Roberts PLAY20 FM/DAB/DAB+ Digital Portable Radio, Rubber-Protected, Full Colour Screen, Black

Bought this to replace a Uno Logic which suffered from a fatal overdose of abuse. The sound is just a little tinny on pop and electronic music, as some people have observed, but given this unit’s diminutive size I think that it more than meets expectations. However, if like us you mostly listen to speech radio then the Play 20 exceeds expectations, the sound on voice is crystal clear. Also, the sound is (perhaps surprisingly) very decent for classical and other acoustic music. Additionally, this radio is capable of achieving decent volumes (the Roberts Rambler BT, which I also own and like, is quieter despite being significantly larger). On headphones (I’ve just tried it out with a pair of Grado SR80Es) the sound is exceptionally good all round. The lack of rotary controls for volume and channel selection makes this radio a little more fiddly than Roberts radios equipped with these controls, but this is no big issue once you’ve preset the radio stations that you listen to regularly (which was quick and easy, assuming you read the instructions!). Finally, the area where it seems to me that most DAB equipped radios fall down, FM reception is as good as I’ve encountered; we live in an area with rather poor FM reception (several million tons of chalk lie between us and our nearest transmitter) but this radio managed to readily find BBC Radios 3, 4, 2 and Solent. I note that some reviews suggest that this radio may be temperamental for reception in respect of placement, but I wonder whether or not they have tried fully extending the aerial (as per instructions). My initial impressions suggest that this radio is no more temperamental in this respect than any other Roberts radio (and we, for our sins, currently own six in addition to this one). My suggestion, if you have reception problems but decent internet, is to buy an Echo; otherwise, in all respects, for the money and for the size, this is a well thought-out and absolutely first class product. Having the option of using AA batteries or being able to use and recharge rechargeables is the icing on the cake.The addition of a travel pouch to protect the radio might be quite useful. It doesn’t come with one. However, the radio does have a locking mechanism to stop it from being turned on in transit, a very good detail.23/3/22. I have now tried out some other headphones with this radio and am happy to report that it has absolutely no problem driving 250ohm Beyerdynamic DT990s.

This small, versatile and durable radio is handy for listening outdoors (garden, beach, park etc. pp.) or on a journey in a hotel room - no alarm function though, but everyones got a smartphone, eh :) The reception on FM and DAB+ is outstanding. Except from the fiddle presets 5-10 it is very easy to operate. The sound for its size is very good in my ears. I would have liked rotary dials for volume and tuning, but on the other hand, like it is now the design is very clear. The display is razor-sharp, dimmable and can be turned off completly.The best thing is: you can recharge batteries (NiMh AA) inside the radio. No external device needed. When the batteries wear out after some time - you can replace them by new ones. This is a lot better as an built in Li-Ion accumulator, which mostly can not be replaced or only by qualified personnel. Operational time on batteries is very good - something between 20 and 30 hours - havent stopped the time yet!The bluetooth function (aac) is quite nice, but in the end, this is a RADIO and not a JBL/Anker flip out of the box bluetooth speaker. This one runs on 4 AA-Batteries - keep that in mind!Price: Well, as I said, in the end this is a small portable radio and for the price of 85 GBP / 100 EUR this quite expensive for what it is, but the product is very well-thought-out and durable. In my opinion it is worth it. If you do not set the value on the ROBERTS brand name, there is an almost identical product by sangean (Traveller 760 / DPR 76) without bluetooth, which you may get a little cheaper.

Just in case anyone's looking for data-points on battery usage, I did a test with 4 x fresh Eneloops (1,900mAh each). Volume 10 (so about a third of max and just right for my desk when working), BBC Radio 2, strong signal on DAB, Backlight on the whole time - and it lasted for about 14 hours. No tests done yet with Alkalines. Otherwise it's a cracking little radio. Really nice, great screen resolution/colours (compared to the vast majority it seems - certainly at this price-point), good and loud if needed, sounds much better/louder than any smartphone, very good signal for FM/DAB on the North Wales coast, takes a long time to charge internally, but good that it does at all - they reckon 7 hours, won't play and charge at the same time, so either/or with cable in, be nice if it had a little carry handle I guess, but nit-picking now. Bluetooth works fine from my phone, good and loud - though some tracks distort at full volume - happier at '28' than '32'. The radio sound doesn't distort on full volume so maybe that's a Bluetooth thing - or how audio files are encoded on the phone/streamed. Lovely little dinky radio though which is worth every penny as far as I'm concerned. Bought with my own money.

Straight forward operation, neat small radio with fair enough sound quality for its size/price.Love that you just plug in to mains to recharge the batteries without all the faff of putting batteries in/out. But not very obvious to me in the listing that the rechargeable batteries need to be bought as an extra.