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This review covers 3 digital radios which are innovative for different reasons: PURE Sensia (unique colour touchscreen and apps like Facebook), KOGAN Deluxe (packed with features and stereo sound for less than $200) and BUSH Walker (very small and light portable pocket DAB+ radio).

I’ve been interested in Digital Radio in Australia since it launched in mid-2009 and have reviewed several budget, mid-range and high-end digital radios.

Unlike the three radios reviewed in this article most DAB+ digital radios sold in Australia differ a bit from each other in price and features but aren’t very innovative.

PURE Sensia (Portable Digital, FM and Internet Radio with Colour Touchscreen)

Few digital radios could be called “Cool” but the PURE Sensia certainly qualifies with it’s unique colour touchscreen interface, internet connectivity and ability to run applications on screen like Weather, Facebook, Twitter and soon Picasa photo galleries.

If you get bored with the range of DAB+ radio stations available in Australia you can listen to thousands of podcasts and streaming internet radio stations using the PURE Sensia’s WiFi connection to access the “PURE Lounge”.

However this means you have a tricky decision to make when deciding whether to buy the PURE Sensia because evidently a lot of effort has been put into the striking physical design and 5.7″ inch (640×480px) colour touchscreen but this is at the expense of audio quality which is not as good as the slightly cheaper and more plain PURE Evoke 2S digital radio which has exceptional audio quality.

Note that the touchscreen is as easy to use as a modern smartphone like iPhone/Android phones but it isnt quite as fast and responsive. Also the power button just above the screen is located in a way that resting your hand on top with the lightest touch can turn the radio on/off when you didn’t mean to.

The PURE Sensia is available in black, white or more exuberant yellow or red colours to match your decor and comes with a nice curved remote (pictured).

The PURE Sensia has a $749 recommended retail price but you should be able to find it sold at retailers like Ryda for roughly $630 including delivery.

KOGAN Deluxe (Wi-Fi DAB+ Digital Internet Radio With Iphone Dock)

Kogan concentrates on manufacturing consumer audio/visual consumer electronics products which are value for money and the KOGAN Deluxe radio offers value in spades since it’s the only sub-$200 stereo DAB+ digital radio sold in Australia with so many features.

Particular standouts are Stereo speakers (at this price point digital radios usually have 1 mono speaker), WiFi and Ethernet connectivity to access internet streaming radio/local network file streaming audio files, iPod/iPhone dock and large OLED multi-line screen which displayed menu and audio information in orange letters which matches the jet black radio finish nicely.

Sound quality from the stereo speakers and front tweeter is certainly powerful with decent bass but lacks finesse at the high end. Also because the stereo speakers are side mounted the KOGAN Deluxe radio has to be in an open area, you can’t place it in a home theatre cabinet with partitions on either side blocking the speakers.

The KOGAN Deluxe uses two rings of buttons, one inside the other to manage all the radio functions and this generally works well except when navigating through 1000’s of song files on the local network when using a knob would be faster. A credit card sized remote is included but it looks very cheap.

The KOGAN Deluxe (Wi-Fi DAB+ Digital Internet Radio With Iphone Dock) is currently sold for $199+delivery. If Kogan continues with their strategy of dropping their prices for products over time it will be even cheaper 12 months from now.

Bush Walker BPR07DAB (Handheld Ultralight DAB+ Radio)

There are very few DAB+ digital radios sold in Australia which call themselves “portable” but the Bush Walker BPR07DAB is the smallest and lightest available by a longshot with a similar size/weight to a matchbox so it easily fits in the palm of your hand or pocket.

The Bush Walker managed to tune all 39 digital radio stations currently available in Sydney once earphones were plugged in (it uses them as antennae). It rarely dropped the audio signal whether in my office, outside while walking or on the bus and achieved close to its stated 10 hour battery life.

Although it has a small screen the BUSH Walker manages to display the current station name, scrolling program information, battery and signal strength as well as whether you have it set to FM or DAB+ digital radio mode.

Overall a big thumbs up due to its size and simple menus because it is amazing that BUSH managed to output decent audio quality with 2xAAA batteries taking up most of the internal space inside the radio case.

The Bush Walker BPR07DAB has a $129 recommended retail price but if you buy it from a retailer who stocks BUSH products you should be able to knock that down to $110.

Visit the Rambling Thoughts Blog regularly to read articles about Technology, Personal Finance, TV Shows, Politics, Environment, Books and more

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I’ve always used headphones to listen to music, podcasts and audio books because all the earphone buds I tried in the past were *really* uncomfortable.

So you can understand my surprise at finding the Logitech’s Ultimate Ears 700 noise isolating earphones I’ve been testing for the past 6 weeks comfortable with excellent sound quality.

If you spend a lot of time listening to music, podcasts or audio books don’t listen to cheap headphones/earphones which sound horrible and can damage your hearing by forcing you to turn the volume up too high.

Logitech Ultimate Ears 700 Photo Slideshow

Pros and Cons of Logitech Ultimate Ears 700 Noise-Isolating Earphones

Good Features

• They’re passive noise-isolating upto 26 dB, blocking a lot of outside noise like buses, trains, city sounds etc by fitting snugly into your ear. Being passive means they don’t need batteries which are required by all noise canceling headphones.
• Comply™ foam ear-cushions meant I could listen within discomfort for long periods
• Impressive sound quality for such a small audio package. Ultimate Ears custom earphones are used by 75% of the world’s touring professional artists for live performances.
• Can be worn comfortably in hot, dry or humid Australian weather when wearing headphones would have made your ears feel hot and sweaty.
• Are tiny themselves and fit in a small plastic case which can be slipped into your pocket or handbag. Good quality headphones with noise cancelling or noise isolating features are usually quite bulky.

Some Negative Issues

• A lot of people use the cheap free earphones which come with their iPod or Mobile phone. So in comparison the cost of buying Logitech Ultimate Ears 700 (AUS $200-$299) seems really high because earphones all look quite similar, the quality difference can only be heard by trying them on.
• You’ll have to clean ear wax particles out of them regularly because these earphones are stuck inside your ear canal.
• Wearing them while exercising can cause “clanky” noises as the earphone cables get jerked around.

Logitech Ultimate Ears 700 Noise-Isolating Earphones are sold in Australia for between $200-$299 in a package including plastic hard case, silicon ear-cushions (S,M,L), two sets of Comply^TM foam ear-cushions, instruction manual and airline attenuator cable.

Other People’s Reviews of Logitech Ultimate Ears 700

A big advantage of in-ear headphones is the noise isolation they provide, an area in which the Ultimate Ears 700 in-ear headphones generally perform well. They provide up to 26dB of passive noise isolation from external sources, so you won’t have to turn up the volume excessively to hear the music over your surroundings. In practice, we found most external noise was isolated fairly well provided music was playing at a reasonable volume. Excessive noise sources, like trains, could still be heard but nearby conversation and other natural sounds were blocked out.
- Good Gear Guide

WIRED Exquisite sound reproduction in an insanely small package. Handy in-flight attenuator saves you from Captain Blowhard’s eardrum-exploding announcements. Fuller, richer base and wider frequency response than previous UEs.

TIRED Spendiferous. Cable noise will be distracting for joggers or anyone planning to use the headphones while exercising. Despite its redesign, the pocket case is still too small to fit all the accouterments.
– WIRED

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In October 2009 I was shocked to hear that Billy Birmingham aka The 12th Man was finally retiring from the game bringing his remarkable innings to a close. Sad news for his many fans, old and new

To mark the occasion he’s releasing a definitive “The Box Set” complete works of The 12th Man in a 7 CD pack. It’s your chance to own a piece of Australian recording history because I can guarantee we will never see his like again.

If you, your friends or family enjoy watching cricket on the TV you’ll be quite familiar with the Channel 9 commentary team and Billy Birmingham aka “The 12th Man” who has impersonated their voices and savagely mocked and exaggerated their mannerisms in The 12th Man Again! (1990), Still the 12th Man (1992), Bill Lawry… This is Your Life (1997), The Final Dig? (2001) and his latest work Boned! (December 2006).

The Twelfth Man is the name for a series of comedy productions by Australian satirist Billy Birmingham. Birmingham, a skilled impersonator, is generally known for parodying Australian sports commentators’ voices.

As befits the name (a reference to the non-playing reserve in a cricket side), Birmingham particularly focuses on cricket commentators such as Richie Benaud, Bill Lawry and Tony Greig. This is also due to the fact that many of Australia’s cricket commentators have distinctive and easily-identifiable voices and accents.

The parodies, released periodically on CD, are designed as a look “behind the scenes” of the Nine Network’s cricket commentary.

Birmingham traditionally plays all the roles with the exception of minor female characters, such as Richie Benaud’s wife. Benaud himself is known to have a very low opinion of the recordings, due predominantly to Birmingham’s use of profanity.

A highlight of the recordings is the cricket commentary itself, generally featuring wildly improbable match results – teams scoring 600 runs in a one-day international match, for example. Birmingham is noted for his creation of humorous names for players of other countries, particularly Sri Lanka and Pakistan.

Some are designed as thinly-veiled references to the players themselves, such as the Pakistani bowlers:

• “Wasee A-Crim” (Was He A Crim, a reference to Wasim Akram during the match-fixing controversy)
• “Hafeez Andmissin” (Half His Hand Missing, a parody of Azeem Hafeez who was born without two fingers on his right hand)
• “Ahkeep Myteefina Jahbesidabed” (I Keep My Teeth In A Jar Beside The Bed, a reference to Aaqib Javed)
• Their captain “Ahbroke Meandad” (I Broke My Hand Dad, a reference to Javed Miandad
• “Javed Gemiteformeandad” – Jar Vegemite for me and dad

As well as the Sri Lankan batsman “Ramatunga Downathroata” (a reference to former Sri Lankan captain Arjuna Ranatunga). Others simply parody the general sound of Urdu or Sinhalese names.

An Australian Christmas and The 12th Man have gone hand in hand now for over 20 years and The 12th Man’s cricket loving fans have not had anything new from him since his multi Platinum No 1 “The Final Dig?” where Ritchie announced his retirement from the commentary team captaincy and then retracted it after he learnt he’d be replaced by Max Walker

So the release of a new double album had fans salivating with anticipation – especially when they learnt that the new album was titled “Boned” and contains over 150 minutes of 12th Man mayhem.

The 2 cd Set features Eddie McGuire ‘boning’ the entire Channel 9 Cricket Commentary team with The 12th Man taking over the microphone. Listen as Richie, Bill, Tony and the boys do whatever it takes to get their jobs back.

All 7 albums from The 12th Man have reached #1 on the Australian Charts, making The 12th Man the only Australian recording artist to have achieved this milestone.

Readers can purchase 12th Man Cd’s from Chaos Music at bargain prices and enjoy guaranteed laughs whether you buy them for yourself or for others as a gift

Please note: Several people have contacted me with questions for Billy – I have no contact with him. I am just a fan like you and this page is a review of some of his best work

Visit the Rambling Thoughts Blog regularly to read articles about Technology, Personal Finance, TV Shows, Politics, Environment, Books and more

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This is the 1st Australian review of the new OXX Digital Vantage DAB+ Digital Radio. At $149.95 RRP the Vantage has the benefits of being portable with a rubberised outdoor resistant finish at half the price of the more fully featured OXX Digital Classic model

One unexpected strength of the Vantage is being exceptionally good at picking up DAB+ signals even in my suburb which has fluctuating digital radio signal strength. When I took it out of its box, tuned all the stations and started testing I didn’t even notice the antenna wasn’t extended until 30min later.

Before you look at any digital radios make sure you read my detailed Introduction to Digital Radio in Australia – I asked digital radio spokespeople at ABC / SBS what their offerings would be and also found out what Commercial Radio, Community Radio and several digital radio manufacturers had to say.

Photos of OXX Digital Vantage Styling/Design

The Vantage has a retro black/silver design which should remind elderly readers of Bakelite radios from long long ago. Play the photo slideshow to see what it looks like from various angles.

Good Features

Reception/Antenna – Second to none, far better at picking up Digital Radio broadcasts and playing them without any sound dropouts than the other digital radio’s I’ve previously reviewed. Picked up all the Sydney stations and displayed the digital radio station datastream eg: current song name, weather forecast, news headlines etc on screen.

Portable – With a rubberised non-marking soft touch weather resistant exterior and 15-18 hours Battery Life using 6 C Cell batteries it’s great for taking out with you while gardening in the backyard, to the beach or a sports event covered by radio eg: cricket match, NRL etc. Weighs 800gm (Dimensions: height 14.4cm x length 21.2 cm x depth: 7.6 cm)

Speakers/Sound – 2watt mono linear magnetic full range speaker feels biased to treble and sounds quite fine upto volume 12/16 but after that it’s a bit distorted. Suited for a studio apartment but doesn’t have enough power for a big open space house living area

Extras – Dual Alarm Clock with Snooze Function and 10 preset radio stations of your choice. Battery or mains power as it suits you.

Warranty – Generous 2 year (24 Months), most consumer electronics products only have a 1 year warranty.

Weaknesses

Connectivity (Inputs/Outputs) – Stereo Line Out and Headphone jack output. Digital Radio + FM Radio input. If you want WiFi internet radio or access to songs via shared network drive you’ll have to pay more for a different digital radio.

Display & Buttons – 2 line screen is clear but it’s somewhat tedious to read scrolling text news updates or song names because the scrolling speed is so slow. The display is clear and easy to read from a distance if you change the backlight setting to “Timeout: ON” (which actually means that the timeout never happens). Make sure you turn the radio off when not in use if “Timeout: ON” because if you press Standby the screen stays backlit.

Buttons – Are small and not raised enough. The button font would be easier to read if it was Sans-Serif (not slanted and italics). The buton to change stations is labelled “DAB Station”, It should have been named “Select Digital Station” or something similar because the vast majority of people don’t know what DAB is.

Buttons would be more user friendly if they were below the screen to make them easier to press and read when the radio is on the grass outside on the lawn or on a kitchen counter

Verdict

If you want a quality portable digital radio to use outside which beats all the others at picking up all the stations clearly and has thought put into the design with a 2 year warranty than by all means buy the OXX Digital Vantage for $$149.95 RRP.

However if you don’t need portability – for $40 extra you could buy a Kogan digital radio with an unpolished design but lots more features or for $150 extra you could get the more deluxe OXX Digital Classic model with a big multi-line screen, WiFi radio, network share drive access etc.

The OXX Digital Vantage will go on sale from the 1st week of December at Wicked Digital online and probably also at some big electronics chains like Harvey Norman, Bing Lee etc.

DISCLAIMER: as of November 2009 I will be doing intermittent (now and then) paid design and usability tests for OXX Digital on new products that they are considering designing. This will not effect blog reviews of their products in any way as OXX has indicated they are keen on any feedback which can be used to improve their products

Visit the Rambling Thoughts Blog regularly to read articles about Technology, Personal Finance, TV Shows, Politics, Environment, Books and more

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Andrew Davies is the producer of Future Tense presented & co-produced by Antony Funnell on Australia’s ABC Radio National (RN).

As a long time listener to RN Media Report, (another team effort by Andrew & Antony) I wondered what this replacement Future Tense program debuting in early 2009 would be like …

“Future or Bust” – photo credit: vermininc

Thankfully the program rose pheonix-like from the ashes of Media Report and is now essential listening because of it’s wide range of topics and critical look at new technologies / approaches / ways of thinking and exploration of the social, cultural, political and economic fault lines arising from rapid change.

EDITOR: A big thanks to Andrew Davies from ABC Radio National for putting time aside in his hectic schedule to answer my interview questions in such depth.

Neerav Bhatt:
On your ABC profile page it says : “When I’m not producing … I seem to spend most of my life online. Luckily for me I get to call that ‘research’!”

What are your favorite research sources on TV, radio, podcast, magazine, RSS etc?

Andrew Davies:
I’m a big consumer of TV documentaries – mainly on the ABC and SBS. Most of my research sources tend to come from radio /podcasts, magazines, blogs / RSS feeds, and newspapers. I have to say though that some of the most interesting and fun material I see comes via the people I follow on Twitter. We’ve done 3 or 4 stories this year arising from links or information that have been on Twitter.

These are some of the Magazines / Newspapers I read:

Wired Magazine, The New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, Slate, Arts Letters Daily, The Economist, The New York Review of Books, Edge, New Atlantis, New York Times, The Australian, Sydney Morning Herald, Financial Review, Washington Post, The Times, The Guardian, Boston Globe Ideas, New Scientist.

In no particular order these are some of the podcasts I listen to (you can try all of them out by importing my podcast OPML feed into your podcast subscription software eg: iTunes (File -> Import).

• Background Briefing
• Big Ideas
• Law Report
• Rear Vision
• BBC Digital Planet
• BBC Pods and Blogs
• CBC Spark
• Guardian Media Talk
• NPR On The Media
• Radio Berkman
• NPR Fresh Air
• BBC Peter Day’s World of Business
• BBC In Our Time
• Radio Australia Tech Stream
• BBC Forum
• The Scoop
• TED Talks
• G’day World

Neerav Bhatt:
Are you familiar with the famous quote by sci-fi writer William Gibson “The future is here. It’s just not evenly distributed yet” and what do you think of it?

Andrew Davies:
Yes I am aware of William Gibson’s quote. I’d heard it referenced a few times but only really became familiar with it this year. I think it’s a really interesting quote. I haven’t done a huge amount of research into the background or context of the quote.

I think I first came across it on Tim O’Reilly’s blog. But I guess to me it suggests that many of the ‘future’ developments and predictions that people talk about are actually already happening today – often in small ways.

I think sometimes there’s an assumption that many of the innovations we’ll see in the future will suddenly emerge from out of nowhere. But I think that many of the developments – particularly in fields such as science and technology – will emerge more from incremental change.

Tim O’Reilly said on his blog that ‘it isn’t until much later that the world realises their significance’. I think that’s a really good way of looking at things. Many of the stories we’ve done on the program this year – bio-technology, urban planning, e-government – have focused on those smaller ‘future’ related developments that are already happening.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see whether they lead to big things or not!

Neerav Bhatt:
30 years ago books like Future Cities: Homes and Living into the 21st Century (World of the Future) were predicting that our living rooms in the future would contain many more electronic gadgets, people would work from home and flat screen TV’s only 5cm thick would be commonplace.

Sure not all the predictions were accurate eg: we don’t have domestic robots yet (though Japanese researchers are working on it).

During your research have you found any modern day publications making predictions about commonly used household technologies 30 years from now in 2040?

“1979 Living Room of the Future full” – photo credit: sots

Andrew Davies:
That’s an interesting question. I’m someone who’s always a bit suspicious about big future predictions! We recently spoke to the futurist Alex Pang , who’s written quite a funny blog post about what futurists do and how they could do it better.

But getting back to your question. I’ve come across a few future related blogs that touch on these themes but so far we haven’t really covered (directly) the changing nature of household technologies.

One prediction we’re keen to touch on at some point though is the idea of ‘the paperless office’. That was quite a big prediction several years ago. But despite the hype it seems as if most offices still use paper, in one way or another.

So we’re keen to follow-up on that to determine what happened. Of course if anyone has any other ideas about future related household or business technologies, then feel completely free to hassle me about them!

Here’s a list of some blogs I’ve come across that touch on predictions about household technologies: Accelerating Future, Future Pundit, Next Big Future

Neerav Bhatt:
In it’s short lifespan of 7 months to date, who has been the most interesting Future Tense interviewee and why?

Andrew Davies:
I struggled quite a bit with this question. It actually made me realise just how many different topics we’d covered in our short lifespan! Sometimes you forget when you get caught up in the week to week cycle of making programs.

One of our most interesting interviewees was PW Singer from the Brookings Institution in Washington. We spoke to him in February about his book Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and 21st Century Conflict.

The book looks at the growing use by the US military (and others) of robots and what that means for civilians, soldiers and the laws of war. PW Singer is one of the first people to investigate this area and he gave a great insight into some of the moral and ethical issues that the use of robots raises for militaries and governments.

Some of the other interesting people we’ve spoken to this year are: Chris Anderson, Editor in Chief of Wired Magazine, Nathan Eagle, a research scientist at MIT, David Bollier, editor of ‘onthecommons.org’, Tim O’Reilly, and Stephen Baker from Businessweek.

Another favourite interview was with Rhonda Hetzel. Rhonda lives in the small Queensland town of Landsborough and is the author of the popular ‘down to earth’ blog.

We spoke to her about the rise of ‘frugal blogs’ back in April. Rhonda has built up an amazing international community of readers around the theme of ’simple living’. So much so that her blog has caught the eye of a New York agent who now wants to represent her in a potential book deal.

Neerav Bhatt:
The Future Tense program gets broadcast on radio in Australia on Radio National, overseas on Radio Australia, streamed live on the internet, downloadable as an MP3 podcast and also available as a transcript – so it’s audience is already fragmented across many forms of media.

Please take your ABC employee hat off … as an avid radio listener and subscriber via MP3 podcast where do you personally think radio is headed?

Will the newly launched digital radio (DAB/DAB+) broadcast over the airwaves eventually reach the same level of adoption as analog AM/FM radio over time?

Or is it possible that the National Broadband Network will render today’s broadcast radio obsolete because everyone will have access to thousands of radio stations worldwide via the internet?

Andrew Davies:
I think this is one of the questions that many people in the media are asking themselves at the moment. Given what I said earlier about making predictions, I’d be foolish if I made any grand claims in answering this! I think sometimes you have to say you don’t know.

However I do think some people will increasingly move towards the ‘on demand’ method of radio – downloads, streams, mobile etc.. I think the ability to listen to whatever you want wherever you want is quite appealing.

I think other people may not necessarily want to have to make a choice about what they listen to. I think some of those people quite like the ebb and flow of radio, and to be surprised by what they’re listening to. The great thing about radio is its immediacy, and the fact that you can listen to it while doing other things.

There’s been a lot written and said about digital radio. I think a lot of people will love the great sound and extra choice that digital radio brings. In contrast some other people may prefer the added portability of listening to their favourite radio programs on the bus or train via their mp3 players.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens with digital radio over the next few years before making any conclusions.

Whatever happens in the future I don’t think it’s necessarily a case of either or when it comes to the future of radio. Hopefully that means (if it isn’t the case already) that there’ll be an even greater range of (ABC!!) listening options to suit individual habit and taste.

Neerav Bhatt:
I have a suggestion – would you consider encouraging listeners to upload photos related to stories covered in Future Tense episodes to Flickr with the tag “rnfuturetense” similar to what NPR’s Planet Money podcast does ?

Andrew Davies:
That’s a great point. I’ve been a regular listener to the Planet Money podcast since it started so I’m very familiar with the way they’ve encouraged listeners to upload images to Flickr.

In the first few months of Future Tense Antony Funnell and I were both quite focused on just getting the program up and running! Now that we’ve been on air for a while we’ve been really keen to incorporate more and more aspects of social media into our production process.

Through my Twitter account @awrd and through our program twitter account @rnfuturetense we’ve regularly talked about stories we’ve been keen to cover, and ideas for questions and topics we should raise.

Twitter – along with so many other social media sites – gives everyone the opportunity for conversation and moves away from the idea of just ‘us’ and ‘them’. And I guess I’m someone who really likes making new connections, collaborating and sharing new ideas.

In my time on Twitter I’ve met and come into contact with so many great people – in many cases people I probably would never have come into contact with any other way!

I should also say that together with some colleagues I’ve been working on a (hopefully!) really interesting social media project that centres around the idea of tinkering. The project will involve Future Tense, Pool and a range of other social media sites like Flickr, Twitter, Facebook, and Audioboo. We’re still finalising everything so more details soon.

And while I’m on that theme. Keep an eye out for something called ‘Flickerman’, another really fun social media project that involves Radio National’s ‘Airplay’ program and Pool. Rest assured I’ll certainly be putting the word out there about both projects!

You can see more on the Flickerman website

Neerav Bhatt:
Do you only work on Future Tense?

Andrew Davies:
No. I spend 3 days a week working on Future Tense and the other two days working with Pool (the ABC’s collaborative media space).

To quote from our about page: Pool is a place where ‘audiences become co-creators’ and can ’share and talk about creative work – photos, videos, documentaries, interviews, music, animations and more’. On Pool everyone has the opportunity to talk and collaborate with each other, and with the ABC.

At the moment Pool is still in Beta but over the last 12 months there’ve been some really exciting developments. Two of the best examples are the ‘My Street’ and ‘City Nights’ projects.

In the My Street project Radio National’s ‘Street Stories’ program asked Pool contributors to ‘tell us about your street using video, audio, images and/or text’. There were hundreds of great contributions, many of which went to air on the ‘Street Stories’ program.

The ‘City Nights’ project asked Pool contributors for ‘text, audio, video and stills contributions which reflect an experience of the city – any city – real or imagined – at night’.

This project attracted over 350 contributions and the best of that material will go to air on Radio National’s 360 program on September the 5th. As well as being on air, some of the best videos and images are also going to be screened at Federation Square in Melbourne.

Both projects really emphasise the idea of co-creation – Pool users working with Radio National producers.

As well as those projects Pool has also worked with QUT’s Creative Commons clinic and the ABC’s Archives and Library Services Department to really pioneer the release of items from the ABC’s archives for re-use. There’ve been some amazing remixes on the site recently around our ‘remix 360′ project.

For people who are interested. The Australian Cooperative Research Centre for Interaction Design (ACID) have just finished a major review of the Pool project and our (beta) website.

I’ve only been working with Pool since the beginning of this year. So our fabulous community (and the other members of the team!) deserve the credit for some amazing work.

The first project I worked on was a joint effort between the Queensland Writers Centre and Pool. As part of a range of events to celebrate Queensland’s 150 years of independence, two groups of authors travelled on a steam train through regional Queensland to promote writing and literature.

Along the way they were uploading material to Pool. I’m very lucky that by working with Pool and Future Tense I get to indulge all my interests at once!

You can subscribe to the Future Tense podcast by RSS and make comments or suggestions about the program via Post, Phone, Fax, Email or Twitter

Visit the Rambling Thoughts Blog regularly to read articles about Technology, Personal Finance, TV Shows, Politics, Environment, Books and more

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With the recent launch of digital radio in Australia I’ve been testing a number of digital radio’s including 2 from PURE Australia – the mid-level portable PURE Evoke 2S and highend table-top Digital Music System PURE AVANTI Flow

PURE Evoke 2S Digital Radio

The PURE Evoke 2S speakers (2 mid-range 3″ drive units + two 3/4″ dome tweeters) deliver 2×15W (30W RMS) audio output and offer the best sound of all the budget/midlevel digital radio’s I’ve tested.

It’s hard to describe why this radio sounds so good but whether listening to news reports on SBS 6 (BBC World Service rebroadcast), rock music on WSFM Classic Hits or a symphony on ABC Classic FM the sound combines the warmth of a analog radio broadcast with a crisp clear sound and solid mid range/bass without distortion. This makes competing digital radios with a mono speaker sound very poor in contrast.

• Features: plays DAB+ Digital radio and FM broadcasts via it’s antenna
• Speakers: 2 mid-range 3″ drive units + two 3/4″ dome tweeters) deliver 2×15W (30W RMS) audio output.
• Portable: Optional ChargePAK E1 battery gives you up to 20 hours battery life
• Display: High contrast yellow-on-black 2 line OLED display – very easy to read at any angle or from a distance
• Output sockets: 3.5mm headphone jack, 3.5mm line out (analogue).
• Power consumption: Standby 0.95W (industry average 2.64W); in operation 3.2W (industry average 5.49W).
• Warranty: 2 years
• Input Sockets: USB (mini B-type) connector for software upgrades and AUX-IN for Mp3 players etc

PURE has included a useful extra feature called “REVU” which lets you pause a radio broadcast (eg: if you’re interrupted by a phone call) and restart playback afterwards (up to 15min later).

Pause/rewind is one of the features which was heavily promoted by Commercial Radio Australia when digital radio was launched but I say they were disingenuous because its a feature of only a fraction of digital radio’s on sale in Australia.

There are plenty of nicely sized preset buttons which you can program with your favourite radio stations and the silver Volume/Tuner knobs give a clear clicking feedback so you can hear how fast they’re being turned.

One clear design flaw is no clear indication of whether the radio is on or not because the display auto-dims depending on ambient light. Several times it wasn’t obvious whether the radio was on or off and it got left on all day.

While an iPod Dock with remote (PURE i-10) is available for roughly $80 the lack of WiFi internet radio capability and/or the ability to access music/audio files on a shared network drive via WiFi is puzzling because it would make this radio almost perfect.

The PURE EVOKE-2S is RRP $699 in Australia but retails for $599+delivery from techbuy.com.au.

Sources in the UK tell me they can buy the PURE EVOKE-2S over there for about 170pounds (equivalent to $AUS 336).

For more details about the Evoke 2S visit the PURE Australia website.

Other People’s Reviews of PURE Evoke 2S Digital Radio

The [PURE EVOKE] 2S has two stereo speakers plus 2 tweeter speakers and delivers 30W of audio output. It’s noticeably the best sounding “basic” radio, with incredible punch and fully rounded audio.

It allows you to pause and rewind upto 15minutes of broadcast content, as well as pause and rewind the scrolling text. The maple veneer looks won’t be for everyone but our main concern is the price at RRP $699.
- Sydney Morning Herald

The most appealing aspect of the Evoke-2S is its sound. It uses PURE’s Clearsound technology. It has “bigger than you’d expect” sound, excellent speech and vocal tonality, and, with a little juggling of the tone controls it’s capable of delivering music in a highly attractive fashion.

I was able to compare this model with the Evoke-2XT, the sound quality of which is anything but disappointing, and the new model is clearly more powerful, more detailed and easier to enjoy. Add to that the winning combination of features and the logical, intuitive operation and this is clearly a highly attractive choice for the serious radio fan. The Evoke-2S isn’t just PURE’s best-sounding radio to date; it’s the company’s best product, full stop.
- Gramaphone magazine June 2009

PURE Avanti Flow Digital Radio with WiFi and iPod Dock

It would be wrong to call the PURE Avanti Flow “just a Digital Radio”, it’s better to think of it as a mid-level hi-fi system for the digital age with an iPod dock and WiFi radio capability instead of a CD player. In terms of sheer power and better bass thanks to it’s subwoofer the PURE AVANTI Flow sounds better than the EVOKE 2S but not by much.

Key features include DAB+ digital radio, powerful power output of 75W RMS total (2 x 20W + 35W subwoofer), design that would fit well on a shelf or tabletop and the aforementioned streaming WiFi radio and iPod dock. All these features can be controlled with the bundled well designed remote control.

PURE shows thoughtfulness by packaging the AVANTI Flow in a soft drawstring bag so it won’t get scratched while being shipped to you. It also has rubber feet to make sure it doesn’t slip around on smooth/glass surfaces with a similar rubberized feel on the bottom of the remote.

The display has 6 lines, 4 of which diplay radio station related information and in a nice touch the information on screen scrolls smoothly vertically down rather than all the other radio’s I’ve tested which scroll horizontally right to left.

• Features: plays DAB+ Digital radio and FM broadcasts via it’s antenna + streaming WiFi radio and media streaming (WMA V9, WAV, AAC, MP3, MP2, Real Audio) from a PC/Mac
• Speakers: power output of 75W RMS total (2 x 20W + 35W subwoofer)
• Display: High contrast yellow-on-black 128 x 64 4 line auto-dimming OLED display – very easy to read at any angle or from a distance
• Output socket:3.5mm headphone jack
• Remote: Reach F10 RF remote control.
• Warranty: 2 years
• Input Sockets: Ipod Dock, USB (mini B-type) connector for software upgrades and AUX-IN for MP3 players etc

As a product with a premium price (RRP $999) it’s strange that PURE didn’t include a LAN 10/100 network port, their REVU (pause/rewind) technology and take more time to improve the function icons/text on the shiny silver buttons across the top of the system which are very difficult to read unless you look directly down at them.

Also while it has WiFi streaming radio capabilities the only navigation methods to choose a station are a giant list in alphanumeric order or searching for a name using the remote, both of which are tiresome.

In comparison the OXX Digital radio powered by Frontier Silicon software categorises WiFi radio stations by genre and location which makes it really fast and easy to narrow down the options to a small number of stations.

Thankfully the Australian retail prices seem to be much lower than the RRP of $999, I spotted the PURE AVANTI Flow as low a price as $798.85 at Ryda. This compares to British prices of 241.70 pounds ($472.76) at Amazon UK.

For more details about the PURE AVANTI Flow visit the PURE Australia website.

Other People’s Reviews

The RRP $999 PURE AVANTI FLOW has an iPod dock and superior 75W of output including a subwoofer. It’s the best sounding radio of all but the price is high.

PureSOUNDS lets you play noises such as seagulls, thunderstorms, guitar tuning and heartbeats to help babies sleep. PURE’s “The Lounge” website means finding internet radio stations and scheduling their recording and playback is a breeze.
- Sydney Morning Herald

Having already garnered five-star reviews from BBC Music for its EVOKE-2S DAB tuner and EVOKE Flow internet radio, we were expecting great things from PURE’s iPod dock radio, the Avanti Flow – and it didn’t disappoint.

This thoroughly modern desktop iPod system incorporates a DAB/FM and internet set-up into its solidly built glossy chassis. The internet radio proved incredibly straightforward to set up via a Wi-Fi connection while you can easily manage and synch station favourites via www.thelounge.com.

And despite its compact size, the two three inch speakers and 5.25-inch downward firing subwoofer delivered a muscular but smooth sound. If you don’t mind the lack of a CD player, then the Avanti Flow comes highly recommended
- BBC Music Magazine June ‘09

Sonically it excels – our expert listeners were impressed by its sound quality on a wide range of different music types and also with spoken voice, rating it as one of the best digital radios they’d heard. Sound quality is helped by a large speaker mounted in the bottom of the radio, which gives it a good bass sound.

On the downside, we didn’t find it particularly easy to use, mainly because of difficulties in finding and navigating round the internet stations. The remote control buttons and menu structures are confusing and not intuitive – you’ll need to learn you way around this radio before you feel comfortable with it.
- Which Reviews (subscriber only)

PURE Pricing in Australia …

True a lot more digital radios are sold in the UK and the market there is both more competitive and mature but these days consumers can easily use the internet to compare prices in different countries and judging by discussions on Australian technology chat forums quite a few people have done so and are angry/annoyed by the relatively high digital radio retail prices in Australia.

If you buy a PURE EVOKE-2S from the UK via a company like Nevada Radio once VAT is removed from that price and delivery to Australia added the total price is appx $AUS400 including delivery. Note: I don’t think the independent distributor of PURE radio’s in Australia would honour any warranty claims considering you didn’t buy it from them.

Hopefully the Australian retail prices for PURE will fall within a few months and WiFi capabilities are added to the next version of the PURE EVOKE-2S because without it the product isn’t able to be used to best effect.

If you’re interested in lower cost mono speaker digital radio’s check out my reviews of the Kogan Digital Radio and OXX Digital Radio

In the digital world a huge amount of range of content always trumps a small amount which is why I predict that digital radio’s with the ability to choose from 1000’s of WiFi radio stations as well as DAB/DAB+ broadcast digital radio stations will triumph in terms of sales.

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