A number of years ago, I installed a whole house audio system and used the Squeezebox series of devices as audio sources. When we moved into a rental six months ago, we pretty much stopped listening to music in the house as it just wasn’t convenient. I had seen the Squeezebox Radio come across on Slickdeals for an open box, but I didn’t act on it in time. About a month ago, I saw on Slickdeals that Office Depot was closing out the boxes, so I acted quickly and purchased the last one at the local Office Depot.
I setup the radio for my wife and she took to it almost immediately. I thought is was interesting enough that I bought a second one (I had to goto another Office Depot) to use as a clock. Unfortunately, this one had a problem with WiFi. I asked my wife if I should just return it or find another one. She said to get as many as I could as it was cool; I didn’t need any additional encouragement, so I found another Office Depot with 2 more units (a poster on Office Depot was nice enough to post a link to an inventory checker).
We now have 3 radios connected to our Squeezebox server that has all our music on it; I already had a Mac mini running the server from before we moved, so setup was a breeze. The interface on the boxes is easy to use and produces decent music (it has a mono speaker). We’re listening to more music and we have one as a clock where we can listen to soothing sounds to put us to sleep.
In our house, sometimes my wife is slow to adopt technology, but in this case, it took no time for her to embrace it. My 5 year old son also has learned to use it and find his music. I purchased batteries for 2 of the units so that they didn’t have to be plugged in; this is huge as my son can take one in the mornings and listen to music so we can sleep a little longer.
The only odd part of the radio is that its alarm clock functionality is controlled by the server. In order to reduce power usage, my server turns off at night and turns on in the morning. When the server is off, the alarm clock won’t work. I could, however, point the radio to the My Squeezebox service and set alarms there, but it would make things harder for my son in the morning. (The radio can point to a local server or the My Squeezebox service; this can make things confusing as alarms could be in both places, but the alarms only work when the radio is pointed to the right place.)
Pros
- Easy to setup.
- Portable.
- Easy to use.
- Decent sound quality.
- Can play local music, Pandora or Slacker.
Cons
- No longer available. (There is a replacement, but Logitech seems to be moving away from the local Squeezebox Server.)
- Alarms don’t work when the server is turned off.
- Mono speaker.
Summary
The Logitech Squeezebox Radio is a great product for us as music is a part of our daily lives. For anyone that already has a Squeezebox setup, it is a worthwhile addition if you can still find the radios for a decent price. I might have gone overboard getting 3 of them, but they are integrating well into our life and making it more tolerable to live in a rental. Once we do find our perfect house, I’ll put in a whole house audio and while the radios will have less utility, we’ll still have a use for them.