Customer Reviews

RCA RP4801 AM/FM Dual Wake CD Clock Radio

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I was very pleased to purchase this clock. However, for starters, do not purchase this clock online when you can pick it up currently in Wal Mart for $29.95. The backlit is very good, a nice blue color. I've looked at clocks online for nearly 3 weeks trying to find a good alarm clock with CD playback, but you'll drive yourself crazy reading the reviews of all the nit pickers. One complaint you'll hear a lot about is the brightness of the backlight. If it's bright, then turn the thing around!!! It's not that difficult, what a bunch of whiners. Anyways, here's what I liked about this clock.

For starters, it does play CD-Rs. I'm not sure what the other guy's problem was unless he was trying to play CD-RWs.

Sound and playback is very nice

It has a back up battery option. This is why I returned my Sony

ICF-CD843V alarm clock. No battery backup. What good is an alarm clock if it doesn't have this feature, and the power goes out??? You pay $60 for the Sony clock without a battery feature. Go figure :)

Easy to use. For all intents and purposes, it's an ALARM CLOCK. It doesn't need 47,000 buttons on it. Very basic. If you want a clock that plays dvds, pours your coffee, turns on the shower, irons your clothes, then don't buy this clock.

Radio is fine with all local stations as well as some of the west coast stations at night.

Finally, it has two alarms. You don't have 30 different alarm sets, so you can't sleep in on the second Saturday of every month that has a holiday during the third week.

Just buy the clock and see for yourself.

Ditto S. Greenwood's review. It is missing all the features he or she listed. It is also available at Wal-Mart for $29.95.

However, it's not a bad radio. The sound is decent, and the dual-function wake-ups were the main selling factor for me. You can even set the cd track you want to wake up to. It's easy to set the time, and the cd player has shuffle and repeat settings. I like the features for the price. In fact, if it hadn't been advertised with features it didn't have, I probably would have rated it higher.

The clock radio that arrived was as pictured on the website. That is where the similarities stopped. Here is what was not as advertised:

1. The 'Auto dimmer' that is supposed to adjust to room light is just a hi/low switch.

2. There is no Weekend Alarm Cancel function on this model.

3. There is no time zone selection.

4. There is no daylight savings time selection.

So, the remaining features do seem to work and are on this model. The CD player can play CD-R's which kinda surprised me.

I read the manual, so it is not that I just didn't know how to use the missing features.

I am disappointed in Amazon for advertising this product incorrectly on their website.

The other reviewers here nailed the problems exactly. Overall, this is an acceptable alarm clock (I bought it just to wake up to CDs, and it does that well enough), but I wouldn't buy it again:

1. The display is too bright at night. If I sleep facing my nightstand, I have to turn the clock away.

2. The nap timer randomly turns itself on about half the times I go through the alarm setting modes. This is especially annoying because the only way to turn it off is to hold down the NAP button for several seconds. Also, the nap timer can only be set to 2 hours at the longest, which is a little short for my tastes.

3. There aren't many alarm options. My last clock had separate buzzer and radio alarms which could each be set to Mon-Fri, Sat-Sun, or daily. On this one, I can change each alarm from buzzer to radio to CD, but I can't make separate weekend and weekday alarms - the clock doesn't even know what day it is.

4. Advertised features are missing. The weekend cancel function, auto brightness control, and time zone selection simply don't exist.

On the plus side, it plays not just CD-Rs, but also CD-RWs! If you like to change your alarm music a lot, you can reuse the same CD-RW disc over and over.

Dispite what has been written, the LED light is not that bright. I use it in my kitchen and thought it might work as a night light too but even on the high setting the glow doesn't go very far. It's short and fits perfectly on a shelf under my cabinets while still being able to fully access the CD lid. The sound is very good to for such a small radio. I'm very pleased!

Every few months I edited this review to reflect my increasing frustration with this clock. I eventually just stopped using it entirely, although it continued to tell time and play CDs and the radio. The alarm function was so poorly engineered that the unit was not usable as an alarm clock, which is what I needed.

I was looking for a clock radio that played CDs, and this one was reasonably priced and seemed to have the basic features I need. I've had maybe seven or eight alarm clocks and clock radios of various types over the years, so I have some perspective and don't expect perfection, but still, this one was extraordinarily irritating.

First, I agree with the several other reviewers who found the display too bright, even on "dim." I'm not overly sensitive about light in my bedroom, but there's no question, this lights up the whole area around it and even casts a definite shadow! It's like a low intensity flashlight that's on all night. Even after using it for several months I still find the brightness irritating, and consider it a definite flaw. I've finally resigned myself to covering it at night, but you really shouldn't have to do this with a clock.

Second, the reviewers who complained that setting the alarm tends to activate the "Nap" function are exactly right; it does, and it's very, very annoying. After a while it happened more and more, so I'd spend literally two or three minutes just trying to set the alarm. Also, when you do set the alarm on this, it stays set to awaken you every morning at the same time forever until you tell it not to. This may be great for those who don't want to have to press a button setting the alarm function each night, but after it wakes you up on a few early Saturday or holiday mornings you may wish for the other alternative. And every time you change the setting you risk going through the ordeal I described.

Third, the CD player mechanism is surprisingly loud; I always awaken not to music, but to the sound of the CD player cranking up and spinning around; I almost always wake up and hit the "off" button before the music even starts. Granted, the unit is only about a foot or two from my head, so it may not be noticeable if it's five or ten feet away, but if you hit the snooze bar (which you're most likely to do if the unit is within reach of your bed) the CD player remains in "pause" mode, making the noticeable sound, throughout the snooze period. So your chances of going back to sleep for another ten minutes are slim; instead, you'll get ten minutes of lying in bed wishing the thing didn't make that irritating noise.

The pluses? It sounded fine, the time was easy to read from across the room, it has two alarm settings in case you have a partner who wants to sleep an hour longer than you do, you can preset the CD track to the one to which you want to awaken, and it's reasonably priced. But not only would I not recommend this clock, but I would probably avoid all RCA consumer electronics from now on.

We bought this item at Walmart as a Christmas gift for our daughter and while it worked for a while (about 3 months or so), the CD player stopped working. We sent it to the address listed in the manual and it took about 3 months to get another one. And, lo and behold, the replacement unit doesn't work at all!

Pass on this and get something of higher quality.

This alarm clock is great, despite not having all the features it claims (see S. Greenwood's review for list of missing features). Also, I believe the manual says that the graduwake feature only works on the alarm setting (not radio or CD), but I have my alarm volume so low that I wouldn't be able to hear it if it was any softer.

It's compact, looks nice, and the CD player is silent. On my old alarm clock, the spinning of the CD would wake me up before the music, but this one is great. I looked for a while and couldn't find an alarm clock with all these features for anything near this price.

This clock radio had some nice features but the backlit time was way too bright.

I even went so far as buying a little bit on static cling vinyl window tint to cover the front of the clock. It still was a night light for the bedroom.

The CD features were nice, but overall it seemed ill-designed. For example every time I went to set ALARM 1 or ALARM 2, this stupid "NAP" feature always got activated, to which I always had to turn it off. It was a constant headache. The buttons didn't seem to well placed either. I did like that you could adjust the SNOOZE time, but that was about it.

I picked this up at Wal-Mart, which was a travesty in itself, and returned it a few weeks later. I am now using my old Sony Dream Machine from 1997 until a better one comes along...

I really like this clock for the features, but the lighted display is too bright. I have read differing opinions in the reviews about this issue. I don't know if there are differences in individual perception of the brightness or if there are quality control issues resulting in a few way too bright clocks here and there. Seriously, my clock makes me feel like I am sleeping in a hotel on the Vegas strip and I can't get the curtains closed!

Other than that, it is wonderful!