Radio Reviews

This stereo is really good if you need to bring it with you a lot. I've had mine for about a year and it still works as good as it did when it came out of the box. The only problem I had was that the antenna broke after the second week of having it, but still get good reception on the radio. It sounds really good, the bass on it is really deep and doesn't distort the sound, even at high volume.

I purchased this boombox just as a hurricane was threatening (the third of the season) and wanted a decent battery powered radio. The unit was well made and extremely convenient to haul around given the handle configuration. Additionally, the tuner's ability to capture even weak/distant fm radio signals was a great bonus. As always, Sony comes through and although I agree that you do pay a little more for the Sony brand, the quality is always there.

Before purchasing this unit I searched many sites on line for reviews, and kept finding the same 3 reviews, as if they were copied and spread from site to site because no one else took the time to review this product. So I will now add my thoughts, recently having purchased the Sony ZS-X1 boombox.

I will admit that I hesitated a bit before buying this because of several negative reviews I found. There's a review floating around saying the sound quality is terrible. The person did say that they were using it outside constructing decks or whatever, and admitted it sounded better at lower levels. I think I can understand how this boombox will not rock anyone's world outside, which is actually a difficult task with any portable player, given the ambient noise of the outdoors be it urban or suburbia.

My review is based on this; I am replacing a boombox I had in my kitchen, and I usually play music while doing the dishes (some ambient noise in itself, yet of course in an enclosed environment). I think this Sony unit sounds excellent. The 'megabass' feature truly does add bass that my last TWO units NEVER had... I believe my former units were in the $45-65 price range. This Sony is definitely a bang for the buck device, and I am truly happy with the sound and physical design.

I had no need for a waterproof device, yet my Sony sports Discman always outlasted any other brand due to the anti-shock, rugged construction, so I figured the boombox should also have a long lifespan. Are you paying for a name? Possibly... but it certainly is one I trust.

I confess that I cannot accurately comment on the longevity of this product, since I've only had the unit a few days. However, I just wanted to add a few thoughts to let people know that this device sounds excellent and best of all has a little low end punch to make music lovers of any genre enjoy. I bought the boombox based on Sony's reputation and my previous experiences with their products, and I have no regrets. Remember, it's a portable boombox, not a home theatre system.

I've had 2 Cobra FRS-250 radios for several years, and I loved them. Being impressed with their quality, functionality and performance on ski slopes, I decided to stick with the brand and purchased a pair of PR-1100 when I needed 2 more radios. After some time of use, here are my impressions:

Pros:

- Very good effective range. The signal was strong enough to punch through 22 stories of a concrete building! I can also communicate between 2 buildings about 2 miles away from each other, through multiple walls on each end.

- Full coverage of FRS band for full compatibility with FRS radios.

- Traditional Cobra signal strength meter.

- Pretty good sound quality.

- Switchable transmitter output between 500 mW and full 2 W on GMRS channels

- Long battery life.

- Useful features like 10 NOAA weather channels.

Cons:

-The functions are hard to get to. For example, it takes 7 presses of the Mode button to get to the scan function that I use fairly often, 10 presses to disable the roger beep, 12 presses to get to the stopwatch.

- Useless gadgets like compass, clock, and stopwatch that serve no practical purpose but overcomplicate the menu, making it harder to get to useful features like scaner and channel memory.

- For some stupid reason, Cobra decided not to use their traditional cradle charging system in this model. Even though the radio can use the same FA-BP NiMH battery pack as most other Cobra radios, it cannot be charged in a standard Cobra charger such as FA-CR because it lacks metal contacts on the back of the battery compartment. The included wall charger must be used instead.

- The charger is not a rapid charger, and it takes up to 18 hours to fully charge the battery. Other Cobra radios that use the FA-CR cradle can be rapid charged in 2 hours!

- To make matters worse, the radio turns off when the charger is plugged in, which renders it unuseable while the battery is being charged - for 18 hours!!! It is impossible to have it on a continuous stand-by, unless you are willing to take your new radio apart and disable the autoturnoff feature by soldering together 2 contacts in the charger jack, like I did.

- When you take the radio apart, you discover that there is no way in hell it can be waterproof. Splashproof? Maybe. Waterproof? Nah. There's a rubber gasket around the battery compartment, but this is only there to impress the user. There are no gaskets between the two plastic halves of the case, and the seams will inevitably leak. Submerge it in water for 5 seconds and see what happens, I dare you!

- Transmission volume is not very loud. You need to hold the unit close to your face and speak up. The mic gain is insufficient and non-adjustable.

- No removeable antenna.

- No privacy (voice scramble) feature that old Cobra FRS radios used to have. Looks like Cobra is not offering it in any of the new models. A shame.

The verdict:

A poorly engineered, cheaply made, hard to use but fairly functional FRS/GMRS radio.

Hi!

I have obtained pair of PR1100 for about $65 via eBay few weeks ago. Because I've read that Cobra antennas are not very good I have done little modification - I have installed a socket for removable antenna (simply using glue). Instead of small 7cm lengh Cobra antenna I installed 5/8 selfdone telescopic antenna. In full size it has about 37cm and in short size it is about 14cm. Before giving detailed data about range few remarks about features:
- PR1100 seems to be PR950 with compass installed (the same circuit board - only compass module installed)
- compass - rather toy (only 8 positions - N, NW, W, ...) - for the difference in price between PR950 and PR1100 Cobra could install full 360deg compass I think
- vibra aler, bells, memory, scann - very usefull
- VOX - super - I will use it as baby-phone
- sound quality - very good - if You plug in simply walkman earphones and Your wife is wispering to You when You are walking along beach is amaizing experience :)
- charg socket - very usefull but it takes long time to charge bateries
- assuming that Cobra gave 2W output power on 4 1.5V bateries (6V) installing 4 rechargable bateries (1.2V) gives 4.8 V (80%). So the power is about 64% (1.3W)
- power indicator is very fine but using rachargable batteries You can see that indicator shows 4 dashes and few minutes later 1 and radio displays "battery low" - but it is common rachargable batteries parameter
So now about tests:
- I did it on the Polish seaside - my wife with my 8 months old son were standing on the little hill in town Wladyslawowo and me with my father were driving along cape Hel - all test were done with me standing by the water - so there were no obstacles - only water. Wether - a little bit foggy
- 1st point was about 3.8km - short antennas and low power gave 1 dash, long antennas and low power 2, and long antennas and high power 3 dashes on level indicator
- 2nd point was in town Chalupy 6.5km - long antenna and high power 2 dashes (in car 0 dashes - only antenna icon was blinking)
- 3rd point was near town Kuznice - 10km - long antenna, high power - 1/2 dashes
- 4th point was neat town Jastarnia - 15km - long antenna, hing power - 0/1 dash
- the last point was behind Jastarnia - 18km - no response from my wife - but the was obstacle (small headland) and my wife complained that radio showed battery low.
- probably max range (using range extender button - removing squelch) is about 20km

On the beach - 3km - long antennas, high power - radio showed 1/2 dashes - I had no force to walk farther with my son sitting on m shoulders :)

In the city - difficult to say - because each building changes the range extremly - for example, when my wife is sitting in our flat on 3rd floor, the windows are situated on East/West walls and I'm in the park which is on the south we can achieve only 1.2km. Now I'm thinking about installing outdoor antenna.

In few words - I recommend this radio!

regards

Marek
PS. Thanks to my wife Beata who has to survive with my hobby :)

This product doesnt says if there is 1 or 2 radios included !
please help

I purchased a Midland 74105XL as a gift, but gave it a quick test to make sure all was well before wrapping it up, and it performed exactly as could be expected.

I compared it to an Oregon Scientific WR-8000 'All Hazards' portable and an Icom IC-M3A marine VHF handheld radio. Reception quality was good on the active weather channels in this area, however there weren't any alert warnings broadcast at the time, so I can't comment on that feature. The Midland was a bit better than the Oregon Scientific, probably due to it's telescoping antenna vs. the short 'rubber ducky' type on the WR-8000. The Icom being a transceiver, and having a more sensitive receiver was better than both. The AM/FM section of the 74105XL works as well as any inexpensive portable radio.

The build quality of the 74105XL is also typical of an inexpensive radio (and typical for Midland) - sort of cheap feeling, but perfectly adequate for tabletop use. I had posted a negative review here on Amazon.com on the similarly featured Midland WR10 All Hazards radio based on it's less than user-friendly design. Fortunately, the layout of the 74105XL is much more straightforward.

Something that's probably applicable to just about every All Hazards radio currently in use in the U.S. is the quality (or, lack of) artificial speech used for NOAA's weather radio broadcasts. Up until a couple years ago, the broadcasts were recorded by a real, live human. They have since been replaced by a computer synthesized voice, and it sounds just like what you might expect - very artificial. According to the NOAA weather radio site [...], they are currently in the process of upgrading all of their stations with a newer technology, more natural sounding speech system. They even have sample audio files available for audition.

The 74105XL does not feature the SAME specific area warning system, so it's probably best suited to milder climes or environments where a highly localized warning may not be as essential. As a good, basic weather radio, the 74510XL does the job. By the way, the recipients I gave the radio to are happy with it!

this product is one of the most important things u should have if u want u your your family to be safe

This weather radio has it all!! Auto Alert, AM/FM, 7 Channels, Great Size. Bottom Line is it saved me last year during hurricane season. 5 Stars!!!

with all the features this thing offered for such a low price. I like the design and didn't even understand everything that it offered when I bought it. My only complaint is that it eats batteries. I use mine to listen to books on tape while cleaning the house and exercising. I hit the off button and lay the thing down to go to work but come back to it eight hours later and see that it came back on again and the battery indicator shows only half strength. I have learned to open the battery compartment and take one battery out when storing it. It's a bit of an inconvenience, but not an unsolvable problem.

ANOTHER GREAT SONY SPORTS PRODUCT... KEEP 'EM COMING - YOU WILL LOVE IT... AND ITS LIGHT! :-)

I really think this product was worth the money. There are a lot of presets, and the tv and weather features are really useful. I also like the auto reverse feature it has when it plays cassette tapes. And in the middle of side A, for example, you can instantaneously switch to side be because of the rubberized stick thing that you can use to change sides. It's extremely durable too. I've dropped it more than five times already from a height of about 3 feet and it still works perfectly.

I like this radio.
Good points are
1. tough antena
2. came with nimh batteries
3. Good range through trees
4. earbud
5. very easy to open up the squelch and keep it open with having to keep pushing a buttion
Bad points are
1. Belt clip is easly broken
2.VOX dose not work with the earbud
3. When scanning the radio dose not show the sub coad of the radios it picks up.
4. can not connect a exturnal antena
5. No lanyard loop

If you get a deal on one of thease go for it. Other wize go for one of the new 2 watt mortorla radios. Or get a midland G11. I can't say I would buy them again but they are overall good radios.

After considering the uniden GMRS 480 and Audiovox 1535, I chose the Cobra GMRS 900-2-DX because of size, the layout of buttons,overall feel, two year warranty, and more price competative if you didn't want the charger etc.. All of the ones I considered appeared to be 2watt with similar specs. (althought the Audiovox may have been 1.8 watt). Both the Uniden and Audiovox did have NOAA but since my wife and I were going to use them mostly in mall shoppoing, weather would not be a problem. The Cobra could fit in my shirt pocket or wife's purse with no problem. The longer antenna in the uniden may not have been as convenient to carry although may get a little better range and audiovox's screen and buttons were smaller, which may have caused a problem with my bad eyesight. The Cobra range is around 1.3 to 2.0 miles,depending on terrain, obstacles etc., sound is adeqauate but high frequency lacking. Compared to FRS I can achieve 4 times the distance since I could only get 0.5 - 0.8 miles with a 0.5watt FRS radio. I don't think you will ever achieve 5 mile range or even 3 miles unless you are on top of a 5 mile mountain talking to someone on the ground. Overall I am pleased with the Cobra. The FCC license fee is a bit pricey at $.. but that's life.

This is a nice machine. Lotsa features, I get pretty good reception. Bought mine at Farm & Fleet for 60 bucks a piece. Figuring that you can easily spend that on a 500mw radio, why get anything else. As previously written by another reviewer, the sound quality lacks but is still audible. It is missing the highs so it can be a little muffled. Would I buy it again? Yes.

The Freetalk FRS handsets I purchased seem to work fine (range was OK and voice was clear). However, after time I detected a design flaw that is most frustrating - the batterries drain fairly rapidly when the unit is turned off. The resistance across the batteries terminals when the unit is allegedly off lends to frustration when you reach for the radios in times of need. I sent the service center a request for help that has gone unanswered. Poor service and poor battery performance means - Don't buy these.

These radios seem to give the most bang for the buck!!! People with kids will surely love these. I have field tested my radios and I cannot complain at all. The only con someone may have is the lack of sub codes. The reception was clearer than I had expected. I like the ability to use regular batteries instead of the rechargeable battery in some radios...

I needed two radios for my kids to use while I have my Motorola. I wanted something good quality without worrying about my kids breaking a $100 radio. These offer the same performance as anything I have used and I DON'T NEED TO WORRY AS MUCH IF THE GET LOST OR STOLEN. These are the best for the money.

I bought these to use at an event - the reception wouldn't carry across the building, and when it did work the quality of the sound was pretty poor.

I bought fifteen sets to use at our school. They've been knocked around and dropped and still work pretty good. Some of the units pick up a lot of static especially as the battery starts to run low. We still can't figure out all the features and the display. The displays are confusing and some of the features appear to be meaningless or possibly aren't working. The battery indicator doesn't seem to work consistently. Some of the transmit buttons are stubborn and have to be pressed HARD. One of the transmit buttons don't work at all. The belt clips pop off, (resulting in the unit hitting the floor) especially if you're fat and you bend over. Hah! Anyway, the bottom line is that for the cost, they've been serving their purpose.

This product has quite a number of things going for it. Firstly it's an excellent FRS radio with excellent range (have not been able to test the two mile range 'cause of my terrain), coupled with the headphone set it allows for ease of communication for a variety of purposes, I use it for security in-store as well and they work marvellously. Also, with the drop-in charger and rechargeable batteries the savings gained in the original great price is magnified 100X over a similar motorolla product, which does not even have battery rationing and is certaily not rechargeable! (these average 2AA batteries per day on continous use!) Ideal choice for the budget conscious shopper who wants a greater bang for the buck.

I bought it last week but I am a little bit disappoinnted. Why:

1. the sound is pretty flat. The XBS is powerful but the rest is like a background. No equalizer is available so nothing can help.

2. the behind the neck headphones are horrible. They do not fit to your ears so you do not hear the music if you are outside or not in a quiet room. Tehy also slip and I have the feeling they are made for big headed people with big enough ears like Shrek for example.

3. Without a remote control you will find it dificult to operate because you have to take it out everytime you want to adjust the volume or skip forward. The buttons are small and almost the same so there is no way to adjust it without taking it out of your pocket.

4. The radio is good even though you cannot listen to it were there is no coverage.

Overall it is good if you are not a sound quality maniac like me. I have a cheaper RCA which sounds better. Changing the headphones won't help either.

General quality of the player is good. Of course the FM tuner will not work wewll, portable ones with antennas built into the player never do. And the reason they invented the CD player was to solve that problem. But every other aspect is good. I listen to it on our boat in choppy water, no skips yet. The only problem I have had is that the latch on the cover has broken. Everyone I see with this player has a piece of tape there too. It seems to be a design flaw.

This is a great discman. Now I am not an expert on discmans, since I have only owned about 4, contacting this one, in my life. They were a Sony, Fishman, Sony and now a Panasonic. Normaly I only buy Sony for my electrics. Now Sony is still a great electric company. But since I just bought a VCR\DVD from Panasonic, and it worked so well, I figured this one would to. And in my opinion and some of my friends' opinion it is great. Ok now more about this discman. No. 1, I feel it is very easy to operate, in you read the directions. Also it is easy to turn it off, just press and hold down 'Stop.' Also after you turn it off or press Stop or Pause, once you press play again, it will start from the exact second, it ended on. No. 2, it runcs on 2 AA batteries. This is not only a discman, but a AM\FM radio. It can up to 20 stations on FM and 10 stations on AM. This discman can play CDs, MP3 CD, audio CD-R, and audio CD-RW, but not ID3 tags. This plays up to 75 hrs of MP3 and up to 33 hrs of CD music. So in this review's opinion, this is a great buy and will work.

Many aspects of the unit seemed good but I returned the one I ordered because in some locations in my apartment the radio received some type of commercial radio or TV signal. The audio coming from the radio was clearly not from a weather radio station. My older Radio Shack weather radio does not have this problem.

This is a wonderful radio. Most of the problems discussed by prior people are not problems at all. Just read the directions carefully and you will have a great experience with this radio.

The only downside is that this radio does not allow you to adjust the backlight length. The four seconds or so that it stays lit is not enough sometimes.

Overall, this is the best weather radio I have ever owned.

After reading the previous reviews for this product, I was a bit weary. However, after the purchase, I was quite impressed. The controls work fine, even in "silent" mode. No faint broadcasts. I wonder if that person was too close to the transmitter?? Radio controls are nice and easy to program. Reception is very good with minimal distortion on all bands. The couple of things I did notice that I would prefer would be that the backlight stay on just a bit longer, 4 seconds on mine. The other would be to display the alert's effective time. That time is not displayed, but the alert light stays lit for the effective time. All in all, a very good price to pay for safety!

I bought this cd alarm clock a month ago and it has been working out pretty well. I use and really like the automatic display dimming feature, which brightens the display when there's lots of light and turns it way down in the dark. The FM/AM reception is pretty good and actually better than my Kenwood home theater receiver. The dual alarm feature was important to me when I was shopping for an alarm clock, and this product has a handy triple alarm feature. I am able to wake up to random tracks on a cd I made specifically to wake up to (although you can wake up to the same specific track if you want.) I also love and use the "Gentle Sleep" feature, so I can go to sleep listening to the radio.

One of the cons is that the display can be difficult to read from across the room and when in bed, if you're not on the exact horizontal plane as the alarm clock. However, these issues don't bother me too much because I'm used to checking the time on my watch or phone, and in bed, it doesn't bother me to have to raise my head to see the clock. I'd actually rather not see exactly what time it is all the time on one of those more sleepless nights, as I'm sure a lot of people can appreciate. I also like it to be as dark as possible when I sleep, so an overly bright display was a concern. This unit, while it doesn't dim completely, does not bother me at night.

The only issue that I consider a major one since I'm pretty picky about speaker quality and sound, is that the tiny speakers on this system (I think there are perhaps 3) are crap and start to pop and crackle when the bass level is turned up more than half way and you don't even have the volume that high. But alarm clocks are not known for their great sound, however I'd expect more from Sony at the price you pay for this unit. A workaround for this clock and actually any other with a headphone jacks, is to use that jack for a pair of quality bookshelf/computer desktop-type speakers and I'm sure this product would then be perfect.

Overall: features -- execellent; ease-of-use -- excellent; sound options -- good; speaker quality -- poor.

I only give it 3 stars just because of hte speakers.

This is a great alarm clock. I have trouble waking up in the morning, but the alarm volume is perfect. I don't think that the controls are awkward at all and I have no problem turning it off in the morning. The sound is also adequate for an alarm clock (after all, you're not buying it for surround sound or digital quality...it's an alarm clock). The only flaws that I found are the lack of battery backup...not a problem for me because I live on the smae block as a school, so my power never goes out, but I can see how it would be an issue. I was also disappointed to find that the gentle wake feature only applies to the buzzer, not the CD and radio. I believe previous models had this feature for all alarms, and it was a big selling point for me, but my overall satisfaction with the product outweighs my displeasure with this. A great buy for the money. Not quite a Bose, but it is a Sony.

I looked everywhere for the perfect alarm clock and finally found it with this Sony ICF-CD863V.

This clock is EASY to use. You don't need to spend 1 hour reading the manual before getting it all set up. It's EASY!

The buzzer is AWESOME!!! I LOVE the buzzer! It's SOFT, it doesn't startle you while you are deep asleep, yet it is loud enough that you can hear. I love it.

The light on the display adjusts itself automatically depending on the darkness of the room. Sooo cool!

I love using the CD feature and the sound is just AMAZING!

This is just a VERY NEAT product for a great price compared to the competition. You will not go wrong when buying this alarm clock!