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Review on πŸ“» AUNA Connect 150 Black Walnut: 2.1 Internet Radio, Wi-Fi Music Player with MP3 USB Port, AUX, Remote Control by Centerfold Montague

Revainrating 5 out of 5

good product, highly recommended -

I've had Auna for about a week and thought I could share my thoughts. It's well thought out. It matters and the fit and finish is pretty good. The knobs are cheap plastic, but the body is nice wood. It has 3 speakers, 2 side speakers and an overhead woofer, assuming you can call a 3 inch speaker a woofer. The TFT screen is small. The icons on the screen are recognizable but difficult for old eyes to read from a distance. The time and date writing is visible up close, but not across the room. That's not a problem for me as it's on the nightstand next to my bed, but using it as a clock radio on the countertop makes it harder to tell the time. Setup was easy and intuitive, and it found my wireless network immediately. There are 5 possible inputs.1. FM: I bought this to replace a Tivoli 3 that was starting to misbehave. The Tivoli has an external antenna which is basically a wire hanging behind the radio. The Auna has a traditional retractable metal radio antenna mounted on the back and pointing up, giving it a rather awkward look. VHF reception is good. I don't listen to FM much, but you could certainly use this as everyday radio.2. Spotify: This works with Spotify Connect, which requires a premium subscription for your Spotify account. You can use this as a Spotify client, ie you have created a playlist on your smartphone and this is transferred to auna, which is recognized as a device in the Spotify app. I don't see how to create a new playlist on auna, just start or stop an existing playlist.3. Internet Radio: Works well. To use it fully you need to create an account on the Wi-Fi Frontier Radio portal, but even without an account you can search for internet radio stations on the radio and select a limited number (9) as your favorites from the crate. The sound quality depends on the bitstream but seems to be pretty good for most channels. Compared to the compression radio, the sound is probably a little better. The interface is fairly basic, although the search feature requires some scrolling.4. USB/auxiliary input: I haven't tried it.5. DLNA client. Actually it was a pleasant surprise. I stored all my music as ALAC files on a server running Windows Home Server and used Logitech Music Server to stream music from my server to multiple compression devices. While Auna recognizes the Logitech music server and finds album folders, it doesn't want to play any tracks, so it doesn't look like it's serving as a Squeezebox client. On the other hand, it sees the music folder on the server and plays from the folder, and it also sees the music folder that I use as a backup on a separate WD network drive configured as a DLNA server. This allows me to continue to wirelessly stream all my music through the radio, either from the WD hard drive or from the music folder on the server. It shows the album art on screen, although the images are tiny. I was planning on using it primarily as an alarm clock and it seems to work quite well. Unfortunately, there's no battery backup, so you'll be stuck in the event of a power outage. I don't think there's a separate alarm tone that goes off if the network goes down and you can't get internet radio if that's the alarm of choice. (This was a useful feature of the now-defunct Squeezebox radio). It plays the input that was last selected as the alarm tone. You can set separate alarm times for weekdays and weekends. I don't see the repeat function, in case that matters. Finally, the sound quality is quite good for a box of this size. I think it's probably as good as a Tivoli and maybe a little bit better than a radio computer. For a little over $100 on sale, this is a good deal. Tivoli's Bluetooth is almost twice the size and has no internet. They are both made in China. The compressor radio used to cost about the same but is no longer sold. I thought of the echo dot. I suspect that the speaker configuration on the Auna emits a better sound than the Spot, but I'm not entirely sure and can still try the Spot. The video clearly has Alexa not in Auna. I love Revain products but am not sure I want Jeff to hear them in my bedroom. :) Update from 204 - I've had this for about two years now and still love it very much - it's my daily alarm clock. Setting the alarm with the remote is a bit fiddly, but there are multiple options: day/weekend/once/repeat etc. My comment above is incorrect - there is a snooze option (press the right button). Only negative - it doesn't seem to handle Daylight Saving Time very well - I have both "Set Time From Network" and "Allow Daylight Saving Time" but it doesn't update consistently - I had to reset the time myself - as long as you me know it's a minor bug, but I was almost late for work when it happened the first time. The variety of internet radio stations is a big plus. Overall a good radio and I would buy it again.

Pros
  • HiFi update: This internet radio offers professional sound from two 2.5" full range speakers and an additionally supported 3" woofer.
Cons
  • Reliability