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Revo Pico Radiostation review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £149
inc VAT

Revo’s Pico Radiostation is a smart-looking portable audio streamer, internet radio and RSS podcast receiver with a built-in DAB and FM radio.

Its built-in mono speaker was loud enough to hear throughout our labs – equivalent to a large lounge – and didn’t distort even at full volume. It’s small enough to easily fit on a kitchen worktop, and is splash-proof, too. It also has a built-in rechargeable Li-ion battery that lasts around 12 hours, so you could listen in the bath or while watering the garden.

Most of the Radiostation’s functions can be accessed using the dial and buttons on its front panel, although a pause button is a somewhat annoying omission. The two-line LCD screen is rather small, but using the dial to scroll through files and radio stations was a pleasure. The same can’t be said for the remote control, which is small, cheap-feeling, uncomfortable to use and easy to lose. The Radiostation has both wired and wireless networking. Although it was tedious, we didn’t have much trouble using the dial to enter our WPA key.

As well as a built in speaker, the Radiostation has a pair of phono outputs and a mini-jack headphone socket. A mini-jack input at the front allows you to use it as a speaker for another device, such as an MP3 player.

Like most streaming audio receivers, the Radiostation supports both UPnP and SMB shared folders and is compatible with MP3 and WMA audio formats, along with RealMedia streams and various uncompressed formats such as Wav and AIFF. This should suit most people, although we’d have liked to see support for Ogg audio streams, which are becoming more popular. To add new internet radio streams and podcasts subscriptions, you must register online at www.wifiradio-fontier.com.

The Radiostation did everything we asked of it, and did it well. The small LCD screen and cheap remote control are more than made up for by its ease of use, audio quality and portability. If you don’t want to be tied to one spot, this is the receiver for you.

Basic Specifications

Rating ****
Media Streamer type streaming audio receiver

Audio Compatibility

Audio MP3 playback Yes
Audio WMA playback Yes
Audio WMA-DRM playback No
Audio AAC playback No
Audio Protected AAC playback No
Audio OGG playback No
Audio WAV playback Yes
Audio Audible playback No
Other audio formats AIFF, AU, RM
Internet radio stream compatib MP3, RM, WMA

Video Compatibility

Video MPEG-1 playback No
Video MPEG-2 playback No
Video MPEG-2 VOB playback No
Video MPEG-4 AVI playback No
Video MPEG-4 MP4 playback No
Video MPEG-4 DivX/XviD support No
Video H.264 support No
Video MPEG-4 MP3 audio support No
Video MPEG-4 AAC audio support No
Video WMV playback No
Video WMV-HD support No
Other video formats none
Internet video stream compatib none

Image Compatibility

Image BMP support No
Image JPEG support No
Image TIFF support No

Network Interfaces

Wired network ports 10/100
Wireless networking support Yes
128-bit WEP Yes
256-bit WEP No
WPA Yes
WPA2 Yes

AV Interfaces

Minijack line outputs 0
Minijack headphone outputs 1
Stereo phono outputs 1
Coaxial S/PDIF outputs 0
Optical S/PDIF outputs 0
Total SCART sockets 0
HDMI outputs 0
Component outputs 0
S-video output 0
Composite outputs 0
Other connectors none

Physical

Size 105x167x105mm
Antennas 1
Internal/external antennas internal
Upgradeable antenna No
Power consumption standby 4W
Power consumption on 4W

Server Compatibility

Software included none
UPnP Yes
iTunes No
SlimServer No
SMB Yes

Buying Information

Price £149
Warranty one year RTB
Supplier http://www.advancedmp3players.co.uk
Details www.revo.co.uk

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