The digital radio audience is slowly expanding, even if the footprint of digital radio coverage isn’t exactly blossoming outwards from metropolitan centres. Pure’s latest radio takes on that portability challenge, although it’s not unique — we’ve seen portable DAB+ units before.
The Move 2500 should cover the digital radio basics, as well as FM for when your digital reception is dodgy. The selection wheel does look a little on the retro side, but then retro styling seems to be a hallmark of many DAB+ devices. In this case, it’s only retro for around 10 years ago, rather than the 50-year-old style of many digital radios. The one thing you can’t do from the Move 2500 is access Pure’s FlowSongs service; that’d require an internet connection and cut rather badly into the unit’s 14-hour claimed battery life.
I listen to a reasonable amount of digital radio (largely because the digital-only stations haven’t been assaulted with billions of ads and annoying morning show/drive time shock jocks), and I could see myself making heavy use of a portable digital radio, but at $199 it’s definitely not the cheapest option for digital reception.
Nate
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 11:10 AMYOu know.. I really don’t get it.. why are we so slow at taking up DAB+? I’ve been using DAB+ almost exclusivly since it came out. I have a clock radio and a protable and even tho pure ahve only just bought this out.. I still don’t think its anywhere near as good at the Cowon D2 DAB+ which I bought nearly 2 years or more ago. Sure the price was steeper than the Pura but it also does alot more. 52hrs + of battery life, video (10 batt life), MP3 with 16GB SSD card space, and you also got the pics that were downloaded from the DAB+ station itself!!.
I’m all for DAB+.. but why the hell is the real market running so dammed slow! Its a great resource, comon companies speed up the dev cuz the consumers will deff buy your products once you see where the market really is for you! Go Pura.. cuz you can also lead the way here too !
Travis
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 11:40 AMI think take-up is going to be slow until digital radio is commonly available in cars. I know I listen to about 90% of my radio in my car.
Some decent stations wouldn’t go astray either. I almost got a digital radio when Austero had their Jelli station, but can’t really be bothered any more.
Nate
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 11:57 AMI do exactly that though.. My car radio has a headphone jack input and all I do is connect the Cowan up to the car radio through the headphone jack and, BAM!, I have digital radio in the CAR !!
Sicarius123
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 12:27 PMDigital radio through a low quality analogue headphone jack doesn’t really sound like the best option.
I’d have digital radio if I could buy a decent car headunit that didn’t look like it came from the video arcade in toy story (why do they keep making these?) that supported it on board.
As for portable, if my phone doesn’t do it, I’m not stuffing more in my pockets.
Michael
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 11:10 AMIt also looks like a lawsuit waiting to happen if a certain fruit decides to enter the dab market…
Sicarius123
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 12:38 PMThey wont enter the market if they can’t sell it in the USA.
z3d
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 12:08 PMI think digital radio suffers from the problem that it doesn’t provide a service that people actively want. sure if you buy a car with digital radio, it’s another bonus point for that car, but with radios in cars being so tightly integrated with other functions in the car and steering controls, the market must be very small for aftermarket. At home and mobile, you have services like tunein radio where you get limitless radio stations from all around the world streamed to you. Tunein plays in our house most days. Why would I pay for a digital tuner that just has shitty local stations when this is free?
@michael they’ve practically owned that market for years.
Sicarius123
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 12:52 PMI would go out straight away and buy a DAB+ car headunit just for Triple J and Triple J unearthed, but the offerings are rubbish.
Why are nearly all the units offering this low end single din, and why on earth can’t a car stereo company make a headunit that doesn’t look like a kids UFO toy. I seem to be stuck with my 1999 stock Lexus headunit with tape deck because every aftermarket stereo makes your car look like a 17 year olds riced up excel with bright blue eye fatigueing LED’s.
Seriously, hire a damn designer guys, the only headunit I can think of from the top of my head that isn’t hideous is the Pioneer Appradio.
I also have no interest in buying any portable units to put in my pocket. Why own a smartphone to fill your pockets with other rubbish?
John
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 1:16 PMThe problem I find with digital radio is that most stations broadcast at a lousy bitrate which equates to thin and tinny sounding music. I much prefer the far greater choice via internet radio (eg. Radio Caroline from the UK)… the TuneIn app on iOS and Android is perfect for this.
Dave Ingram
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 1:25 PMI’ve a portable DAB+ music player for a couple of years now — the iRiver B30. This plays MP3, AAC, MP4 video, has an FM radio, DAB+ radio and lets you record. When the 8GB of memory fills up, add more as a micro-SD card.
I think it was $180, and they’re below $170 at JB now. Since the player has a colour full LCD screen it shows cover art, wx forecasts and the such on the screen. I haven’t seen any other player take advantage of this.
Jon
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 2:40 PMThe problem isn’t the styles or the aesthetics of the devices. It’s the price.
When DAB+ breaks the $30 price point we will see them being taken up. When I go in to Dick Smith I see the vast majority of digital radios at above the $70 mark. Considering that the primary stations are what I listen to. I have the choice of a $10-$20 am/fm radio or a $70 digital one.
When the price comes down. I will get one.