The Livio Radio featuring Pandora
For all of us who listen to internet radio, it has been long trapped inside our computers, so we have to sit at our computer and listen. Pandora is really cool since you can just plug in a few artists and the website will play music you like. There is now a radio that has the benefits of Internet Radio as well as the Pandora application, built in. The Livio Radio featuring Pandora works either using Wired ethernet or WiFi and can stream internet radio right to the receiver.
Looking at the device after pulling it out of the box, it’s very simple. Just a few buttons and a volume knob which, when pressed, acts as an “enter” key. You do have to hop on your computer to enter your radio’s Key into the Livio website and register your radio under your name. After that, the device doesn’t require a computer. You can sign into your Pandora account or play practically any internet radio station you desire. You can’t, however, manually enter the URL to a stream, (which i imagine would take some time using the knob.) For Pandora, there are “Thumbs Up” and “Thumbs Down” buttons so the music can be set according to your taste. The buttons and display light up blue, which is cool. I’m a fan of things that light up, so that’s a plus for me. There is an Auxiliary input on the back if you wish to use it for playing say, audio from a tape deck. I wasn’t impressed with the sound, though. It’s very tinny and the lows aren’t represented too well. I have heard radios that much nicer sound in a cabinet about the same size and this one is really not that great. I peeked inside and indeed, it is a wooden cabinet. I think the speaker they used isn’t too great. Being that the Livio is meant to work indepentally, I would expect deeper, richer sound, rather than having to use the headphone jack to utilize additional speakers, when one is already there. What else I noticed is that the WiFi signal drops very quickly in areas close to the router where my laptop had excellent signal. This resulted in gapped audio. I think the antenna belongs on the outside of the radio, rather the inside.
Otherwise, the Livio is a fantastic product. It’s very well thought out and has a lot of usability.
http://www.livioradio.com - $199.99
