Addressing the search for today's new "Super Radio," StarHalo writes:
A web-connected device linked to a hi-fi Bluetooth speaker is the new SuperRadio.
I've been listening to KKNE out of Honolulu, HI using an iPad playing through a Sony BTX500; the reception is better than is physically possible with a radio receiver, and the sound is better than the SuperRadio 5268, all with no antenna and no wires..
Super radio III has many negative reviews. I don't have it and maybe wrong but I believe is nothing wrong with this radio except quality controls. Quality control is big issue for this model. Super radio III use varactor diode and potentiometer to control frequency. The Frequency controlled by the voltage increase and decrease. This is substitution for air variable tuning capacitor with one is not longer made and expensive to use. Almost all modern devices today use same technology to control variable capacitance include expensive receivers like Ten Tec etc. Varactor diode and potentiometer suppose to make smooth enjoyable tuning and properly aligned Super radio III could be excellent receiver.
Posted by: val | June 29, 2014 at 10:27 AM
If all you care about is sound quality, Internet Radio can be your new Superadio. However, it is not a Superadio in several ways. The following occur to me:
It is true Internet Radio doesn't need any wires or outside antennas... except of course you need the whole blasted Internet. You need either a wired, WiFi, or cellular data connection to the Internet for it to work at all. Hard as it may be for those of you who are urbanized to understand, there are places not far from you where these signals are just not available.
That's without adding in power failures, cell system slowdowns, disasters, emergencies, or just simple holidays when the cell system is overloaded, and so on. The Superadio continues to work fine however many other people are trying to tune into the same signal. The same can't be said for internet radio.
The Superadio is a buy-and-forget solution. Once you've bought your radio you have no ongoing expenses except batteries or line electricity to power it. Streaming Internet Radio requires an ongoing Internet connection, which costs money. Granted you probably have this anyway. In my case, though, for pure portable operation I have to fall back on a cell phone whose data is, effectively, limited. Heavy audio streaming is going to eat up my data. Radio won't.
For the tinfoil hat crowd, it is harder for The Man to know what you're listening to with a radio, or that you're listening to anything at all. It can still be done but Internet Radio leaves footprints all over the place, showing what streams you heard. That might be a serious non-paranoid concern for some people, I suppose.
(I find a radio easier when I just want to tune something in casually, without having to work at it or decide in advance just what I want to hear. That's just a matter of taste, though, so it doesn't really count as an advantage.)
Posted by: bill | June 29, 2014 at 05:30 PM
Bill, what I can receive with my wi-fi setup might be unfair in comparison to the rural listener's radio lineup, but that's only because rural folk are unfairly cut out of internet access.
I agree re: emergency radio, but I find that almost everyone who takes radio listening seriously uses a different radio for that purpose - a casual listening radio and an emergency radio; even if I owned a shiny new Sangean WR-22, I would still go to my Sony ICF-B05W when the power went out (330 hours AM listening on two C cells!)
And casual listening doesn't get any easier than using an iPad or similar; most stations display what they're playing so it's like browsing an active TV Guide, and you have no distance/signal limitations on what you can listen to, it's whatever you want. If the lineup looks boring, put on a podcast. Or browse new albums [in their entirety] on Spotify. Etc. This is far removed from successfully digging out a faint signal from hundreds of miles away only to find the station is playing a Glenn Beck rerun or infomercial..
Posted by: StarHalo | June 29, 2014 at 06:05 PM
Yes, I do all that, but even at this late date there is still the thrill of unearthing an AM signal with a plain old AM powerhouse DXer.
Just tonight I snagged the Yankee/Red Sox game on WXLM in Groton CT, a new one for me. On my decidedly retro Panasonic RF 1150.
Posted by: Ken K. in NJ | June 29, 2014 at 08:50 PM
I've always considered Internet radio a fun supplement to broadcast radio, not a replacement. That's just me, I guess. Broadcast is cheap, accesible just about everywhere except really remote areas, and indispensable in an emergency.
Posted by: Keith Beesley | June 30, 2014 at 07:43 PM