I have wondered for a while when DAB will spread to music centres well it may not be mainstream yet but this ghetto blaster size unit has DAB, FM, CD and of course the ubiquitous remote control.
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Small it isnt at 44x26x18cm and nor is it light at over three kilos without batteries. In fact batteries are not supplied not even for the remote control. To use on batteries you will need 6 x D cell batteries for the unit and two AAA for the remote.
However unlike almost all the other DAB offerings I have reviewed this has no clock except when used in DAB mode so no alarm or sleep timer facility, something we now seem to take as read.
Plug in the mains lead extend the rod aerial and switch on, it goes into DAB autotune and as my reception is quite good it finds around 50 stations. It is possible to view stations in a number of ways but the default is alphabetically. You can have up to ten DAB presets so your favourite stations are only a click or so away.
Press a button to change to FM and you are at the lower end of the spectrum. Here you can also have up to ten presets, I found tuning somewhat quicker than on some other DAB/FM offerings I have seen.
Press the same button again and you are in CD mode, not only can this play standard audio CDs but also CD-R and CD-RW offerings such as your favourite compilations. The various functions you might expect are available such as random play, up to twenty track programming and various repeat functions.
This is the sort of size of unit that you used to see various young people roam the streets not holding it by the handle but resting it on their shoulders, something I have not and nor will I try.
As with most systems today it has bass boost and two stages at that. It has twin 4 inch speakers (RMS 2x2 watt) built into its ample frame.
Apart from the AC input there is also a 3.5mm headphone socket and also a Aux input for connecting such items as MP3 players.
Returning to DAB it expresses signal strength in a different way to all other units I have looked at. Instead of the standard % so 100% being perfect it expresses in terms of signal error rate 0-15 is described as good 16-30 as adequate and over 30 as poor. A different approach but no problem once you are used to it. Another feature not found on all DAB units is DRC (dynamic range control) this has two settings here and is useful at low volumes but by no means all stations currently support this facility. There is a perfectly adequate 20 page manual to describe the buttons, controls, the remote and how to store your favourite stations.
I am not quite sure about this unit, the £99 price point including the CD is fine, the size is okay for something that is not often moved. It remembers presets even without batteries. All these are plus points, however why no alarm or sleep functions? Other units manage to have them. Certainly a better buy price wise than the Pure Legato, however style wise the Legato is much more pleasing on the eye.
Link http://www.philips.co.uk/index.html then enter AZ 6000 in the search box and click on the top answer.
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