Review on ⏰ Sangean RCR-22 Atomic Clock Radio: FM-RDS/AM/Aux-in Digital Tuning, Silver, One Size - Ultimate Timekeeping Experience by Darius Early

At the time of writing this I have owned the RCR-22 for more than two months. Today, our product range is limited to a select set based on an ignorant, indiscriminate public that dictates worldly choices to those of us who know what we want. Every now and then something comes to mind that makes me say; "Where did it come from?" When I looked at the clock radios available I wasn't thrilled as far as what I wanted and what I could find. Nowadays every product is the same or even worse. They are either common or excellent. When I found the Sangean RCR-22, it stood out from the many "me too" radio clocks. I will not describe all the features here as they have already been released. I found a few goodies that aren't listed in the specs, as well as a few things of my own that I'd like. What I needed was a radio clock with a quartz time base, reset by a radio time signal transmitted from Boulder, Colorado, connected to a world-class atomic clock at the US Naval Observatory in Washington, DC. AM good quality. / FM radio, runs on AC power with a battery used only as a backup during a power outage. A fairly large display that's illuminated at night but very dim, amber at best (warm colored light in a dark room is more sleep-friendly than teal). Of course, I didn't get everything I wanted. With the RCR-22 I found most of what I wanted and then a little more. This radio"atomic clock". It runs on AC power without those "wall warts". AM/FM radio quality is above average thanks to a phase-locked FM tuner. The sound of the speaker is above average for a clock radio. It has a headphone output for stereo headphones, but only mono audio output. It has many buttons to access many functions. Some buttons are on the front, others on the top. One thing I found handy is that when you press the front buttons, there is a kickstand at the top of each side to place your finger on the back to stabilize the device when you press the front button. It doesn't use a backup battery, but instead has a "supercapacitor" that keeps the clock running for about an hour during a power outage. Some outages last longer. If it exceeds the energy stored in the capacitor and your wake-up time, the alarm will not go off. Even if power is restored before you wake up, it may take some time for the atomic clock signal to reset. So I would prefer a backup battery. We recently had a 2 hour power outage and when the power came back the clock went off. All other settings (alarm clock and radio presets) remained untouched. The clock is automatically reset by the radio control, but this may take some time depending on the reception. The dial backlight is a blue LED. You have the choice between light or dark. The blackout selection is fully adjustable by adjusting the screw head on the bottom. You can adjust from zero to bright in standby mode. That means even if the color is blue, you can adjust it so that it's barely visible in a dark room. I did this and I can still read the display in a lighted room. Repeat can be disabled with ANY of the top buttons. The snooze alarm sounds every 5 minutes. I would prefer 8 to 10 minutes. If I try to write down all my thoughts about this product I will never get this rating. In closing I just want to say that I am very happy with this Sangean clock radio. Instead of competing with the product against everything else, they innovated and thought of a product that stands out from all the rest. Of course, it's still too early to tell how long that will take. I know my previous Timex atomic clock radio lasted 13 years before the function buttons lost their conductive foil inside. It has a setting to add or subtract the hour. Some people prefer it, some don't. I have other radio controlled clocks that reset themselves automatically. Instead, I'd prefer the option to choose between automatic daylight saving time or non-automatic. The DST/ST code has already been sent from Boulder, Colorado, and if the data changes, the radio signal will reflect the change.