- Joined
- Jul 6, 2004
- Messages
- 61
Well, it's been a long time since I've been to this forum but I just wanted to post a quick mini-review/first impressions of a couple gadgets I got today.
First one is after a long time of looking at them on the shelves at stores I finally picked up a shortwave radio: the Grundig Mini 300 PE. Here's a picture of it courtesy of the sharper image.
I've been playing with it for most of the evening, and I'm impressed with what I can pull in. I mean, I always expected shortwave radio would not be good I was able to pull in a pretty clear signal from london, russia, and china. Lots of stuff is in languages other than English, but it seemed like at least one in 3 stations was broadcasting in English. It's smaller than i expected, fits in the hand and pocket well. Came with 2 AA batteries, a nylonish case that fits on the belt, a lanyard-type-deal, and a pretty decent pair of ipod style earbuds.
If you get sick of the sometimes-whiney sound of the shortwave stations, it also picks up AM and FM. I didn't listen to AM a whole lot, but FM in particular reception was really very very good, unlike for example mp3 players I've used that have built in FM radios.
Earbuds went up *plenty* loud and the speaker was loud as well, especially for a radio that size.
The tuning on it is actually analog, but it shows the station digitally, which I like much better than one that it all analog. I think I might prefer a radio with all-digital tuning; I don't know if this one has PLL (Phase Lock Loop I think) which is supposed to help lock in on stations. I don't even know if that would be possible with analog tuning. Probably not, and I also imagine they would advertise it, but it doesn't seem to drift much if at all, at least on local stations.
All in all I paid about $30 for it, I'm real happy with it. If nothing else it should be a good radio to listen to music at the beach this summer, although I'd be kinda worried about sand.
Second gadget that I picked up was a PALight Survival, in a pack with a couple accessories. It's been reviewed a million times (on CPF if not right on this forum) so I'll be brief, but it's pretty nice. I've seen them online and at stores for a long time but I never picked one up, I guess because I figured it would be too big to carry comfortably. It actually fits quite nice in a pocket, and it seems to be quite solidly made. Almost forgot a picture, there's nothing like a picture to make a review like 2 times better.... here we are:
Mine came with the two accessories pictured, the signal cone and the lanyard, as well as with a battery. I could have gotten one with just the battery for about 3 dollars cheaper ($18 vs. $21ish) but I figured it'd be fun to play with the accessories even if I never use them
Anyhoo, the light itself is made out of a soft rubbery material, very tacky. You may not be able to tell from the picture, the case is in two sections held together by a metal band. I was a little worried from seeing pictures on the web that the band holding it together would deform or likewise, but it seems real sturdy and has a high quality clasp holding it shut. When you push the button to turn in on, it goes to a low mode first, another press puts it into high, then high flashing, then back to the "off". If you're not familiar with pal-lights, their signature feature is that they are always on: they just run enough power through the led so you can find them in the dark.
Accessories, the lanyard seemed a little plasticy and bulky, but well made. the signal cone seemed only a little useless, but it lit up pretty good. The lanyard hooks on to a little bail that folds out from the bottom of the light. it's nice to know it's there even if i'm not using the lanyard, and with it tucked away the light stands on it's end very nicely. They say that the low light mode can be used for a nightlight (not the always-on mode), seems like it would fit that pretty well.
All in all seems to be a pretty good product.
I hope this has been helpful to anyone who might have been on the wire with either of those products or similar; at least you have some idea what their all about if you see them and are considering an impulse buy (that's really what they were for me, I just knew about both products before. But I didn't *plan* to buy them...)
I do have another product that I love that I would do a little review of, but it's late and I have to go to sleep. I would however, recommend that anyone take a look at this pen: the lamy pico
I can't think of anyone I wouldn't recommend it to, Lamy is a great company, the pen is beautiful and fits at the bottom of your back pocket so you don't lose it (unless you get a hole in your pocket that you don't notice...), and you can open it up with one hand, something I can't say for fisher bullets, although the telescoping will do that. Plus it writes great, so I personally think you can't go wrong. Also, the mechanism on mine broke (possibly due to my own fault) and instead of fixing it Lamy sent me a brand new pen at no charge. Very nice.
One more thing, moleskine notebooks have I'm sure been talked about here, but I've found that their smallest, real skinny 64 page notebooks fit absolutely perfect on top of a Lamy pico in my back pocket, and as long as the chair or whatever has at least a little padding it's comfortable.
I hope those sites don't mind me borrowing their images... eh, whatever.
Standard disclaimer: I'm not associated with Grundig, Lamy, Moleskine, or PALights, just in case someone mistakes me for a "stealth marketer" or otherwise
Pete
First one is after a long time of looking at them on the shelves at stores I finally picked up a shortwave radio: the Grundig Mini 300 PE. Here's a picture of it courtesy of the sharper image.
I've been playing with it for most of the evening, and I'm impressed with what I can pull in. I mean, I always expected shortwave radio would not be good I was able to pull in a pretty clear signal from london, russia, and china. Lots of stuff is in languages other than English, but it seemed like at least one in 3 stations was broadcasting in English. It's smaller than i expected, fits in the hand and pocket well. Came with 2 AA batteries, a nylonish case that fits on the belt, a lanyard-type-deal, and a pretty decent pair of ipod style earbuds.
If you get sick of the sometimes-whiney sound of the shortwave stations, it also picks up AM and FM. I didn't listen to AM a whole lot, but FM in particular reception was really very very good, unlike for example mp3 players I've used that have built in FM radios.
Earbuds went up *plenty* loud and the speaker was loud as well, especially for a radio that size.
The tuning on it is actually analog, but it shows the station digitally, which I like much better than one that it all analog. I think I might prefer a radio with all-digital tuning; I don't know if this one has PLL (Phase Lock Loop I think) which is supposed to help lock in on stations. I don't even know if that would be possible with analog tuning. Probably not, and I also imagine they would advertise it, but it doesn't seem to drift much if at all, at least on local stations.
All in all I paid about $30 for it, I'm real happy with it. If nothing else it should be a good radio to listen to music at the beach this summer, although I'd be kinda worried about sand.
Second gadget that I picked up was a PALight Survival, in a pack with a couple accessories. It's been reviewed a million times (on CPF if not right on this forum) so I'll be brief, but it's pretty nice. I've seen them online and at stores for a long time but I never picked one up, I guess because I figured it would be too big to carry comfortably. It actually fits quite nice in a pocket, and it seems to be quite solidly made. Almost forgot a picture, there's nothing like a picture to make a review like 2 times better.... here we are:
Mine came with the two accessories pictured, the signal cone and the lanyard, as well as with a battery. I could have gotten one with just the battery for about 3 dollars cheaper ($18 vs. $21ish) but I figured it'd be fun to play with the accessories even if I never use them
Anyhoo, the light itself is made out of a soft rubbery material, very tacky. You may not be able to tell from the picture, the case is in two sections held together by a metal band. I was a little worried from seeing pictures on the web that the band holding it together would deform or likewise, but it seems real sturdy and has a high quality clasp holding it shut. When you push the button to turn in on, it goes to a low mode first, another press puts it into high, then high flashing, then back to the "off". If you're not familiar with pal-lights, their signature feature is that they are always on: they just run enough power through the led so you can find them in the dark.
Accessories, the lanyard seemed a little plasticy and bulky, but well made. the signal cone seemed only a little useless, but it lit up pretty good. The lanyard hooks on to a little bail that folds out from the bottom of the light. it's nice to know it's there even if i'm not using the lanyard, and with it tucked away the light stands on it's end very nicely. They say that the low light mode can be used for a nightlight (not the always-on mode), seems like it would fit that pretty well.
All in all seems to be a pretty good product.
I hope this has been helpful to anyone who might have been on the wire with either of those products or similar; at least you have some idea what their all about if you see them and are considering an impulse buy (that's really what they were for me, I just knew about both products before. But I didn't *plan* to buy them...)
I do have another product that I love that I would do a little review of, but it's late and I have to go to sleep. I would however, recommend that anyone take a look at this pen: the lamy pico
I can't think of anyone I wouldn't recommend it to, Lamy is a great company, the pen is beautiful and fits at the bottom of your back pocket so you don't lose it (unless you get a hole in your pocket that you don't notice...), and you can open it up with one hand, something I can't say for fisher bullets, although the telescoping will do that. Plus it writes great, so I personally think you can't go wrong. Also, the mechanism on mine broke (possibly due to my own fault) and instead of fixing it Lamy sent me a brand new pen at no charge. Very nice.
One more thing, moleskine notebooks have I'm sure been talked about here, but I've found that their smallest, real skinny 64 page notebooks fit absolutely perfect on top of a Lamy pico in my back pocket, and as long as the chair or whatever has at least a little padding it's comfortable.
I hope those sites don't mind me borrowing their images... eh, whatever.
Standard disclaimer: I'm not associated with Grundig, Lamy, Moleskine, or PALights, just in case someone mistakes me for a "stealth marketer" or otherwise
Pete
