Internet Radios

mossie

I am currently looking to buy an internet radio. I like the look of the Pure Evoke Flow, particularly managing the internet stations online, but I don't think it supports last.fm. The Roberts Stream 83i does support this. I am looking for opinions / reviews from users of these (or other internet radios) please as I am new to this subject.

decies

Couldn,t connect to internet radio on roberts last night,thought it was eircom broadband problems.
This morning i discover eircom all right,but still network timeout on all stations.
Any ideas?

The Black Oil

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055574557

This thread might help.

The Black Oil

Mine is OK with BBC and NPR stations..

decies

Thanks cant connect to anything here!!!

The Black Oil

Maybe unplug it for a minute or two and try it again.

Have you tried checking the manual for advice? http://www.robertsradio.co.uk/assets/User_guides/Internet_Radios_PDFs/ug_STREAM202.pdf

decies

The Black Oil wrote: »

Maybe unplug it for a minute or two and try it again.

Have you tried checking the manual for advice? http://www.robertsradio.co.uk/assets/User_guides/Internet_Radios_PDFs/ug_STREAM202.pdf

I picked up the phone to ring them ,one last check,now its not working fine :rolleyes:

mossie

The Black Oil wrote: »

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055574557

This thread might help.

Thanks

FlutterinBantam

The unplug and plug back in is good advice.

usually works.

The Sparrow

I saw this thread a few days ago and meant to reply but forgot. Sorry!:pac:

I own a Pure Evoke Flow. I was given a present of a Roberts 202 and I sold it and bought the Evoke Flow because of positive reviews and because it was for my room and for some stupid reason there is a big blue light on the Roberts 202 that cannot be switched off.

I'mm slightly disappointed with the Evoke Flow. The online managing of stations is a bit rubbish really and the whole radio is finicky. It is difficult to add custom stations (although popular BBC stations etc are easily added) and the menu system is not very intuitive.

I tend to use the Listen Again feature for BBC Radio and BBC podcasts quite a bit and even though it is getting better, alot of times it says "station not available" which is a pain. About a month ago, anytime I tried to listen to either feature it came up as unavailable. But that was after a firmware update from Pure and it seems to be working better now. The radio has also crashed on me a few times and the device can be awkward about picking up my wifi signal.

Also you have to pay extra for a battery which is a ripoff. And when youu buy it, the battery is some eco nonsense so it will only work if your radio is on and you unplug it. If your radio is on standby and you have the battery in and you unplug the power, the battery won't kick in and it will just die. So it is not trustworthy as an alarm clock.

The good thing is that once you figure out the menus and it works, it is a pretty great device. It looks cool and it is a real pleasure to get crystal clear reception from lots of stations and the listen again feature is ace. You can also pause and ff/rewind listen again broadcasts and podcasts.

I can't say I'd recommend it, but once you have it, there are good things about it.

if it wasn't for the stupid light on the Roberts 202, it would be much better as the menus are much better, it is a breeze to add custom stations and it works very well.

katy39

Hello all,
I wonder if someone could tell me if I bought the Bush TR82 BLU radio would I be able to recieve L.B.C brodcast from London ? If I am situated in Dublin
Thanks

The Black Oil

The brightness on the Roberts 202 is adjustable (including turning it off, though it can come back on if you select another station/menu) thanks to a software update a while ago.

The Sparrow

The Black Oil wrote: »

The brightness on the Roberts 202 is adjustable (including turning it off, though it can come back on if you select another station/menu) thanks to a software update a while ago.

Ah nuts. If they had done this initially I would have kept it and been saved a lot of hassle.

Greenman

katy39 wrote: »

Hello all,
I wonder if someone could tell me if I bought the Bush TR82 BLU radio would I be able to recieve L.B.C brodcast from London ? If I am situated in Dublin
Thanks

Answer is no, for Clive and friends you need an internet radio or a satellite receiver or a PC/laptop.

Was that of any help?

katy39

Greenman wrote: »

Answer is no, for Clive and friends you need an internet radio or a satellite receiver or a PC/laptop.

Was that of any help?

Yes thank you:)

rebeve

I have the evoke flow ,about 2 years now . A great radio.

Macy0161

Thinking about investing in either the pure evoke flow or the Roberts 202 (the roberts probably winning at the moment). What's the range like on these - is it comparable to a wireless laptop? If I'm within coverage with the laptop is it a safe assumption that I would be within the coverage with either of the two products? If it doesn't reach my bolthole shed it's not really a runner at the money!

mossie

I eventually bought the Logitech squeezebox duet and I'm well pleased so far. Crystal clear radio, streaming, last.fm etc. Setup was dead easy too.

byte

Currently on the lookout for a new internet radio myself, after the demise of my cheap Logik IR100.

My current top-of-list is the Roberts 83i, one ugly beast of a radio, but with lots of options and functionality, including Last.FM support (which is nice).

Diving Board

My Logik100 no longer supports the pause,rewind,FF functions for BBC on demand shows. Can anyone suggest a radio that does?

ingalway

mossie wrote: »

I am currently looking to buy an internet radio. I like the look of the Pure Evoke Flow, particularly managing the internet stations online, but I don't think it supports last.fm. The Roberts Stream 83i does support this. I am looking for opinions / reviews from users of these (or other internet radios) please as I am new to this subject.

I have the Logitech Squeezebox Boom. It is wi-fi or ethernet operated and it is excellent. Great sound, loads of features plus a remote control, which is so handy when you want to flick around all those stations when lying in bed. I tried out a couple of others prior to this and they were no where near as good. More expensive but well worth it.

DublinWriter

mossie wrote: »

I am currently looking to buy an internet radio. I like the look of the Pure Evoke Flow, particularly managing the internet stations online, but I don't think it supports last.fm.

The Pure Evoke Flow is wonderful, unless you want to pause/bookmark Podcasts.

The Sparrow

DublinWriter wrote: »

The Pure Evoke Flow is wonderful, unless you want to pause/bookmark Podcasts.

Yeah you should be able to pause podcasts but every time I do, it comes up as station not available after a couple of minutes which is a pain. What's that about?

JayeL

Got a Philips NP2900 back in December, very simple, solid machine.

tbh

Macy0161 wrote: »

Thinking about investing in either the pure evoke flow or the Roberts 202 (the roberts probably winning at the moment). What's the range like on these - is it comparable to a wireless laptop? If I'm within coverage with the laptop is it a safe assumption that I would be within the coverage with either of the two products? If it doesn't reach my bolthole shed it's not really a runner at the money!

unless you've a massive garden, you should be ok. Mine (roberts) works fine in the garden, even takes batteries (which triple the weight and last about an hour!)

I would say if your phone/laptop picks up your wifi in your shed, your radio will too.

jacaranda

tbh wrote: »

unless you've a massive garden, you should be ok. Mine (roberts) works fine in the garden, even takes batteries (which triple the weight and last about an hour!)

I would say if your phone/laptop picks up your wifi in your shed, your radio will too.

I am terrified to use my Roberts on batteries as they last about 5 minutes and cost about €50 as it takes 6 of those really big batteries!

Macy0161

Thanks for advice on the range, but the battery life would be a concern. Can I ask anyone with one, how long do you get out of the pure evoke flow battery pack?

tbh

Macy0161 wrote: »

Thanks for advice on the range, but the battery life would be a concern. Can I ask anyone with one, how long do you get out of the pure evoke flow battery pack?

for the roberts, you're not really supposed to use batteries for wi-fi. it's just there as an added "you can do this if you want" bonus.

jacaranda

While the roberts looks like a radio, its really a cross between a computer and a radio, and that's why it needs more power than a conventional radio.

I like listening to Talk702 on my roberts. However I haven't been able to listen to it for a while now as, when it loads up, I get an advertisement for Talk702, then a gap of a minute or so, then the same advertisement and so on indefinitely.

Like many computers, internet radio is less reliable and more capricious than a conventional radio sete.

Somavar

I got the roberts 83i on the back of good reviews but found that it had a very poor wifi signal. It worked fine until it was moved into the kitchen (about 15m from router) then the signal died.
I contacted Roberts and they said bad antenna so I had the unit replaced under warranty-same problem.
PC and different types of laptops work fine on the wifi up to 30m away(the signal strength was strong on all units bar the roberts)I connect to my PC via the router to share my music around the house and allow me to listen to internet radio(particularly BBC listen again).
I was going to try the logitech sqeezebox or Pure Evoke Flow. Anyone have experience of either using wifi and listen again?

byte

Somavar wrote: »

I got the roberts 83i on the back of good reviews but found that it had a very poor wifi signal. It worked fine until it was moved into the kitchen (about 15m from router) then the signal died.
I contacted Roberts and they said bad antenna so I had the unit replaced under warranty-same problem.
PC and different types of laptops work fine on the wifi up to 30m away(the signal strength was strong on all units bar the roberts)I connect to my PC via the router to share my music around the house and allow me to listen to internet radio(particularly BBC listen again).
I was going to try the logitech sqeezebox or Pure Evoke Flow. Anyone have experience of either using wifi and listen again?

Got the 83i last week, and to be honest, I'm very impressed with it.

Compared to the Logik IR100 it replaced, wifi reception is much better (I ended up having to modify the Logik to get reception - move antenna out of the unit). I've not experienced any dropouts yet, and seems well featured for the price.

I don't know if Argos do Logitech or Pure, but maybe use their 16day return policy, and try the units out? Might be the best way to see if they suit where you want to put it.

Otherwise, maybe a Homeplug to connect into the LAN port (I realise this is added expense, but if the other 2 fail to be any better than the Roberts)?

pedigree

Hi
Interesting thread, does anyone know if you can get a internet hi fi tuner supporting fm and wifi internet. I would like to add the internet radio to my hi fi system maintaining a good level of sound quality.
Thanks
Pedigree

PURE Ireland

pedigree wrote: »

Hi
Interesting thread, does anyone know if you can get a internet hi fi tuner supporting fm and wifi internet. I would like to add the internet radio to my hi fi system maintaining a good level of sound quality.
Thanks
Pedigree

Hello,

Our Evoke Flow has an unamplified 3.5mm stereo output (seperate to headphone out) which is designed to be connected to exsisting Hifi systems letting them amplify the output, which in turn gives a much better sound quality and avoids dual amplification.

http://www.pure.com/ie/products/product.asp?Product=VL-60896&Category=Connected

Regards,

Sean

Somavar

I got an evoke flow two weeks ago specifically to use internet radio and media player using a wifi link. I found it to be unsatisfactory on both counts-very tempted to just bring it back. It works ok for a while then drops the link to the router and the media server(windows mediaplayer11) but immediately sees the router if reconnected. I know the network is sound as the signal strength never drops below 4 bars and three different laptops can connect with no errors ever. It reboots if you try to scroll too fast and won't see auto playlists. The internet radio drops the signal and doesn't recover unless the wifi link is reset.
My experience of internet radios would be that they are just not robust enough to function consistently in anything other than the simplest of ethernet environments.

PURE Ireland

Somavar wrote: »

I got an evoke flow two weeks ago specifically to use internet radio and media player using a wifi link. I found it to be unsatisfactory on both counts-very tempted to just bring it back. It works ok for a while then drops the link to the router and the media server(windows mediaplayer11) but immediately sees the router if reconnected. I know the network is sound as the signal strength never drops below 4 bars and three different laptops can connect with no errors ever. It reboots if you try to scroll too fast and won't see auto playlists. The internet radio drops the signal and doesn't recover unless the wifi link is reset.
My experience of internet radios would be that they are just not robust enough to function consistently in anything other than the simplest of ethernet environments.

Hello,

That certainly doesn't sound right, it should maintain a strong wifi connection as long as there is signal. Firstly I would ensure you are running the latest firmware, once you have that, try a hard reset:

Instructions for EVOKE Flow/AVANTI Flow: Make sure your radio is switched on. Press and hold the 'Options' button down for two or three seconds and confirm the reset when prompted.

This basically resets the radio back to factory settings and also clears any on-board cache and network connections.

Let me know how you get on after that.

Have a read through our support page, which is great for helpful bits of info etc.

http://support.pure.com/index.php

Regards,

Sean

Somavar

Thanks for the reply Steve but after many adjustments to my network settings,upgrades to the firmware and numerous resets and reconnections I have come to the conclusion that the Evoke Flow is not robust enough to function reliably in a wifi environment.
I returned it yesterday.
Having had a Roberts and comparing the network performance and limitations(no 801 'n') I think it maybe that the hardware performance in portable Internet radios is not yet comparable with laptops or desktops. I have no problems connecting and streaming through these other devices and setup and connection is not an issue once they are given the WPA key and added to the MAC exclusion list but with the Flow I was asked to open ports, not use exclusion etc all of which could compromise my network's security.
I am still in market for a solution which will allow me to stream from my PC and listen to internet radio but at the moment I don't think it's available in my price range.

Greenman

Just an update and maybe something that someone might find interesting.

The BBC switched of the BBC World Service 648 khz transmitter so I was without my staple of world news while on the move.

I needed to think of my options, a pal at work told me I could by a sim card with 500 MBs of data for €5 per month. I did not want to spend a fortune on an Android phone so I spotted a great little phone called the ZTE Blade/San Francisco for €150.

I downloaded an APP called Tunein and I was up and running. What I noticed was that this doubles as a great internet radio on my WIFI system plus the ease of use, variety and mobility is great, say if you want to move around the house with headphones is terrific.

Although I use my bedside internet radio at night I feel this mobile internet radio is a great addition .

Two more things, the phone works great as a mobile internet radio in the car just need to tweek things re getting a phone cradle plus car charger and for €5 a month I'm delighted.

Last thing Live RTE radio dose not stream on Tunein all I get is Stream is over "any help there"? but I did find will your trying to RTE to stream live if you click on Tunein Options top right then go to See Complete Schedule you get to play most of the RTE Podcasts.

I hope this is interest to someone:)

tbh

Ghats great greenman, another big tunein fan here. I have rte streaming no bother, are you using the free or paid app?

Greenman

tbh wrote: »

Ghats great greenman, another big tunein fan here. I have rte streaming no bother, are you using the free or paid app?

tbh I'm using the free version, are you saying the Tunein Pro will get RTE, if so I'll have to pay up and look cheerful:)

Are you using on a WIFI network? Tunein is really the best radio player I've seen.

If you're radio mad its a must.

tbh

Greenman wrote: »

tbh I'm using the free version, are you saying the Tunein Pro will get RTE, if so I'll have to pay up and look cheerful:)

Are you using on a WIFI network? Tunein is really the best radio player I've seen.

If you're radio mad its a must.

I don't know if you'll definitely get it, all I can say is that I use the pro version and I can get it. I'm using it on iOS. I use it mostly on wifi, but also in the car. Data usage is actually very low, there's a menu option that gives you the statistics.

Greenman

tbh wrote: »

I don't know if you'll definitely get it, all I can say is that I use the pro version and I can get it. I'm using it on iOS. I use it mostly on wifi, but also in the car. Data usage is actually very low, there's a menu option that gives you the statistics.

Just an update.

I installed Tunein Pro still no RTE :-(:confused: , Stream is over any ideas?

Nice to have the recording possibility.

JD

Greenman

Greenman wrote: »

Just an update.

I installed Tunein Pro still no RTE :-(:confused: , Stream is over any ideas?

Nice to have the recording possibility.

JD

Just a further update.

I went to the RTE website and saw the RTE Pocket Radio App. Installed that and I've got RTE Radio 1 now but would love to know what its streaming at? I was hoping for 32kbps and hope its not 128kbps as that would really eat into my data allowance:mad:

Any input welcome.

tbh

Greenman wrote: »

Just a further update.

I went to the RTE website and saw the RTE Pocket Radio App. Installed that and I've got RTE Radio 1 now but would love to know what its streaming at? I was hoping for 32kbps and hope its not 128kbps as that would really eat into my data allowance:mad:

Any input welcome.

Tunein says it's streaming at 32K if that's any use. I'm not on a wifi network at the mo and 3g is disabled, so once I get home I'll look at the settings for RTE and get back to you.

decies

yep am on 3 network unlimited data so i use my tune in radio v i phone via cable to av in socket through stereo so internet radio,it can be frustrating constant buffering while on the go,but no doubt in near future internet radios willl be standard in the car,its great for live sports have live irish horse racing on it ( added from paddy power site and live eurosport radio for eg live tour de france via ooTunes app)

bossdrum

Greenman wrote: »

I needed to think of my options, a pal at work told me I could by a sim card with 500 MBs of data for €5 per month.

Where did you get one of these?

Sounds good.

Greenman

bossdrum wrote: »

Where did you get one of these?

Sounds good.

Not sure where you are but I'm in Belgium, its a company called Jim Mobile, Alditalk do 400 MBS for €4.:)

If you are in IRL go to Mobiles and PDA's and ask about the best deals in IRL.

bossdrum

Greenman wrote: »

Not sure where you are but I'm in Belgium, its a company called Jim Mobile, Alditalk do 400 MBS for €4.:)

If you are in IRL go to Mobiles and PDA's and ask about the best deals in IRL.

Thanks, I doubt we'll get anything as good value as that in Ireland.:(

Greg Parke

I hope this page will be of help to anyone getting a Wi-Fi radio. http://www.buzzradio.fm/index-1.html There are some good demonstration videos and links on where to get best value for money. Please let me know if you think there are better places to buy on line and I'll have those links added.

Plus Buzz FM (from Derry city) is now on many smart phone apps globally. For more info please email buzzfeeds@gmail.com

Thanks Guys.

0lddog

Sorry to pick up an old thread but .......

bossdrum wrote: »

Thanks, I doubt we'll get anything as good value as that in Ireland.:(

3 : 500MB PAYG valid for 30 days @E4.99 incl VAT

ZTE Blade = Orange San Francisco

See http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056086197

If you want a new one, Argos sell them in N.I. ( and of course Orange do too )

( Any Android should be able to support TuneIn )

Renn

Thinking about picking up one of these - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Roberts-Stream-Stereo-Internet-Speaker/dp/B002VEN10O/

Good price? The signal in the house can be weak sometimes, what sort of range does it have? If I was to set it up in the kitchen it would be about 10m away from the router.

chinwag

Looking at internet radios myself including roberts stream 83i above. Also, looked at their 205 and 202 models, thinking of going for the 205 (possibly 83i) if it's to be a roberts, these seem to be most recent models and they have fm/dab as well as wifi. Perhaps a bit expensive but I'd love to have a wifi radio, been promising myself one for ages. Any advice on above or other makes?