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Pure Elan RV40
Pure are perhaps the best known name in DAB technology and have produced a whole range of offerings. I recently reviewed their excellent Pocket DAB1500 (28/8/06) a real portable unit. Here we have a more conventional portable unit that can go with you round the house and out into the garden.
The Pure Elan RV40 is 28x7.5x17cm however the last figure the height increases by 48cm when the seven section rod aerial is fully raised. The top has 14 buttons - all clearly labelled as to there job - and an earbud / headphone socket to enable private listening. The front has two nice speakers behind a full length grill. Above the grill is a 5x15cm three line LCD display. The back has inputs for the mains adapter and a USB socket that is there to future proof the unit to allow for downloading any upgrades to the firmware.
Before first switch on extend the rod aerial attach the mains adapter and then switch on the radio then autotunes in my case it found 54DAB stations but I do live in good reception area. To check your local likely reception go to http://www.ukdigitalradio.com/coverage/search/postcode.asp and enter your postcode you will then be shown some of the stations you can expect to receive.
This unit supports up to twenty presets and unlike early DAB units these are very easy to select. Find a station you like press the Preset button and it shows the stations already selected (if any) then press and hold the Preset button again for around three seconds and then a message comes on the LCD saying Preset 'x' saved where 'x' is a number from 1 to 20.
There is a clock that shows the time on the top line of the LCD display while switched on taking the time from the station being broadcast. If you are running from mains power the clock continues to display when switched off.
FM works slightly differently, it shows the actual MHz IE 94.9 till tuned and then this changes to the name of the station on line two of the display and scrolling text (by default) on the third line. Unlike some other units the Presets are shared meaning you can press whichever Preset you wish and the unit will change automatically between DAB and FM.
ReVu technology have only been available in a very few of Pure products the most interesting being their first offering with it The Bug. Here it is improved so up to 30 minutes can be replayed. But this is not a feature that works miracles you do have to have been listening to that station for the period of time - up to 30 minutes - for ReVu to function. Again this a very simple procedure press a single button to start ReVu and then you can start moving back and the amount you are behind is shown on the LCD, should you wish you can then move quickly forward again.
There is sleep timer so you can fall asleep listening to your favourite station and of course an alarm to wake you up, the latter needs mains power. On batteries (6x 'C' cells) you get between 15 and 20 hours use. This unit also supports Charge PAK and this automatically recharges when reconnected to the mains so if left there when not out and about you should always have a days use available.
A very nice feature but no facility to record and save as there was using SD cards with The Bug. This unit is miles ahead in reception quality from early units and there are features I have not even mentioned so try the third link and download a PDF file to find out more.
The best price I could find is £57.99. See the first link below.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/B000JK8QJ8?condition=new
http://www.pure-digital.com/Products/Product.asp?Product=VL-60796&PageType=Intro
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