Philips DAB Portable Radio

The AE5000 Philips DAB portable radio is the first move into the DAB market by Philips. It’s not a bad attemp either. With a nice modern look it could be the best looking DAB portable on the market. The good looks together with a large, clear LCD display makes the AE5000 stand out from the crowd. We found the sound quality to be very good too.

It may be a little too big to be considered a true DAB portable radio by some while others will feel the quality of sound more than compensates for it.

A let down was only having the 10 presets as the standard seems to be 20 for similar priced models and with a price of just under £50 the AE5000 Philips DAB portable radio is up against some stiff competition.

If you are looking for a modern stylish DAB radio for the kitchen or bathroom the Philips DAB portable radio is going to be the one for you.

Pure One DAB FM Portable Radio White

A good looking, good value, good quality DAB FM portable radio that is also part of the EcoPlus product range, meaning it’s made from recycled and sustainable materials and it uses less power than conventional DAB radios.

This is certainly something that sets it apart from other DAB portable radio sets and the power saving is a welcome addition to power hungry DAB radio. The 35 hours battery life we got during testing with standard batteries was the best we have on record.

The Pure ONE portable radio also features FM with RDS for when you are on the move and in areas where DAB is currently unavailable. It also has a host of other features including Intellitext®, textSCAN™, kitchen and sleep timers, a backlit display and a USB socket so you can upgrade its software from your PC or Laptop as and when upgrades become available.

The Pure One DAB FM portable radio white is perfect for the kitchen table or on this Summers picnic. It’s very easy to use and the chrome dials give it a smart look. The sound quality is right up there as we expect from Pure.

The Pure One is the best selling DAB FM portable radio in the UK and as soon as you switch it on it becomes apparant why that is.

TRS Intempo Portable DAB Radio

The Intempo TRS portable DAB radio is a retro looking design available in five different colours.

The Intempo TRS is both slim and lightweight making it a popular portable DAB radio with travelers. The light build and flimsy feel seems to be matched by the tinny sound though and the quality is not knock you off your seat brilliant that you get with say a Pure One but for the price, it’s good enough.

We also had problems with the volume control. While it goes exceptionally loud without any noticeable loss of sound quality, trying to get the volume low proved difficult. At its quitest setting it still seemed to be quite loud to us. This is caused by the click volume control rather than having a standard dial control.

One thing we did like was that the TRS Intempo uses the cheap AA sized batteries rather than the expensive C Cells. Put the cheap running costs with the low price tag and the TRS Intempo makes a decent budget entry level into the world of DAB portable radio.

Sony XDRS50 Portable DAB Radio Black

Although many DAB portable radio sets tend to be power hungry, the Sony XDRS50 seems to suffer more than most. Sony tell us it will do 9 hours on a set of 4 AA batteries, which we found to be a reasonable assessment.

If you do decide to use rechargeable batteries you can expect not much more than 3 hours use between charges so you would probably be wise to invest in Ni-Mh cells rather than ordinary rechargeables and nothing under 2500 mAh.

The Sony XDRS50 Portable DAB Radio has decent sound quality but the volume is barely adequate if you like your music above ‘chat’ level.

It’s hard to call the Sony XDRS50 a true DAB portable radio because of the battery and volume issues. If you are out in the park on your own for a few hours, no problem. Take it to a BBQ with other guests who want you to crank up the volume for an hour or two and you might be struggling.

Pure One DAB FM Portable Radio Black

The Pure One DAB FM Portable Radio Black is the flagship of the Pure DAB portable range. It looks the business with lots of features yet is nice and simple to use. For the tech challenged, just switch it on and it scans the airwaves and then tells you by name which stations you can listen to. It even sets its own clock!

The Pure One Dab FM portable radio black has a satin coat finish and is the most popular of the various Pure One’s available.

If you get the rechargeable pack (costs extra) you will get 40 hours use per charge. With standard disposable batteries you can expect 80 hours but with 6 C size required, it can get expensive.

Pure One DAB FM Portable Radio Black also includes sleep timers, backlit display and USB upgradeability. Nice addons we did not expect to find included on a DAB portable radio with a price tag of less than £50 is the ReVu feature which allows you to pause and rewind live radio and also the inputs for your ipod/MP3 player would also be expected on a more costly radio but probably not one with this price tag.

Sound quality, as you would expect from Pure is excellent. As the world leaders in DAB technology Pure radios come with a certain expectation of both sound and build quality and the Pure One DAB FM portable radio black doesn’t let the company down on either count.