Freeplay Energy Devo FM/DAB Radio

The radio is very easy to use, has the features you need for a portable radio and seems a fairly solidly build unit also.

Radio station pickup on FM is great and i was surprised by DAB as I live in a non-DAB area and when I turned it on to test and immediatly Half of the DAB stations were available... so certainly the tuner seems to be strong as I have a friend with a dab radio and he can't receive DAB in this area and needs very high ground to get anything.

The wind-up feature is a great backup to the charger and a 60 sec wind will give a few hours listening on the FM band although unfortunatly only a few minutes on DAB. Although for most people switching to FM when the batteries run down is a lot better than finding new batteries. It can also, of course, be used with the supplied charger/adaptor if power is available and you can listen to DAB or FM while the unit is re-charged.

In summary a great site radio, sound quality good for the size of radio, reception excellent and windup feature a great time and money saver.

A nice size Radio, although not small, can be held fairly securely with both hands, although I can't see why most manufactuers don't put on handles anymore? But apart from that I found the Radio fairly pleasing to look at although it doesn't have any Metal finishing, only Plastic and the Knobs are of a Grey plastic, like the case, but they are easy to turn and the On/Off/Volume button is smooth and makes a nice 'Click' when switched on/off.
The Outer turning dial is for the FM Band and tunes a conventional FM radio and a few turns of the intergrated Generator handle will give you instant reception on this band, which is fun straight out of the box, but don't expect to do the same with DAB, as you will probably need to put the radio on charge for 24 hrs first to condition the batteries and perhaps even if you do try and get DAB from the Flat batteries using the Generator, then you are probably looking at only 5 minutes, but you would need to wind the handle pretty briskly, as there is a green LED on the back that glows brightly when you are turning the handle at the right speed and this is fairly fast!
However, once you have fully charged the batteries, then at least you should get around 6 Hours on DAB and a claimed 36 Hours on FM (Some reports say more), but I have not tested mine this far yet.
The DAB Tuner seems pretty good, although I still see that the manufacturers don't include a DAB Aerial socket on the inexpensive radios, which is a shame, so you will have to make do with the supplied Telescopic one, but it seems to work fairly well.
There are 5 presets on the front of the radio for DAB only and by holding them in for a second or 2 will enable you to store the station you are listening to, plus you can mark your favourite stations and a setting to 'Prune' any stations you can't receive in your area, although the radio will still display any stations it has been previously tuned to, despite Pruning, even if reception is so bad, they cannot be heard.

It does this by putting a '?' next to the station, i:e ?PLANETROCK So I assume the 'Prune' function just erases Stations that were previously tuned from a previous area? So not quite sure if this is a good function or not, as you would need to tune in one area and then move to another area to want to 'Prune' any unwanted, i:e Throw them away.

But there are functions even the 'Pure One Elite' does not have and you can sort the Stations Alphabetically etc.

Although this is only a single speaker radio, it does have a nice tone and can turn up quite loud, although it is better to keep the level lowish to improve distortion and save blowing the speaker cone.

You can plug in Headphones as well and I guess extension Speakers, as the output from this is Stereo.

A little gripe, is that the Input is only 9 Volts, so no chance of charging the Radio from a Car, unless you have an adapter and I don't want to test if it will take 12 Volts, so that is a pity.

A lot of radios do accept an input of 6-12 Volts, so a little bit annoying, as this would make the radio more suitable for trips to the Country etc, although I guess you can always charge it up at home first before setting out.

The Inner DAB setting Knob works smoothly and you turn it to select the station and press it in the confirm, much like the 'PURE' range of radios etc, so no surprises here.

All in all, not a bad radio, Pro's: Nice Tone, DAB/FM Tuners work fine.
Cons: No Carry handle, no 12 Volt input.

Really good functionality. Despite rumours to the contrary, on a full charge I've listened to over an hour and a half of Dab radio before it lost power, and a brief wind of the handle (30 seconds) maintained it for at least a further half hour. I like the Dab/FM choice for when out of Dab range. Despite minimal Dab coverage where I live I still managed to receive over 20 stations due to powerful or effective tuner. Info function lets you know what track you're listening to - solves a lot of arguments. Sound quality is fine for a small 3w 3" speaker but it sounds great through the headphones output and also has stereo RCA line-outs for connecting to a PA system or hifi.
Seller had lost the power supply for it so a quick call to Freeplay resulted in a brand new one sent out the same day for £4! Result.
I got this in order to bring radio into my place of work for background music, and also to provide power-free listening whilst on holiday in our camper without resorting to the van radio or using leisure battery. My only gripe is that it doesn't have a line-in socket (unlike the Roberts Solar Dab) but I can send my ipod to it through the FM Trip (fm tuner) - easy.

All positives for this item, compact and robust, stylish in my surroundings at least. Sound quality for this size is excellent on both FM & DAB and ECO-FRIENDLY built in charger for those that care or are for whatever reason without mains power (though in reality it uses too much power on DAB to be utilised). Cost effective and useful in my opinion. *****

grate small radio with clear sound and when on fm the batteries will last for 20 hours plus if they do run down wind it up and on fm it will last for a long time with out to mand winds.

This digital radio is really good. We had the first one about 3 years ago and my husband uses it whilst doing his gardening work. It is charged up overnight and goes all day. If it does fade and not near an electric socket then it will go on after using the winder.
Its compact and easy to carry in a bag and to use around the house. It is very robust and withstands being outside in the garden and even rain.We would recommend them and hope they don't go out of production quite yet.

There is nothing I dislike about this radio, Excellent quality and sound, Fantastic that it has both Dab and FM radio options. Also has a great rechargeable battery.

Quite good sound for its size and, if you listen to FM radio, you never have to buy batteries - you just wind it up! For DAB you need to charge the batteries for a few hours first or use mains. I love it.