Need to buy a radio

CJ1

I hope to buy a radio as gift for my parents. They listen to morning radio in kitchen. We live in County Galway, pretty hilly, not sure if this contributes or is it just that their radio is crap but the reception is terrible. It is not a digital one, i.e you need to position the dial between 88-90 etc to get station.
Can anyone recommend a good radio and where should i go to buy one.

Apologies if this is off topic for here.

tbh

CJ1 wrote: »

I hope to buy a radio as gift for my parents. They listen to morning radio in kitchen. We live in County Galway, pretty hilly, not sure if this contributes or is it just that their radio is crap but the reception is terrible. It is not a digital one, i.e you need to position the dial between 88-90 etc to get station.
Can anyone recommend a good radio and where should i go to buy one.

Apologies if this is off topic for here.

they don't have internet access by any chance? if not, and you are looking for a digital tuner (probably best if the recep isn't great), you could do worse than this one:

http://www.peats.com/cgi-bin/catalog.cgi?view_product=1&id=24307&sid=10&cid=7677&scid=26571

CJ1

Thanks for that, looks grand, they do have internet access, eircom broadband.

tbh

CJ1 wrote: »

Thanks for that, looks grand, they do have internet access, eircom broadband.

in that case, I would recommend the Roberts WM-202, as it uses the internet rather than the airwaves. If they are radio fans and can't get good reception, this radio will make a huge difference, plus you can get stations from all over the world.

Sideshow Mark

More expensive, but I love my Pure Evoke Flow. Has internet radio so if the FM reception is poor they can switch to that also has DAB/DAB+ so it's future proof.

coylemj

Just make sure that they have an unlimited data plan with their internet provider, otherwise bills could mount up listening to internet radio. I believe there is no digital (DAB) radio in Galway.

OP, what's the approximate location and have you checked that they're on the correct frequency? The best thing to do is to park your car outside their house, switch to RTE1 and then see what frequency it's using, the automatic (RDS) retuning function in the car radio will switch to the best local signal.

CJ1

Exact location is Leenane in Connemara.
The only station they listen to is Radio 1.

jamas

Hi. I'm looking for a good radio (preferably with alarm) that will pick up BBC Radio 4 on Longwave in a bad location. We only have mobile broadband so I think digital is out. Can anyone suggest. Thanks

coylemj

jamas wrote: »

We only have mobile broadband so I think digital is out. Can anyone suggest. Thanks

Apart from the radio service that's often supplied with cable TV, 'Digital radio' means DAB which has nothing to do with Internet radio.

DAB is received over the airwaves by an aerial and is transmitted from a local transmitter just like FM radio. Internet radio is picked up by a special type of radio which has a permanent connection to the Internet.

coylemj

CJ1 wrote: »

Exact location is Leenane in Connemara.
The only station they listen to is Radio 1.

Your nearest main transmitters are Maghera (near Gort) which is transmitting RTE Radio 1 on 88.8 MHz and Truskmore (88.5) which stretches down into parts of Gaway but you could be serviced by a relay such as Clifden (89.5).

There are plenty of places around the country with poor reception so if I was you I'd borrow a decent radio and try it out in your parents house rather than going out and buying a good radio only to find out that it's the signal that's the problem.

If your parents are not very technically minded then I would strongly recommend that you not go down the Internet radio route, that would be buying you a whole lot of trouble down the line because you would be their technical support and you do not want that believe me.

jamas

Thanks for that clarification. In areas of poor reception (between two mountains) is DAB tricky to get? Our FM is usually OK, provided you don't move the radio . LW is very variable I will also take the advice of borrowing a radio and actually trying it out.

coylemj

jamas wrote: »

In areas of poor reception (between two mountains) is DAB tricky to get? Our FM is usually OK, provided you don't move the radio . LW is very variable I will also take the advice of borrowing a radio and actually trying it out.

Long Wave is variable but don't forget to swivel the radio as the antenna is a horizontal bar inside the receiver so you'll need to swing it around to get the best reception. The ideal way to do this is to swivel it to the point where the reception is worst, then turn it 90 degrees.

DAB is currently only available in North Leinster, Cork and Limerick, see the map at this link...

http://www.rte.ie/digitalradio/faq_map.html