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Grace Digital Internet Radio mini-review

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2015 2:44 pm
by FlyingPenguin
I like to listen to the news in the morning while shaving and doing other bathroom things, usually I listen to NPR.

Trouble is I live in a very fringe reception area for FM radio. Orlando is 60 miles south, and Gainesville is 65 miles north. I get a weak signal out of both of them, and they are usually being overpowered by adjacent radio stations.

I'm sick of poor reception, so I purchased this Grace Internet radio:
http://www.amazon.com/Grace-Digital-3-5 ... B004YI9NTS

Really nice build quality, easy to setup, good quality audio (this is a heavy device - I'm supposing it has a pretty beefy speaker magnet in it).

Once I connected it to my Wifi, it offered to install a firmware update which I skipped for now.

Simple menu controlled by a push-button knob. Once you setup your geographic location (the automatic location detection thought I was in Kansas), it can display a list of your local radio stations. You can also just search by station ID name. Using that I found both the Orlando public radio station (WMFE) and also the Miami public radio station (WMFE). Miami has a REALLY GOOD public radio station, much more news oriented than the Orlando station, and I miss it. Also found the the Twit.tv live stream (you can also listen to pre-recorded podcasts from Twit), and a couple of local classic rock stations.

It has many other choices including Pandora. You can also connect a USB stick loaded with MP3 files to it.

It also doubles as a clock-radio.

Pricey, but an excellent product, and good looking - it doesn't look cheap. Grace sells less expensive versions, but they generally don't have a built in speaker.


http://www.amazon.com/Grace-Digital-3-5 ... B004YI9NTS

Image

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2015 10:54 am
by psypher
Have you configured any streams that are made available through http://tunein.com ?

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2015 11:50 am
by DaMaN
Sweet looks like my old but still functioning
logitech squeezebox:

http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Squeezebox-Player-Discontinued-Manufacturer/dp/B002LARRDK

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2015 11:53 am
by Genom
Maybe I am too cheap, but I just repurpose old Android phones to do this, since I have Bluetooth speakers around the house.

Old HP tablet in the kitchen since the bigger screen is better for recipes, but old S3's in the living room and dining room for media playback. I get the phones usually for under 50 bucks and have them in standup chargers/holders.

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2015 12:39 pm
by FlyingPenguin
psypher: Don't see a specific option for Tunein.com in the main menu, but there's a lot of deeply nested options I haven't looked at.