Grace Digital Wireless Hi-fi Internet Radio Tuner featuring Pandora аחԁ NPR (GDI-IRDT200)
- Listen tο over 16,000 internet radio stations including Pandora, iHeart radio, NPR, BBC, ESPN, Live 365, Sirius аחԁ over 30,000 Podcast аחԁ οח demand selections
- Built іח Ethernet аחԁ 802.11g card tһаt connects tο аחу Ethernet οr 802.11b,g οr n wireless router (חο computer needed)
- Connects tο аחу home stereo via tһе Digital (Toslink οr Coaxial) οr RCA analog outputs
- Control уουr internet radio music οr media files via Large 2 line ԁіѕрƖау wіtһ micro backlight adjustments
- Includes a remote control, аחԁ batteries, FM antenna. Works wіtһ tһе Free Grace Digital iPhone / iPod Touch remote control app
Tһе Grace Digital Tuner (GDI-IRDT200) іѕ a combination Internet radio аחԁ audio media streaming device tһаt brings all tһе audio content οf tһе Internet frοm уουr broadband connection directly tο уουr home Stereo. Wіtһ іt users саח listen tο 16,000+ radio stations frοm NPR οח-demand, FOX news, CNN, BBC, CBS tο KROQ, over 35,000 podcast, 20,000+ Oח-Demand subscription streams οr уουr personal Pandora radio stations – Free. Tһе Tuner provides חοt οחƖу standard RCA connections tο уουr home stereo b
List Price: $ 219.99
Price:
Strong performer, few flaws,
It is a very strong performer with lot of features. The team that came up the specs did a wonderful job. Tonnes and tonnes of features. WIFI, Radio, Alarm clock, DLNA music client, Windows network share, headphone output, digital SPDIF and Optical output etc etc. I can’t find any thing lacking in terms of connectivity or features. Once I plugged and connected every thing it worked flawless, I didnt hear any noise or jitter. Played well with tough AKG headphones, digital output quality was fantastic. I didnt hear any difference between Audio CD and DLNA streamed media. I use a Bel canto DAC3 as external DAC. Features wise it is top notch. I dont think any one who buys this will miss any thing. It found almost all the radio stations, lot of variety. It has support for high bit rate audio via digital output, in built DAC can only support 16 bit audio.
Now comes the cons. All of them are related to the User Interface, Remotecontrol and LCD screen. The LCD screen is a pre-historic 4 frames/sec refresh screen. If you scroll faster it blinks and is hard to read. The menu system has lot of issues. Every time you hit return it goes back to the start the list. Let’s say you have 1000 songs in your folder, you want to play the 500 and 501th song. In IPod you go scroll down choose the 500th song once it is over, you can just go down and choose the 501th song. Here it goes back to 1st, then you have to scroll down again to choose 501th. It get annoying when you want to put more than 10 songs in the queue. You have to scroll down 10 times. The remote control is useless, all the initial configuration like WPA key etc has to be done via the knob. You can’t do the initial configuration like setting up WPA via remote control, you have to use the dial and there is no easy way to do DEL or BACKSPACE. Every thing from setting time to WPA key has to be done via the front panel buttons and knobs. There is another annoying bug with media streaming, it skips the first 10 seconds.
There is no pause, next, prev buttons on the front panel. You need to use the remote for that. For scrolling down(which you will do a lot). If not for the user interface annoyance, it will be a 5 start product. Unable to measure jitter as my sound card input didnt work, from what I could hear I sounded flawless. Iam not expecting great things from the inbuilt DAC, it is probably as good as cheap laptop DACs. Use a external DAC or your pre-amp DAC to get the best sound.
I replaced the default wireless duck with a larger 5db antenna, it improved the range a lot. Now I see 5 bars all across on the other side of the house. It is a very strong performer, if you are willing to forgive some of the user interface annoyances.
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|Freaking awesome!,
Wow! What a sweet device this is for the even the not so techo-inclined. Installation was a breeze as there were only 2 cables to hook-up: power, and RCA jacks. I piped it into my receiver and hit the power button and bingo! it found my network over it’s installed handy dandy wireless network adapter (G). It prompted me for my password, which I entered (by turning the knob, which was kind of a pain) and it connected no problem. You can also wire your connection through the network cable slot in the back, however, no network cable was included.
After that, I chose internet radio and I had choices galore. The real beauty of this device is how you can personalize it. Got a Pandora account? Pipe it through this baby with ease. How about Live365? You can do that too. Want to search the internet radio via genre? No sweat. Absolutely amazing I tell you.
I created my Grace account, added stations online and podcasts and after unplugging the device and plugging back in (yah, they tell you to do that so it updates the streams), my customization was found on the device and away I went.
Here is the absolute frosting on the cake…I’m now streaming all of my music from my laptop and external hard drive to this device! Sort by genre, album, album artist, create a queue, you name it, this thing can do it. This kills the Windows Media Center that never worked right with my 360.
Who knew you could have so much fun with a radio??
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|Super Radio, Dated Interface,
The “Grace Digital Wireless Hi-fi Internet Radio Tuner” is one of the best tuners that I have ever seen. The ease of setup and the multiple choices that you have for your listening pleasure (Internet Radio, Pandora, Live365, and others) was honestly quite astonishing to me. With the WiFi I have in my house, I had 5 bars on everything and the radio comes in crystal clear. And the channels! There were so many of them that I had trouble selecting JUST one. It also has a nice bright display that includes a clock (as well as an Alarm setting) and a headphone jack. As far as setup goes, it was as basic as plugging in power and then piping it into an output device (I used my old stereo since its already hooked into the speakers). It’s actually a quite attractive system (I guess I like the blue LED display), it is light (maybe too light when you are pushing the buttons on the front) and the profile is quite low – about as tall as your typical high end blu-ray player.
However there is a BIG “but”. The User interface system that Grace uses is archaic. It’s been awhile, and I’m dating myself here, but I felt like I was programming the clock on my hi-fi that I got in 1980 (that still had an 8-track player in it BTW). All the initial setup uses the Tuner’s knob and the frame refresh rate makes the display constantly flash if you scroll faster than say 1 or 2 channels a second. The display only shows a few stations/songs at a time and there is no way to fast forward or go back beyond the simply pushing the forward and back buttons over and over and over again – so you basically have none of the time-saving buttons that we have all come accustomed to in your basic $25 stereo or any car radio built in the last 10 years. And just wait until you want to queue up more than 2 or 3 songs at a time – I think it took me about 2 or 3 minutes to setup music that then only played for maybe 10 min – a huge waste of time – because when you pick a song (or a radio station), the unit goes back to the top of the list for your next selection and NOT to the place where you last selected. So like if I chose a station called “Klassic Kristian” music, scrolling all the way down from “AAA AM” (and going from A to K on the radio takes a LONG TIME), the next time I want to pick a station (mind you w/o turning the tuner off) it is back up at the top at “AAA AM”. As you can probably assertain for yourself, I have never gotten out of the “A’s” on the internet radio because 1) there are so many stations and 2) it takes so long to scroll down. Which means that I basically use about 10% of it’s capability – a huge waste of this unit’s vaste potential. After you do the initial setup, there is no interface with the front of the unit – everything is on the remote – so God forbid if you lose that sucker.
So the Pandora and internet radio are really, honestly God sends and this unit plays them with crystal clarity. I really love the look of it and there is a vast potential that I have yet to even tap. However, the interface system is so awful that I rarely bother. I’ve had it setup in my house for 4 months and I think I’ve only used it half a dozen times and my kids don’t even try – it just takes way too much time. What a crying shame…
(As a caveat, I have read in some of these reviews that you can download an I-Pod app that allows your I-Pod to act as an advanced remote. Although I have not tried it, this would be a huge benefit. However it wouldn’t change my rating as 1) not everyone has an I-Pod and 2) you shouldn’t have to use a 3rd party device in order to get the darn thing into the 21st century)
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