Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1163 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: Pure
• Model: VL-60914
• Released on: 2007-08-09

Manufacturer's Description

From the world leaders in DAB radio comes Chronos CD - DAB/FM/CD/MP3 Stereo Clock Radio.

Chronos CD The Chronos CD is an elegant, compact, DAB/CD clock radio, which delivers superb digital-quality audio from its stereo speakers, fitting the maximum audio performance into the minimum space. Chronos CD has easy-to-use bedside features including four completely independent alarms that can be set for weekdays, weekends, daily or as one offs – each with the choice of waking up to either DAB digital radio, FM, CD or a simple tone alarm. A sleep timer allows you to drop off to your favourite station and the all-important snooze button is easy to find, with an adjustable snooze time for an extra lie-in when you deserve it. The light sensor adjusts the display brightness to suit the ambient light in your room, and handy front-panel connectors enable you to play an iPod/MP3 player through the stereo speakers and to connect headphones. For the ultimate in convenience, Chronos CD is supplied with its own infrared remote control so you can operate all of the main functions and features even if it is on the other side of the bedroom. Whether you want to listen to your favourite audio or MP3 CD in the kitchen or wake to crystal-clear DAB radio in the bedroom, Chronos CD is the perfect choice.

EcoPlus™ is a statement of PURE’s on-going commitment to our environment and its future. It indicates that environmental impact has been considered in the design, manufacture and transport of our products, and has driven both what we do and how we do it. All EcoPlus products are packaged using cardboard produced with a minimum of 70% recycled material, and finished using water-based varnish. All internal pulp trays are 100% recycled, and the user documentation is printed on 100% recycled paper using Soya-based inks. We also encourage our customers to recycle all packaging materials. The boxes of EcoPlus products are designed to be the smallest they can be whilst still ensuring the integrity and security of the product inside. This maximizes the number of products which can be shipped in each container, and thus minimizes the environmental cost of transport.

Ease-Of-Use
Digital radios are much easier to use than analogue radios because they automatically search for all available stations. Once the radio has found all the available stations you just choose the one you want by name. No more trying to remember frequencies.

Wider Station Choice
With up to 55 DAB stations available in many areas, and more on the way, you’ll be spoilt for choice. As well as existing favourites like BBC radios 1-4, BBC radio 5 live, Classic FM and talkSPORT, there are also great exclusive-to-digital stations such as BBC 1Xtra, BBC 5 live Sports Extra, BBC 6 Music, BBC 7 and Planet Rock.

Digital Sound Quality
DAB is crackle-clear and hiss-free because it’s not subject to the same interference as analogue radio.

DAB Stations
There's more listening choice on DAB too. These great stations and many more are available in the UK on DAB digital radio. As DAB coverage varies, remember to check which stations are available in your area.

	Independent Alarms Four independent alarm settings, with wake to tone, DAB, FM or CD options
	Adjustable Sleep and Snooze Timers Go to sleep with the radio on and it will power down after a set time and if you want to catch a few extra minutes of sleep in the morning, the snooze timer lets you do just that!
	Automatic Brightness Control An integrated light sensor automatically adjusts the display brightness to suit the light levels in your room
	MP3 or WMA Play MP3 or WMA files from CD or CD-R/RW. Supports ID3 tags
	Remote Control Infrared remote control included
	Line-in 3.5mm input enables you to connect an iPod, MP3 player or portable CD player and use the Chronos CD as stereo speakers
	TextSCAN This feature enables you to pause and control scrolling text: useful if you want to catch the title of a track, note down a competition phone number or rewind to catch a news item
	RDS Support for station name display on FM and RDS scrolling text

Box Contents

Customer Reviews

Three sides good...
Although this unit had been advertised since August, it only hit the shops in December, not sure if this was a quality control issue or just a matter of obtaining supplies from China.

The first thing that strikes you is the size, very small for a two speaker DAB radio/CD player. It is an eye catching triangular design with a top-loading CD. The speakers seem fairly efficient although because of the compact size there isn't much stereo separation and it isn't loud enough to provide music for a party.

The DAB radio is easy to set up and is the usual PURE high standard of reception, despite the rather cheap looking aerial wire. Access to the radio pre-sets is a bit clunky, there are no numbered buttons so you have to scroll through the preset numbers every time you change station. CD sound is good, with the usual play functions including repeat, random etc. The auxiliary source setting lets you play an MP3 player through the unit's speakers but I found the volume very low when playing my Creative Sleek through the unit. I found the manual badly written and many of the unit's functions/settings were not described at all.

However, despite a few niggles I'm fairly pleased with the unit which I'll use for radio/CD listening in the kitchen.

Good value
This is great. I needed something light I could take to university because my hi-fi was a bit impractical. The DAB and CD sound quality is crisp and consistent. I personally find it easy to use - the buttons are quite intuitive so you hardly need to read the instructions to get what you want done. You can have several alarms, to play DAB, CD... at whatever volume you want. The variable display is excellent, with a large clock, and not at all bright when you turn it 'off' and go to bed. Looks good, too, and matches my other black, grey, white and silver desk items well. Contrary to one previous reviewer, I have not received a mains hum when this is on standby/off, let alone a signigicant hum, so don't be discouraged by that.

It's ok for the price
When I bought it this was one of the few CDs and combined DAB radios on the market. It seemed to tick all the boxes for me in a nice compact unit. Having had it for several months now these are my thoughts:

Pluses:

1. Nice compact size so fits well on a bedside table
2. Clock is great, and has an adjustable brightness feature which I have found useful.
3. Tuning the DAB is an absolute breeze.
4. Sound quality from the DAB is excellent.
5. Very nice little remote control.

Minuses:

1. There is quite a significant mains hum. Despite plugging into an adaptor on the floor behind a table I could still hear this at night - in fact it's so distracting I've had to start turning it off when I go to sleep, which kinda negates the point of an alarm clock!

2. Call me a perfectionist, but I think there's too many buttons on the front. The layout could be simplified so you can find things more easily in the dark!

All in all not bad for the price, but I'd do anything to get rid of that mains hum!!