"Retro" sytle radio for the kitchen

[ILoveMondeo]

Morning all,

You know the thing, 50's retro style stuff...

GF wants one for the kitchen for x-mas, wants to be DAB and good quality to replace the £20 piece of cack that hit the bin the other week.

I was going to buy a Roberts something-or-other but seem to recall a general opinion they were all style and actually pretty crappy bits of kit. Or have I got that wrong?

Any recommendations?

Budget not that important, £100 would be nice, £200 just about do-able. Probably hard pushed to spend more anyway on a little portable (probably famous last words).

I need to get a move on as all I've got her so far is a keg of desperado tequila beer....

Cheers

[jinkster]

You can buy a Bang and Olufsen Beolit 600 which is an acutual 1970s retro radio however it will not have DAB.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Transistor-radio-Bang-Ol...

[sunnygym]

Roberts do a retro dab radio about £125 and it come in loads of colours

To be fair it not that bad, yes your paying more for the styling than the kit but they do look good and are not ment to be used as a music system if your having a party

Edited by sunnygym on Tuesday 11th December 09:14

[StuH]

How about a Pure model. Very good sound quality for the money - even get them in pink

http://www.pure.com/products/product.asp?Product=V...

Personally I like the little "Marshall" amp. Handily runs off batteries as well as mains. You can also get an odd on speaker for full stereo:

http://www.superfi.co.uk/p-9694-pure-evoke-1s-mars...

[Cheib]

Have a look at this Ruark R1....I'd imagine it beats the Roberts hands down for sound.

http://www.ruarkaudio.com/products/r1-overview

I literally yesterday bought the R2i for SWMBO as a Xmas present....it's slightly bigger brother and includes an iPhone dock. Tested it against the Roberts equivalent.....quality of sound is miles better the Roberts sounded tinny in comparison.

[JimbobVFR]

Not a specific suggestion as such but how about going internet rather than DAB


All the same channels (and much more) and most will also stream stuff from a PC as well

Edit: Like this Roberts that does DAB as well as a bonus
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Roberts-Revival-iStream-Ra...

Edited by JimbobVFR on Tuesday 11th December 16:03

[StuH]

Or even better FM, as DAB and internet radio mostly sounds **** after they compress the life out of it.

[JimbobVFR]

Depends TBH. I listen to higher bit rate stations using my various squeezebox devices. Absolute radio at 192kbps MP3 sounds pretty good and higher bitrate AAC also sounds pretty good, certainly wont be noticeable using a small single speaker standalone radio in a kitchen.

The other point is that the stations I mainly listen to aren't available on FM, The choice being BBC stations or crappy Stray FM (local station in Harrogate)

The other thing with Internet radio is the availability of listen again stuff, some pretty good live sessions on the BBC are available on demand (believe you get the same listen agaoin stuff on Pure Internet radios, not sure about the roberts)

[Rollin]

I have a John Lewis DAB radio like this, but I have the black version rather than wood.



I listen to speech on it most of the time, for which it has a wonderful tone. It is on at least 4 hours a day and has great reception and very good build quality. Looks are spoiled slightly by the John Lewis logo.


ETA they don't sell it anymore.

[StuH]

JimbobVFR said:

Depends TBH. I listen to higher bit rate stations using my various squeezebox devices. Absolute radio at 192kbps MP3 sounds pretty good and higher bitrate AAC also sounds pretty good, certainly wont be noticeable using a small single speaker standalone radio in a kitchen.

The other point is that the stations I mainly listen to aren't available on FM, The choice being BBC stations or crappy Stray FM (local station in Harrogate)

The other thing with Internet radio is the availability of listen again stuff, some pretty good live sessions on the BBC are available on demand (believe you get the same listen agaoin stuff on Pure Internet radios, not sure about the roberts)

I completely agree with the convenience and wide station choice of internet radio (and DAB), I use it all round the house through the Sonos, it just frustrates me that they compress it as heavily as they do - as you say it sounds fine on a small radio but on better equipment its just complete pants compared to FM.

[ILoveMondeo]

Thanks everyone, that's ace!

I'm now spoilt for choice... will have to have a think about it and order one pretty sharpish!

Cheers

Dave

[snotrag]

Ruark R1.

Very, very swish bit if kit.

[ILoveMondeo]

Went for the roberts DAB one in the end. All down to aesthetics eventually, it's more the style she would want and their colour choice was great.