depending on which method you choose for connecting. There are four ways of connecting this to your system the first being the best and so on.

1. Direct Connect--Will require you purchasing an adapter cable a PIE cable or Blitzsafe cable, if your head unit has an AUX input. Most newer cars have an aux or cd changer input. My Toyota has one and the cable can be had online for about $70.00

2.Cassette Adapter-- Sound quality is very good just a bit below Direct Connect in my honest opinion

3.FM Modulator-- Good sound

4.Wireless FM Modulator Good sound as well may be better in some areas than others

The portability of the unit is another big selling point to me on this item. I purchased through www.xmradio.com a home kit which comes with an antenna, power supply, stand,RCA cables, for $28.00 delivered.

The only reason I am giving it 4 stars instead of 5 is the connectors and connector location on the side of the unit. I take my in and out of my car frequently and the connectors seem a bit flimsy, although in all fairnesss I have had no problems yet.

My costs incurred are less than $150.00 for home/car so that to me equals an unbelievable value.

When you get right down to it it is a no brainer..... this unit is the best bang for the buck out there right now for Satellite Radio.

Overall, this is a very nice little receiver. I was suprised at how good it sounded. Using the cassette adapter, the sound quality is far better than the ground-based broadcasts through regular FM radio. The unit has a lot of features for tuning and is easy to use but the buttons and tuning wheel are small and require nimble fingers - a little distracting while driving.

The XM programming is great and no commercials!

The installation is easy - no tools or special skills required. Although the 20' antenna wire was just barely long enough to route through the back of my SUV and out the rear tail gate window onto the roof - just a few inches to spare. If you have a really large SUV such as a Suburban or Expedition, you may not have enough antenna wire to do a rear roof-mount installation.

Overall, definitely worth the [$$$].

My title says it all. The only complaints I have are the following:
Lack of accessories. Would be nice to have a boombox it can plug into.
The stupid external decorating accessories is just that, stupid. I stuck on the blue cover, and the blue rubber band. A few months later the blue rubber band was pulling on the corner button that it helped aid in changing my settings. It's safe to say I took that off.

But I have to give the unit a five for as the unit itself, it's great. So if you buy this I highly recommend get the remote with it, and if you want to hear it in the garage, bedroom, or whatever, get the home kit too.

Enjoy!

I currently own four Philips "boomboxes." The best sound was from our older AZ2000/17 (unfortunately, not purchased from Amazon.com). The CD player quit working in less than two years. To that point, it was one of the greatest sounding portable players I've ever heard - very close to BOSE quality sound, without that ultra high cost. In purchasing the 'newer' AZ2025/17 (from Amazon.com), I noticed a very close resemblence in the sound quality to our AZ2000/17, but the unit is not the most attractive piece of audio equipment that I've seen. Although, the best part is that GREAT Philips tuner system. I buy Philips because their tuners are unusually strong, and seem to pick up stations with more clarity, from far greater distances than any other portable on the market. Not to mention the terrific sound quality! Philips' older model "boomboxes" tended to have fragile, easily breakable antennae clips though, so beware. I'm now investing in the much more attractive, later model, Philips AZ2035/17 (again from Amazon.com). Hope that this continuous "upgrade" will produce the same (or better) sound qualities of the past AZ2000/17 (now defunct) and the AZ2025/17 models.

I got my Phillips Boombox CD/radio/cassette player yesterday ahead of the schedule and in good condition. Thank you Amazon.com. I had narrowed my choice down to 2 or 3 choices and hesitated because of the negative reviews about a broken lid; cheesy remote, etc. but I decided to order this one mainly because of the one comment made about good radio reception which was not given in relation to other CD/Radio boomboxes. I do not get good radio reception where I live and I have never been able to get King 98.1 classical station very good at all. Now I get quite good reception and am very happy about that and the great sound of radio and CD. I have not played a cassette but ear phones work great too. I hope it will prove to be very reliable as I love it. The little toy like remote has STOP on it but very strange not to be able to turn on and off the whole system via remote. I am close to it when I use it so visuals and distance of remote no problem.

Kudos to Phillips for the great radio reception both FM and AM and quality of sound. I value clear sound over just volume but volume is great too. I also like the unique and (not all black) looks. Today is day 1 of use and hope to have many more without a problem.

Up2ulovdov

I punished my boombox for well over two years, strapping it in the right seat of my city tractor--very rough ride--and also in my linehaul rig running twelve hour days dragging triples up and down Interstate 5. I think I finally wasted one channel of the amp, or perhaps broke a connection. I've lost one speaker. I constantly ran the volume wide open with the bass boost on it's second setting with no distortion, so I wasn't worried about frying the amp, but perhaps I did anyhow? I was very pleased with the sound quality. Sony and other manufacturers in the same pricepoint market couldn't hold a candle to my Phillips. Now I've got to find a new model. . .

I bought and returned this item. Very poor quality and all parts seemed cheap.

I live in city of St. Petersburg where the location of radio stations not that much far from me. And here is the PRO and CONS of this Sangean ATS-606AP:

PROS:
- Good designed pocket size radio
- Very good speaker
- Very good features
- Good FM/AM reception even without using antenna
- Come with complete accessory: case, earphones, External Antenna, International AC plug
- Also run on 3 AA batteries- easy to find

CONS:
- LW- no reception at all
- SW- Bad/fair even with external antenna
- The square designed and the position of the up and down tune buttons can accidentally break easy

Above all if you are SW listener, I don't think this radio help you much. And to spent $... for only good on FM/AM, not practical to me. But if you don't mind above your pocket and all the issues listed in " CONS " this stylish radio is a good start. I would give this radio 4 stars.

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I have owned this particular model of Sangean, as well as several others, for a number of years. Sangean radios, in my experience, have excellent sound (for their size), have great reception, and are quite easy to use.

I listen to classical music, international news, and domestic news while at my home in radio/tv/cellphone no-mans land. Only the Sangeans work up here. Our pretty little Grundig Porsche radio has to live at the city house to be useful.

Back to the 606 - the metal and plastic case of the 606 is quite solid, handsome, and compact. The built-in stand is both very convenient and angles the radio perfectly for easy viewing of the LCD at counter/table/desk height.

The sound quality is terrific, considering it is a single driver of maybe 2.5". Sound is full, dynamic, lively, remarkably rich, and very fast. Bass is lacking, as you would expect over a radio with such a small driver.

The 606 has one nasty habit, which is that if you plug it in, and it has batteries in it, it will drain the batteries instead of using the wall power. You must take the batteries out of it before it will use the AC. Mine is a fairly early one (it uses the european power adapter with a US adapter on it), so this may have been fixed.

As mantioned, this is my 6th or so Sangean, and the whole line is well built (except perhaps the 322) and they all sound great. I highly recommend them all.

At first I had it hanging under the shower head where it would occasionally get a splash. On the 3rd or 4th shower water got into it and it quit working. I put it in the bedroom for a couple of weeks to dry out and it worked again. Then I put it on the window sill in the shower where it would rarely get water on it but it didn't last long there either. I let it dry out again and put it on a self over the sink in the bathroom where it would never get wet but apparently the steam condensed inside it because there was water in it again (I could see tiny little drops on the inside of the display). After that I threw it a way. Needless to say I was very disappointed in a Shower Radio I couldn't even keep in the bathroom let a lone the shower itself.

This shower radio cost a bit more than other shower radios for a reason. It works! It's built solid and has lots of nice features. The volume knob is easy to use with wet hands. The digital tuner tunes 'right on' and pulls in the stations I've had a hard time getting with other radios. There are 5 presets for each band AM,FM1,FM2,TV, and Weather that make it EZ to change stations when all soaped up. The digital clock is a nice feature so you know how late you are. It also has a timer(good for kitchen use I guess) and several auto off delays. The speaker sounds nice too and isn't tinny. I tried several other shower radios before this one and they were all junk. I am very happy with this one. Well worth the extra cost. I guess you get what you pay for.

If you've ever bought a shower radio (I've bought & tried several), you know that they all s*#k. This is the first one that DOESN'T s*#k. Not the slightest bit. This one is fantastic.

It's got a digital tuner - no dealing with tiny tuning knobs and guessing if you're on the right station. It's got an accurate digital clock. It's got weather band. It's got tv audio (channels 2 thru 13). It's got an antenna wire with a suction cup at the end so you can actually better tune in your station. All the function buttons are simple & waterproofed. The sound is great - for a mono shower radio. It's got a heavy duty string to hang it on your shower head, or just set it on any flat surface - it's solid and will stay still. And to top it off, 3 C batteries in this thing last forever - instead of a single 9 volt or a few AA's that other shower radios usually have. Sony did good here.

Just buy it. Then buy another whenever you can't think of a good gift to get someone - people LOVE getting this as a gift. I've given several.

As a longtime user of the Sangean DT-300VW radio, I needed to
purchase another radio and didn't need the weather band. I have
been extremely satisfied with the DT-300VW except that the coating
on the metal faceplate wears off very quickly (the radio does not
age gracefully).

I received the DT-210V only eight days ago and had similarly high
expectations. I am extremely disappointed and am planning
to return this radio as I write this review.

My disappointment concerns the method of using the memory presets.
Incredibly, the memory presets are not the default method of tuning
for this radio. The user must depress the recall button on the side
of the radio in order to place the radio in memory preset selection
mode. An "M" on the display begins to flash allowing you to select
the presets for a short period of time. The radio then returns to
manual tuning mode automatically. On my radio, the recall button
is also very imprecise making it difficult to ensure you are in memory
preset tuning mode without holding the button down for an extended
period of time.

This is an incredible engineering error by Sangean! How many
car radios (or any radios) do you know that do not have memory
preset tuning as the default or allow you to select that default.
I even wonder if Sangean only found this error at the last minute
and didn't want to recall the radios in the distribution pipeline. I
mention this because the photo on the back of the DT-210V's box
shows the graphic "SEL" adjacent to the button instead on
the term "RECALL" that is on the actual radio. A select function
would make more sense allowing the user to select either
manual tuning or memory preset tuning.

In my opinion, this is a grievous engineering error and I would
not recommend this radio in any circumstance (at least
until Sangean corrects the problem).

I've had a Sangean DT-110 radio for the past year (under the Radio Shack brand) which I thought was very good, except I wanted one w/a speaker, and wanted to try and get better AM reception (since I'd heard so much about the DT200). I ended up getting the DT210 which I'm quite happy with. I love listening to distant AM stations and in actuality this one isn't that much different on AM than the 110 is (but is still far better than any other pocket radio). I also wanted better FM reception, b/c the 110 has TERRIBLE station separation and bleed-through (strong stations are picked up on weaker frequencies all over the dial). Well, the DT210 is only SLIGHTLY better with that.

What should be noted, is regarding the presets. You can preset 10 (count `em.. 10) AM - FM and TV stations. The box says 15 for FM, but that's NOT for THIS model!!!! (go figure) I like the quality of the radio, it's slim design and it's speaker. It has the same features as the DT110 and the belt clip is great too.

Overall, a very good unit.

I walk a lot in an urban setting, and like to spend the time listening to the radio, including some weak FM stations. All of the radios I've tried had difficulty getting the weak stations. Setting the DX/Local switch to local helped, but there were parts of my walk where I just couldn't get the stations I want.

This radio has solved that problem. The reception is rock-solid on both AM and FM (even without a DX/local switch). It's much better than the four or five other radios that I've tried. (I can actually get some AM stations inside a public bus in an underground station! Beat that!)

I took away one star because the controls could be better designed. The volume control knob is too small, making it overly sensitive and hard to work with gloves on. And to use preset stations, you have to push a button before you can browse through the presets. After a short time, it resets to manual, so you have to push the button again to change stations again. It's annoying for station-flippers.

Despite these minor annoyances, I heartily recommend this radio to anyone looking for really good reception in an urban area. I haven't used it to get weak signals out in the boondocks, but I bet it would be good at that too.

I was very disappointed in the product. The volume for the radio was too low to hear with any outside noise and the CD player skipped often. This was given as a gift, which I was asked to return. I tried to use it myself and was amazed at the poor quality. However, on a positive note, full reimbursement was made without any hassle. Thumbs Up to Amazon - Thumbs down to Panasonic.

I've had this model for almost a year, and I don't have much negative things to say about this CD player. This is actually the SECOND Panasonic CD player I own, the first one was an older model purchased around seven years ago and still runs great, I'm expecting this one too will provide me many more years of faithful service. If you're the athletic type and worry about skipping, worry not. This model is equipped with a 40 seconds memory, I've used it while jogging, working out and tumbling down a hill(don't ask) and it never skipped a beat on me. If you listen to radio, you will fall in love with its built-in digital AM/FM tuner. Not too many portable CD players have a radio tuner built in? It also has a full-feature remote control (wire-based). Sound-wise, I have no complaints. All my favorite CDs sound crisp and powerful. Its Bass Boast system works very well. What else? The battery life is amazing. It runs for around twenty CDs on a pair of Everyday rechargeables. As good as it sounds, it's not perfect. The following is a few minor design faults I've experienced. The in-ear headphone came with the unit was literally a pain in the neck (well, in the ears). It was so uncomfortable I had to replace them with a same style Sony headphone. The switch between Random and Sequenced play is located UNDERNEATH THE LID! You have to actually open up the lid, and remove the CD to select between Random/Sequence. I know it's suppose to be a Sports model and all, but I'd still want to be random WHENEVER I want to. Don't know which crackhead enginneer came up with this brilliant design. Aside from the aforementioned problems, this model is perfect.

When I was looking for a CD player, I really wanted one that includes a built in AM/FM tuner. I looked around and this was the only one I could find at the time. It sounded great with good features and a built in AM/FM tuner. And I had the [money] to spend, so I bought it. This is a great product. I am very happy with the CD qualiy, and the only time I could make it skip was when I tryed to. And even then it was hard. The radio was very good with the ability to preset 30 CHANNELS. Thats a whole lot. The only thing I was later mad about was that three weeks later my friend bought a CD player with an AM/FM tuner for ... less. So lets go over this once more.

Pros- Great sound Quality AM/FM Tuner w/30 preset channels 40 second anti-skip memory X-SBS

Cons- Pricey Shuffle button under lid

Overall, this is a great product with awesome options, great skip prtection and a good AM/FM Tuner. The ony real bad thing is its price. But these kinds of CD players are not easy to come by.

My ATS-909 is so disappointing that I cant wait to return the thing. Its a shame, because the radio is very easy to use, easy to tune, and has many nice features.

So whats wrong? Its weak and the sound that comes out of it is poor.
The speaker makes everything in the SW bands sound blurry, dull, and mumbled. It doesnt matter how I tune it, where I set the gain, or whether I use the wide or narrow band. Doesnt pull in many stations either. My tiny analog Grundig Mini World 100 PE has a clearer sound and does a better job at pulling in stations. No joke. And the 100 PE only cost me .... I'm not sure I'd recommend the 100PE to anyone. Its analog, so you'd never be sure what frequency you had on. But atleast you'd be able to understand the broadcasts.

My other peeve with the ATS-909 is that it chewed up my 4AA batteries --and I've only had it for two days!

AM & FM work decently. But if thats all you want from a radio, why would you buy a portable shortwave receiver? You could spend you money getting an AM/FM radio thats both better AND cheaper. If you're interested in shortwave or SSB, buy something else. I am.

This is the finest Sangean shortwave radio on the market, and it is a worthy "competitor" to most of the finest portable shortwaves in the industry. I own many shortwave radios, including venerable entries by Sony and Grundig. And while this doesn't quite match the best of either company, Sangean's radio is respectable in many ways.

The radio's shortwave reception is more than adequate. A good external antenna always helps, but it also does fine with just the telescopic aerial. The Sangean's sensitivity could be favorably compared with the Sony ICF-2010, although the Sony is still champion. It also should be noted that the Sangean radios of the last 15 years or so share the same lineage with the older Sony ICF-2001, so the Sangean's performance is understandable.

The ATS-909 has very good FM reception with good adjacent signal rejection, and the Radio Data System (which automatically reads out some station IDs and other info on the LCD) performs well.

The Sangean features 306 programmable memory positions. There are 29 "pages" of 9 frequencies (261 total) allocated for shortwave. As an example, a page could be used for up to 9 frequencies of a chosen broadcaster, and the page can be assigned an 8-digit alphanumeric ID by the listener. I'm not a big fan of the "page" format, because I'd like to assign IDs to each frequency, not a whole block of nine. But, when you have hundreds of memory positions of keep track of, the page format does have its advantages.

I don't like having to select the FREQ button every time I want to directly tune into a frequency. I just want to punch the numbers and enter it. Having another step to remember makes tuning a pain at times.

Overall, I believe the Sangean ATS-909 is an excellent radio and a good value for shortwave listeners with a little experience. It could be slightly improved, but it's certainly worth a listen.

I own all the others, Kenwood, Grundig, etc. but SANGEAN ROCKS. I own 3 of these ATS-909's and I love everything about it: the layout of the buttons and knobs, the display is FANTASTIC, and the sound is AWESOME. For the money, you get it all. If you don't like the factory presets of all the SW Frequencies, program it the way YOU want it. The RDS is great! You can lable the stations with the call sign or whatever you like. Buy it, use it, learn to operate it like a pro, and you with respect this radio for the rest of your life.

I have owned 1 motorola Talkabout Distance for about a month and a half. Two weeks ago I recieved my Talkabout 5100's. I brought all three radios on vacation to Sandestin, Florida with me last week. It is a huge place, and a lot of people were using FRS there. My channel choices were limited, but interference was a problem only 2 or 3 times. The choices were limted by both the Distance radio, which does have the 38 interference eliminator codes but only channels 1-7. And the choices were limted by the 5100's which have all 14 available channels, but no interference eliminator codes. Therefore, I had only 7 channels to chose from. My point is that interference elimator codes would have been appreciated by me on this trip. On the other hand, there have been a couple of times I got to communicate with parties not originally intended to be in my talkgroup. Had I had Interfernce codes available to me and in use, I would not have been able to communicate with other people who I just happened upon, and sometimes it is fun to do so. So, I think that the codes can be a nice feature but definately are not necessary, even in places where FRS is in moderate to heavy use by others. The range of the 5100's is noticably shorter than that of the Distance radios. These are the only two models of FRS radios I have ever used, so I cannot compare the 5100 to other radios very much. But I will say that if you're contemplating on getting some radios with extra features, I say, for what? Who needs a compass, or a thermometer or barometer on a radio. There was no instance in which I thought, "Man, I really wish that my two way radio had an altimeter." If you pay more for a two-mile range FRS radio (Unless you are getting a rechargeable battery), that is probably all you are paying for--useless features. If you want to know what time it is, look at your watch. The only feature that some of the more expensive radios may have that I can imagine using would be the FM radio to allow you to listen to music. But what is that going to do but undermind your original intension of having effective two-way radio communications by running down the battery in your communications device. Stick to the basics. Spend more money on a two way radio only for two reasons. Number one--a rechargable battery. Rechargeable batteries for two-way radios are almost necessary. I use standard AA rechargeable batteries and a battery charger from Radio Shack for my Talkabout 5100's. Reason number 2 to spend more, for a radio--for a longer range. For example, the Motorola Talkabout Distance.

I love these walkie talkies. My family has a set of 4. We have the old one's which are discontinued and we just got these ones. My friend and I take them on the slopes with us while we are snowboarding so we can talk to our parents while we're out on different runs. Before we had them we would always have to meet somewhere at a certain time, which was a big hassle. Once we got the talkabouts we didn't have to meet as often. It's funny to hear the other peoples code names and hear them talk. Theres enough channels to have a private talk with your parents. The only problem is you don't know if another person is on the channel with you. Unless they are talking.

I purchased this so me and my gf can talk when we go to some event. She's a little embarrassed to be talking on it, but definitely does help. Never had one before so can't compare to anything else. I can easily talk about 2 blocks away.

Sometimes fun to start sending out messages and talking to someone random. I don't think that's what it's suppose to be used for, but oh well.

I have owned 1 motorola Talkabout Distance for about a month and a half. Two weeks ago I recieved my Talkabout 5100's. I brought all three radios on vacation to Sandestin, Florida with me last week. It is a huge place, and a lot of people were using FRS there. My channel choices were limited, but interference was a problem only 2 or 3 times. The choices were limted by both the Distance radio, which does have the 38 interference eliminator codes but only channels 1-7. And the choices were limted by the 5100's which have all 14 available channels, but no interference eliminator codes. Therefore, I had only 7 channels to chose from. My point is that interference elimator codes would have been appreciated by me on this trip. On the other hand, there have been a couple of times I got to communicate with parties not originally intended to be in my talkgroup. Had I had Interfernce codes available to me and in use, I would not have been able to communicate with other people who I just happened upon, and sometimes it is fun to do so. So, I think that the codes can be a nice feature but definately are not necessary, even in places where FRS is in moderate to heavy use by others. The range of the 5100's is noticably shorter than that of the Distance radios. These are the only two models of FRS radios I have ever used, so I cannot compare the 5100 to other radios very much. But I will say that if you're contemplating on getting some radios with extra features, I say, for what? Who needs a compass, or a thermometer or barometer on a radio. There was no instance in which I thought, "Man, I really wish that my two way radio had an altimeter." If you pay more for a two-mile range FRS radio (Unless you are getting a rechargeable battery), that is probably all you are paying for--useless features. If you want to know what time it is, look at your watch. The only feature that some of the more expensive radios may have that I can imagine using would be the FM radio to allow you to listen to music. But what is that going to do but undermind your original intension of having effective two-way radio communications by running down the battery in your communications device. Stick to the basics. Spend more money on a two way radio only for two reasons. Number one--a rechargable battery. Rechargeable batteries for two-way radios are almost necessary. I use standard AA rechargeable batteries and a battery charger from Radio Shack for my Talkabout 5100's. Reason number 2 to spend more, for a radio--for a longer range. For example, the Motorola Talkabout Distance.

I love these walkie talkies. My family has a set of 4. We have the old one's which are discontinued and we just got these ones. My friend and I take them on the slopes with us while we are snowboarding so we can talk to our parents while we're out on different runs. Before we had them we would always have to meet somewhere at a certain time, which was a big hassle. Once we got the talkabouts we didn't have to meet as often. It's funny to hear the other peoples code names and hear them talk. Theres enough channels to have a private talk with your parents. The only problem is you don't know if another person is on the channel with you. Unless they are talking.

I purchased this so me and my gf can talk when we go to some event. She's a little embarrassed to be talking on it, but definitely does help. Never had one before so can't compare to anything else. I can easily talk about 2 blocks away.

Sometimes fun to start sending out messages and talking to someone random. I don't think that's what it's suppose to be used for, but oh well.