Griffin Technology Radio Shark Radio Input
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- Platform: Mac
- Interface with Host: USB
- Adapter Type: Radio Input
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disappointing
Pros
Has cool blue led lights. Might work well in cities with strong radio signals.
Cons
NOT TIVO-LIKE, NO INTERNET STREAMING, needs strong radio signals. PCversion has fewer features. SharkFinShapeIsStupid.
Recommended it?
No
The Bottom Line:
Not ready for prime time, useful for specific situations, but consider other software & hardware solutions in this niche: RadioTime, RadioLover, RadioYourWay, AudioHijack, and many others.
I wanted this product because it was advertised as having a TiVo like interface, and because MacWorld had given it some innovative product award. However, seems the product wasn't actually released for a long time, and when it finally showed up, it was missing lots of cool features.
If you have good radio reception, this will record radio, either live, or if you manually specify frequency and time. Once recorded, you can pause it while you're listening to it. Big deal, so will lots of other products.
It does not do internet streaming, as was promised in early announcements.
The PC version is missing many features, like AAC encoding.
It has no programming information, and thus has no TiVo-like functionality. (There is much more to TiVo functionality than ability to pause). If you have any experience with TiVo or other good scheduling programs, this software does not seem to be so full-featured.
If you have a strong radio signal in your area, it may work for you. If you really like the quality of over-the-air music then you can record it. I'm not in a city but don't normally have problems with radio reception, however this was unable to get most stations.
I was really looking forward to timeshifting lots of public radio either from over the air or internet streaming. I held off on buying other products because of the advance announcements for this product. Now I'm disappointed I did so, and I'll move on to one of the other products.
There must be a reason they don't have any technical information or manual pdf on the web (as of this writing) or on the box.
A much more mature well-developed version of the software could address many of these complaints.
P.S. The "Ease of Use" field of the review form seems to consider "ease of use" as equivalent to program quality; but they aren't necessarily equivalent. In this case my "ease of use" rating represents the simplicity of the program, but not how well it accomplishes the goal of capturing radio.
If you have good radio reception, this will record radio, either live, or if you manually specify frequency and time. Once recorded, you can pause it while you're listening to it. Big deal, so will lots of other products.
It does not do internet streaming, as was promised in early announcements.
The PC version is missing many features, like AAC encoding.
It has no programming information, and thus has no TiVo-like functionality. (There is much more to TiVo functionality than ability to pause). If you have any experience with TiVo or other good scheduling programs, this software does not seem to be so full-featured.
If you have a strong radio signal in your area, it may work for you. If you really like the quality of over-the-air music then you can record it. I'm not in a city but don't normally have problems with radio reception, however this was unable to get most stations.
I was really looking forward to timeshifting lots of public radio either from over the air or internet streaming. I held off on buying other products because of the advance announcements for this product. Now I'm disappointed I did so, and I'll move on to one of the other products.
There must be a reason they don't have any technical information or manual pdf on the web (as of this writing) or on the box.
A much more mature well-developed version of the software could address many of these complaints.
P.S. The "Ease of Use" field of the review form seems to consider "ease of use" as equivalent to program quality; but they aren't necessarily equivalent. In this case my "ease of use" rating represents the simplicity of the program, but not how well it accomplishes the goal of capturing radio.
