Sangean RCR-1 Advanced Atomic Clock Radio - Silver
by Sangean
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List Price: Our Price: $65.00 You Save: $64.99 (50%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Sangean RCR-1 Advanced Atomic Clock Radio - Silver
Customer Review: Almost great
Summary: 4 Stars
Bear in mind that I paid $50 for this unit using the "get a credit card and get a $30 discount" promotion. I might not have paid more, then again I might. I dig the Sangean.
*Radio is excellent for a bedside unit. FM reception is very slightly better than my Tivoli PAL. AM reception is not quite as good as the Tivoli, but I did pull in the Grand Ol' Opry last night from Nashville, TN. Sound quality is very slightly not as good as the Tivoli, but it beats the pants off of most bedside units, and good reception and sound are priority for me. The Sangean does not disappoint. Tivoli, by the way, makes an alarm clock radio with an analog clock that looks great and doubtless has excellent radio qualities, but that unit has few features and costs $200.
*The RCR-1 is a full-featured unit with all the bells and whistles. Sleep, nap, dual alarm, ability to choose the days for the alarm. Separate volume control for the alarm is very nice, as is the ability to choose a radio station for the alarm, so you can go to sleep listening to one station and wake to another.
*With a dual alarm, I like to set alarm 1 for radio, and alarm 2 for the bell. This is the first unit I have encountered that, when alarm 2 sounds, alarm 1 is cancelled. In other words, the radio is turned off. I don't much like that. As far as I am concerned, this is the major fault of this unit.
*The second serious fault is the display. I have the RCR-1 at eye level and look at it straight on, so I don't have the problem of the vanishing characters when viewed from an angle. But still I can only clearly see the clock at night if the backlight is turned pretty bright, which I prefer it not to be. So I have dimmed it as much as possible and still be able to--just barely--read the clock. If the unit is easily reachable, you can always just push the dim/bright button.
*The third fault of this unit is the lack of battery back up. It does have some internal power reserve, so this is an issue only if the power is off for more than half an hour or so. I solve this problem with a little Seiko battery-powered atomic travel alarm clock that functions as a regular quartz clock if it can't get the signal from Boulder. In retrospect, instead of the Seiko, I wish I had one of the little Oregon Scientific atomics with projection clock that runs on AC power and has battery backup. That would solve the problems of the poor clock display and the lack of battery backup in the RCR-1.
I live in northeast Georgia and have had no problems getting the signal from Boulder with either the Sangean or the little Seiko. The RCR-1 synchronized in about 15 minutes, as did the Seiko. Both units are silver so they look nice sitting together and ticking away at exactly the same time.
Options are limited if you want good sound and good reception and atomic clock in a bedside alarm clock radio. If you don't care about the atomic feature or the analog clock, you might look at the Boston Acoustics Receptor. It has good FM reception and very good sound, and costs $149. Also Brookstone has something called AcoustiClear that I suspect has very good sound, and it looks kind of neat. Seems like Sharper Image has a unit that might do. And there is always the Henry Kloss Tivoli alarm clock radio at $200, or possibly the Tivoli SongBook at $159. Or maybe even the Tecsun available on EBay.
Customer Review: Great Features and Good Sound Quality
Summary: 4 Stars
I'm the type of guy that is fanatical about my electronics. This clock radio offers nearly all the features I want in a clock radio with only a few draw backs. I love the flexibility of the alarm's. You can set it up to wake you only on certain days of the week. It also features what Sangean calls Humane Waking System which is basically a way of gradually increasing the volume of the alarm tone or radio. This allows for a gentle wake up as opposed to a sudden jolt when the alarm sounds.
One reviewer on this site claims that he was unable to wake to an AM station. My unit wakes me to AM stations just fine so I don't think he understood how to set the station while setting up the alarm. The instructions don't really explain that very well so here is the easy way to set the station you want to wake to. Simply turn on the radio and tune to the desired station. Then press and hold either Alarm 1 or Alarm 2 for more than two seconds and wait till you hear a beep. Then your wake up station will be stored into memory.
Turning on either alarm requires several key presses but it is not overly difficult to master. My take on this is that it is a safety feature so that you don't turn on/off an alarm by mistake. The radio also features a basic power failure feature. It will retain it's settings for up to 4 hours in the event of a power failure. However, the alarm will not sound at the designated time if the power is out. I see that as a critical oversite and I hope that Sangean corrects that in the next model. I have mine plugged in to a APC Battery Backup so I don't worry too much about power failures.
What I don't like about this clock radio. The LCD display is is very hard to read. I have good vision and I find it difficult to read the display. The contrast could use an adjustment knob but sadly there isn't one.
A clock radio of this caliber should have an automatic dimmer. I hate having to manually set the brightness before I go to sleep.
It should have a programable snooze function. It does snooze but only 5 min. at a time. You cannot tap the snooze bar repeatedly to add more time.
Overall I'm very pleased with this clock radio but as always the search continues for the perfect clock. When I find it, I'll buy but until then I'm happy to use this one. BTW, the sound quality is very good. Not Bose or Tivoli quality but good nontheless.
Customer Review: All around good atomic clock radio
Summary: 4 Stars
I recently purchased the Sangean RCR-1 and find it has many unique features for a clock radio. The main reason I bought it was for the automatic time updates from Fort Collins, Colorado which makes it very accurate and also automatically changes time for daylight savings. I originally bought the Sangean RCR-2 which is similar but had to return it because the display was too bright and it did not have a dimmer switch which the RCR-1 model does. The radio is an advanced clock radio as far as clock radios go. When the alarm goes off the display changes color from blue to amber and the alarm or radio increases gradually in volume. You can also pick the days of the week for each of the two alarms to sound. I found positioning the radio to receive the time signals from Fort Collins rather touchy. I had to move it just a few inches on my night stand in order to get the signals regularly.
I agree with the other reviewers regarding the display. The LCD display is hard to see unless viewed on directly. Fortunately the RCR-1 model has an analog clock that is much easier to see. My vision without my glasses is not that good but I am able to see what time it is from the analog clock in the middle of the night if I wake up.
The radio portion of the unit is better then most clock radios. It has a tone control and stronger amplifier and larger speaker then most clock radios which retail for $20 - $30. It also has a digital tuner with 7 presets for each of the AM & FM bands.
There are digital clock radios which retail for about $30 which have the time and date preset at the factory. They will automatically adjust the time for daylight savings because they have been programmed by the factory to do so. However in 2007 the date for daylight savings has changed so some currently in stock may have not been programmed for this change. Since they do not receive the time signal from Fort Collins you may have to adjust the time on occasion but they are a lot cheaper then either the Sangean RCR-1 or RCR-2. Examples are the Timex Auto Set Clock Radios T307S or T309T models.
Customer Review: Above Average Clock Radio
Summary: 4 Stars
This feature-rich clock radio is not for everyone...The user interface is a bit more difficult to learn than most. Sound quality is slightly reduced by the rear-facing speaker.
Otherwise, this is the best clock radio that I have owned!
The "atomic" clock keeps accurate time by updating its setting with a time signal broadcast from Colorado. At my location (Oregon) this feature works quite well.
Reception of AM and FM signals is quite good, picking up the weaker educational stations without noise or interference.
The "Humane Waking System" wakes one up gently... Note there IS a volume control on the bottom of the radio.
The analog clock is GREAT for a bleary-eyed squint at the time during the night...Note brightness IS adjustable using a control on the bottom of the radio. The digital display is best viewed from slightly above...contrast washes out if the radio is placed too high.
Another "fun" feature is the color change of the display from blue to orange when the alarm sounds, leaving no doubt that it is time to get up!
Update 11/2/08:
After the change back to standard time last night, the analog time ended up 15 minutes behind the digital time (which was correct). I tried to set the clock to different times, but the analog always ended up 15 minutes behind the digital ! There is a hole in the bottom of the clock for "reset"... this realigned the analog and digital times, but time, station presets, alarms had to be set up again... took about 10 minutes to get everything back to "normal'... bummer!
Customer Review: Sangean RCR1 Clock Radio
Summary: 4 Stars
Overall, the Sangean RCR-1 clock radio is awesome. (For me, it replaced the "Sunrise alarm clock" by Sharper image that I found sorely wanting in quality and features). The Sangean atomic clock radio, however, was hardly wanting in any area. See below for my comments.Advantages:
-small footprint: takes up half the space on your nightstand versus most clock radios
-atomic time synchronization: this works perfectly and is very accurate
-automatic tuning: sets station preset buttons automatically based on signal strength
-very cool looks
-adjustable illumination from very bright to nearly off
-gradual increase in volume of either alarm tone or radio to gently wake you from sleep
-reasonable radio sound fidelity, not "tinny" like many clock radios
-value: try finding another clock radio so feature-laden for this price. I tried... nothing else came close.
Disadvantages:
-difficult to read digital display at night (you can simply read the analog display, or turn up the illumination)
-my wife says the receiving bar for the atomic signal that attaches to the back of the unit is ugly. It is hidden but would be even better if it were internal
Why I didn't give it 5 stars:
I almost did! But it felt a little dishonest to do so since I did list two weaknesses. Nevertheless, I find these weaknesses to be minor, especially given all the huge advantages above. I have been exceedingly happy with this purchase and recommend it to anyone looking for a unique clock radio with the above features.