Objective: To help average radio listener choose a radio that gets superb reception at a reasonable price. Any of the five radios would be a good choice. The buyer has to choose a radio that meets his or her needs. Therefore, size of the radio, speaker sound, digital or analog tuning with or without presets, and the visual look and tactile feel are all personal preferences.
The requirements: Radios are priced between 90-150 dollars.
Number One: The Eton S350 Deluxe (formerly the Grundig S350) for $99. Looking like a military retro radio, this analog radio's big speaker easily fills a room and “grabs” hard-to-get stations. Its AM and FM are stronger than average. Sometimes you’ll get a little “birdy” sound on AM at night and a bit of overload on some AM stations. For example, in Los Angeles 1150 AM gets “crowded,” tuning in two stations at once. All in the all, for the money the Eton S350 Deluxe, also known as the Tecsun BCL-3000 in China, is perhaps the best buy out there.
Number Two: The Tivoli PAL for $150. A bit overpriced but so attractive in its rubber brick shape. It stands solid on the counter and doesn’t tip over like its slightly more expensive digital brother the Tivoli Songbook (which in spite of its presets and sleek design doesn’t sound as full or receive signals as powerfully as the PAL). Of all my radios, the PAL is in many ways my favorite. Its look, its feel, its warm sound from its monoaural speaker, its MP3 auxiliary input, its easy-tuning dial. I’d say its FM is slightly less sensitive than the Eton S350 DL, but in many ways its AM sounds better. Nor does the PAL give you a digital read-out like the S350. If you have an iPod and don’t mind spending the extra fifty dollars, you’ll probably want to get the PAL over the S350. Or get both, one for the kitchen, another for the bedroom.
Number Three: The Kaito 1103 for $90. This is a great deal for a digital radio with presets. Outstanding FM, better than average AM, powerful shortwave, its only weaknesses is its interface, which requires you to press buttons to adjust volume and features a small speaker. What’s great about the Kaito 1103 is that it has a “Line Out” so that you can connect a ten-dollar audio cable to a Tivoli PAL and use its wonderful speaker or connect it to a pair of 39-dollar JBL Duet speakers. For a small digital, “travel” radio, the Kaito 1103 is probably the best deal out there.
Number Four: The Eton E5 for $150. Eton bought this radio from Degen/Kaito and in many ways the E5 is a “clone” of the Kaito 1103 but, according to Radio Intel review, has a much better interface, a better design, feel, and look, has solved the “volume control problem,” and has a slightly better speaker. From what I’ve read, I don’t think the advantages make it worth sixty dollars more than the 1103 but this depends on personal preference. Either way, the Kaito 1103 or Eton E5 are, arguably, the best digital radios out there for the money. But there’s one more digital radio that is in the mix, which takes us to number five.
Number Five: The Grundig G4000 for $99. This radio, an update of the Yacht Boy, performs almost identical to the Kaito 1103, costs 10 dollars more, but has a better speaker and a much easier volume control (a knob). More importantly, it gets far superior AM. The interface is easy to use. What might make radio buyers choose the Kaito 1103 over the G4000 is that the G4000, unlike the 1103, doesn’t have a “Line Out” for connecting to speakers or a Tivoli PAL. However, the speaker gets pretty good volume, and decent sound (however not even close to approaching the warmth of the PAL) This is the radio I use by my office desk. I use the PAL in the living room where I do yoga. I use my Kaito 1103, as a "backup" radio, as it sits atop my Sangean WR-2 clock radio (nice speaker) and I use my Eton S350 Deluxe in the kitchen. For neurotic reasons, I also have a Tivoli Songbook as a “backup” in the kitchen and another in the bathroom. What goes by my bedside? My favorite of all, my Grundig G4000.
Number 6. The Sangean PR-D5. Perhaps the best of all the radios at its $75 price point. Outstanding AM and FM. Digital. Presets. Dual 2.5-inch stereo speakers. Auxiliary for iPod. Headphone jack. If you can only get one radio, this is the one.
Number 7. Boston Acoustics Recepter (misspelled "Receptor" on Amazon). Sells for 99-149 dollars depending on sales. I dismissed the Recepter as a "pretty" radio for philistines. I was in error. The radio shines on both AM and FM and the sound, especially on talk radio, achieves an unmatched closeness and intimacy. It has one fatal flaw: No headphone jack, which means it loses bedside privileges.
Conclusion: Is it possible to choose just one radio? Obviously in my case the answer is no. People smarter than I would argue that my radio obsession is less about radios and more about finding the “right frequency,” some chimerical quest for an absolute, a Holy Grail that does not exist. Perhaps. But the search sure is fun.
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