Digital radio is almost a year old, and it’s starting to gain a bit of momentum, thanks to units that aren’t just big and bulky. Grundig’s latest DAB+ player is even designed to be taken with you.
Dubbed “Roam”, the Grundig radio offers both DAB+ and FM tuners, has 30 station presets (15 for each tuner), a two-line LCD display, 3.5mm headphone jack and an eight hour battery life. It also has a retractable antenna, for those old school moments.
The Roam will cost $179 RRP. As a point of comparison, the iPod Nano starts at $199 with 8GB and an integrated FM tuner. As much as DAB+ is on the rise, it still has a bit of a way to go in the price stakes before it becomes ubiquitous…
[Grundig]
Terry O'Fee
Tuesday, July 27, 2010 at 8:22 PM… and isn’t digital radio only in the capital cities still???
Peter Simpson
Tuesday, July 27, 2010 at 9:24 PMI believe ABC and SBS broadcast around the country, but DAB+ is much more finicky than analogue signals. Almost every store I’ve worked at, we haven’t been able to get a decent DAB+ signal. Beautiful sound though, if you can get it.
Peter Simpson
Tuesday, July 27, 2010 at 9:24 PMOh, and it chews batteries like a mother…
StevoTheDevo
Wednesday, July 28, 2010 at 7:36 AMIt’s ridiculous that DAB+ is so expensive…
It’ll never get off the ground at the high prices it continues to “demand”.
Dave I.
Thursday, July 29, 2010 at 11:19 AMThe iriver B30 has had this for well over a year, and has a video player too. The radio stations are tranmitting news & weather as JPG over DAB+ and I think that most receivers are missing out on this.
My B30 doesn’t chew batteries too much, will record the DAB+ as AAC and takes an SDHC card for extra memory. It is also under $200.
‘AM’ radio sounds much better on DAB+ and is the only way to listen on a train (where electric motors seem to hash out analogue AM), and in office buildings (steel reo acts like a screen to low frequencies).
jack
Thursday, July 29, 2010 at 8:39 PMSounds very interesting – but the price and features suggest there is much much better on the way from other manufacturers.
Tempting – but no – I will hold off for now.