After years of neglect, the once-lowly table radio is experiencing a rebirth. You’ll find a nice variety of models that aspire to do more than provide low-fi background music or a quick news fix, and those that have built-in CD players — like two of the three reviewed here — can even serve as complete compact music systems.
Besides assessing sound quality, features, and ease of use for the Boston Acoustics Recepter ($159), Cambridge SoundWorks CD 740 ($400), and Teac SR-L50 ($249), I’ve attempted to draw some conclusions about their reception ability based on how many stations they picked up cleanly in my home, about 25 miles from midtown Manhattan. I used their internal or supplied AM and FM antennas as well as an attic-mounted directional FM antenna aimed at the city, with a high-quality component FM tuner as a reference in the latter case.
PDF: Fast Facts/PerformanceBoston Acoustics Recepter
The first radio from Boston Acoustics is elegantly simple — mono with dual alarms. One of its two front-panel buttons turns the radio on and off, while the other toggles between AM, FM, and presets (any mix of up to 20 stations). Below them are the volume and tuning knobs, the latter of which is also used for setting the clock and alarm times — much less frustrating than the usual button-pushing routines for setting digital clocks. On the top of the radio are buttons for controlling the alarms, a second on/off button, and a large snooze bar that can also be used to set a sleep timer, plus a few other controls. The back panel has an F connector for an FM antenna and spring clips for an AM antenna. The Recepter has an internal AM antenna and comes with it attached to the spring clips. For FM reception, a simple length of wire is provided to plug into the F connector.
AM reception was good on local stations, and the supplied FM antenna pulled in 28 stations cleanly vs. 38 with the big attic antenna. The Recepter was the FM reception champ in this trio, slightly besting even the reference tuner (set to mono, naturally). It also proved capable of receiving stations on adjacent channels without interference, a difficult feat for a tuner.
Sound quality was pleasantly rich and clear on good AM transmissions and impressive on FM, with plenty of detail and a smooth, natural balance. And the bass performance was great for such a small radio, giving realistic body and impact to drums, string bass, and piano.
Operation is straightforward and mostly intuitive, in part because of the knobs. One minor annoyance is having the same button select between AM and FM as well as select preset tuning — to get back to manual FM tuning from the preset mode, you have to toggle through the AM band. And there’s no interstation muting during manual tuning, so you’ll hear static as you move from one station to the next. Apart from those niggles, it’s really hard to fault the Recepter. If you want a compact, easy-to-use radio that looks and sounds great, the Recepter is an excellent value.
Cambridge SoundWorks CD 740
With its three-driver stereo speaker system, slot-loading CD player, and front and back auxiliary inputs, the CD 740 is less like a table radio than an extremely compact music system — and a pretty sophisticated one. Its FM tuner boasts RDS (Radio Data System) capability, which lets the CD 740 display station call letters and RDS text messages — like song titles — from participating broadcasters (a good idea that’s never really caught on in this country). And its CD section supports both CD Text and MP3 playback with text titles. All these features do add a layer of complexity.
The CD 740 has more than 20 buttons on its front panel, plus a volume knob that doubles as a scroll wheel for a menu system that controls some secondary functions, such as tone adjustment, loudness compensation, and mono/stereo selection. Sensible arrangement makes the controls relatively easy to learn and use, however. To the right of the knob are the transport, tuning, source-selection, and power buttons. On the left are eight buttons for storing and recalling as many as 24 station presets (two FM banks and one AM), some of which perform other functions for CD playback, which begins automatically when a disc is inserted. Flanking the large display are four buttons for operating the clock and two alarms. And on top of the case is a large bar that serves as a snooze control in alarm mode and a mute button during normal listening. Nearly all of the controls are duplicated on a credit-card-size remote (not shown). Both an AM loop and an external wire FM antenna are supplied.
AM reception was good on local stations. On the FM band, the radio received 21 stations cleanly in stereo using just its built-in power-line antenna, 22 with the external wire antenna, and 32 with the attic antenna. (That’s actually better than the reference tuner’s stereo mark of 30 stations from the attic antenna.) And the CD 740 pulled in stations on adjacent channels without interference. Regardless of source, sound quality was best with loudness compensation engaged and the bass turned down slightly. Both CDs and FM had excellent bass and treble, accompanied by a smoothness and clarity that put many larger, costlier shelf systems to shame. AM reproduction was clear, though with a balance that favored warmth over sparkle.
Despite its profusion of buttons, the CD 740 was easy to operate. Having mono/ stereo selection buried in the setup menu was occasionally annoying, and I would have liked to be able to mute the interstation noise while tuning — minor points. You could spend twice as much (or more) on a conventional stereo minisystem and come away far less satisfied.
Teac SR-L50
The SR-L50 combines an AM/FM tuner, a CD player, and a three-driver speaker system in an imposing brushed-aluminum package that sports blue accent lighting when it’s turned on (you can also dim it). To the right of the display window are a volume up/down rocker and the CD transport-control buttons. At left are a tuning up/down rocker along with buttons for power, source selection, band selection, and other functions.
On top is a large oval snooze bar, and on the right side are the dimmer button and a minijack headphone output. At the bottom of the back panel are an F-connector FM antenna input and RCA jacks for the auxiliary input; the AM antenna is internal. Almost all the front-panel controls are duplicated on the remote (not shown), which adds some others such as muting, bass boost, and direct track and preset selection.
Reception of local AM stations was good, except that strong signals often came through on both the broadcast frequency and the one above, which could make it hard to receive stations on adjacent channels cleanly. On FM, I received 20 stations cleanly in stereo with the supplied wire antenna vs. 35 with the attic antenna (again compared with only 30 stations pulled in by the reference tuner). Unfortunately, you can’t switch the tuner to mono to reduce noise on weak stations, and it can’t lock onto a station adjacent to another with a stronger signal. (In fairness, however, adjacent-channel discrimination is a difficult task for a tuner and won’t be an issue in most areas.)
The SR-L50’s sound was clean and detailed, but unless I engaged the bass boost it was also thin and hollow. Even with the bass boost on, the sound was often aggressively forward. Although most everyday functions were easy to use, some of the setup operations, such as setting the clock or station presets, are too complex. The clock-setting procedure, in particular, involves three buttons and actually varies somewhat depending on which source is selected.
Other oddities include the absence of a mute button on the radio itself and that you can’t even open the CD tray without first switching to CD mode! Although the Cambridge SoundWorks CD 740 does everything the SR-L50 does, and does it better, it costs $150 more, which makes the Teac SR-L50 more attractive if you’re on a tight budget.
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