Customer Reviews

Timex T300B Digital Tuning Clock Radio with Nature Sounds

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(17)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(16)

 

 

I am happy with this alarm clock. Period. It has some awesome features that I haven't seen on any other alarm clock. It also has some less useful features, but even if these were magically eliminated, you would still be left with a great clock.

UNIQUE and terrific features: 1. Sleep function: 90/60/30/15 min countdown at Normal/Low/Very Low volume. Here's the best part: the volume control on the side is over-ridden by the 3 sound levels. So if you want to fall asleep to low volume, the wake to radio alarm is at normal volume. (I don't know what Denys was talking about in previous review) Also, it can be a completely different station than the one you fell asleep to. 2. 3 alarms: radio or buzzer or nature or any combo. Easy to set a sort of progressive wake sequence: 1st alarm nature sound, then later radio, then last brain-splitting beeping. (see drawbacks below) 3. digital tuner. Try to find this feature in another clock for this price. Great reception. 12 FM presets (lots), plus 6 AM.

Other good features: decent sound from single speaker, three light levels from backlit display (though I would have preferred Indiglo), date on display, unlike others here I found it to be very easy to set all features "Buzzer" very much resembles the "beep" of a Timex watch, but much louder. The rhythm of the beeping increases every 10 sec or so. I'm a deep sleeper, and this works well.

DRAWBACKS (that would not keep me from buying this clock again, but why I gave it 4/5): 1. buttons a bit cheap feeling... whadya want for this price 2. clock/alarm set is forward only (bad), although you set hour/min separately (good). My last alarm clock had fast/slow, and you had to count around the clock to set something earlier - this drove me crazy. How hard could it have been to have up/down buttons? And there are already tuner up/down buttons there! 3. I was hoping (but not really expecting) that there was a bit more flexibility with the 3 alarms: ie. possible to set buzzer for all 3. Alas, the 3 alarms are one each of radio/buzzer/nature. 4. Nature sounds. All resemble white noise, as if recorded with a bad microphone. Not great for relaxing prior to sleep. However, surprisingly unobtrusive way to wake up in morning. 5. Backlit display on the lowest level is still a bit bright after your eyes have adjusted to dark.

Cheers Stink

I don't know why everyone is having such a hard time using the clock, I'm not Bob Vila, but after reading a few pages in the manual, the clock was very easy to program.
I prefer to wake up to the babbling brook sound (even though it sounds more like an aviary than a brook) and I love the fact that you can go to sleep with one radio station on at a certain volume and wake up with a different station on at a different volume. The digital tuner works great, I always had a hard time getting "dial radio" reception on my old, clock radio but the tuner on the Timex is superb. The sound quality of the speaker is nice. I agree with another reviewer-- the ocean and the wind sound very . . . how do you say . . . creepy, like something you'd hear in a bad Dr. Who episode.
THE BIGGEST DRAWBACK: The display is way too bright. I'm convinced that it's screwing up my melatonin production! There are three settings for the brightness, 1) forest fire 2) day at the beach or 3) staring at the sun. And the color of the display is very annoying. Perhaps if it was tinted blue instead of orange it may be a little more soothing (like an alien ship stopping by my room in the middle of the night rather than the feeling that you get if you left every light on in the house before you hit the sack).
THE BEST FEATURE: Definitely, the alarm options. I haven't slept through my alarm yet (something that I consistently did in the past with my old Panasonic clock radio).
WOULD BE SWELL IF THEY COULD...: Change the display and had some better "nature sounds" or added a Zen chime.

This clock radio has great radio sound (thats why I bought it). However, the buttons are way too small and there are too many of them so changing the alarm is too complicated. I am never sure if I have set it correctly. The time is large enough but the backround color is strange looking in a dark room. Also, it is difficult to see if the alarm is set while I am in bed.

I bought this clock and tried to use it without reading the operating manual. BIG MISTAKE! Whatever logic there is to the labels of these buttons and what they do is not clear to me. And NEVER try to change ANYTHING in the dark. It is actually easier to change the time than to change the alarm settings. But, after getting used to the buttons, I still could not get used to the sounds. I don't know what planet they used as a model for the ocean sounds but it wasn't Earth. The waves crash on the shores at least TWICE as fast as real life. Instead of being relaxing, it's actually stressful. The only sound that doesn't play at light speed is Forest. By the way, the manual mentions casually on page 14 that the volume control for the radio also controls the sounds level. Late for work that day!The good things about this clock are its two-level lighted face and the fact that each alarm type can be set independently and all three can be used at different times. I don't recommend this clock because it's too much hassle for so little return. Two coworkers overheard me complaining a few days back and they mentioned that they have the same clock and the same problems. Seems this was a popular seller but not a popular item to own.

I recently bought this and I love it. It sounds great for a little one speaker clock RADIO (not stereo). The best part about the radio is the DIGITAL tuner. No more of the crackling of the tuner, or trying to touch the tuner to just the right position. Or even trying to figure out if you're tuned in to 99.5 or 99.9 FM. Just push a preset (you have 12 on FM) or tune up/down. For the nature sounds, they're pretty good. I agree that they are a little short, but do you really want to listen to a babbling brook and bird for 5 - 10 minutes? For clock functions--they are the same as any other clock without +/- buttons for hours and minutes. How much of a bother could it really be to have to go from 8:00 am all the way around to 7 a.m.? At least you can choose to adjust either hours or minutes. Some clocks only have the alarm set fast/slow buttons. This is easy. Plus you have 3 alarms: radio, sounds, buzzer. Set each for a different time. If you're thinking about a clock radio, not very big, sounds great, do yourself a favor and buy this one.

When I received this clock radio I was pleased by its size and general arrangement. The price was right. It took a little doing to get everything set up but not too bad.

On the plus side is the digital radio tuning and the presets - much better than an analog dial. The radio sounds ok. I did not have the unit long enough for an in-depth analysis of the radio.

But the first night using this clock radio destroyed any illusions that I might have had as to keeping the thing.

First of all, the display, even at its dimmest, was still a night light - much too bright. And in the daytime I could not see the time on the display from further that a few feet away. In the future I will avoid all LCD displays and, instead, look for a large red or green LED display.

Second of all, the "natural" sounds were anything but relaxing. I had figured that this would be ideal for lulling me to sleep. But of the four, the Brook, Forrest, and Wind were very obtrusive and annoying. The Brook starts out with an explosive blast of bird chatter that is more akin to several large parrots fighting than anything else. The Ocean sound was a little better but of such a short duration that the repetition of the short sound byte rapidly became annoying. It sounded much like a record that was skipping and repeating itself. I had to turn it off as there would be no lulling off to sleep with these sounds.

I just cannot recommend this product.

"Nature sounds!" it says. I thought to myself, hey self, that would be a nice relaxing way to wake up...

Wrong. The "nature sounds," advertised as Ocean, Brook, and Forest, are more accurately described as "Garbled Static," "Unidentifiable Cacophony," and "Kittens in a Blender."

The display itself is awful. It's fine in daylight, but I have to turn it away from me at night, or the Massive Orange Beacon of Halogen Death keeps me awake. In other words, it's too dadgum bright. So bright that when you wake up in the middle of the night and look at the clock, you're completely unable to read the time until your pupils have adjusted to their "high noon in the Sahara" setting.

Recommendation: The features I bought it for aren't worth it, but it was a decent price, and the radio is ok, so I'll deal with it until it breaks or gets lost in a move.

PLUSES: very smart looking unit, surprisingly solid feeling, variable intensity display, multi-alarm abilities, adjustable sleep feature w separate volume setting, good sound and reception, excellent price for a digital tuner with so many features. if you can set a clock on a microwave, you can probably handle this unit. i felt comfortable w it after reading the short, comprehensive manual and playing w the unit for a few minutes.

MINUSES: nature sounds are mildly irritating - ocean sound ok, but most likely use them as a pre-wake-up alarm.

THE BAD NEWS: my first unit's display died within minutes of plugging it in. i returned it and received another one today. again, within minutes of plugging it in, part of the display stopped functioning. no idea whether i got the only 2 defective units or not. different display segments failed on the two units.

THE GOOD NEWS: amazon makes it very easy to return merchandise their prices are also very good.

CONCLUSION: this is one neat little digital tuning radio that looks and sounds great and has some fun features. don't know what conclusion can be drawn from my display problems, the units appear to be well constructed. i guess i will continue to swap them out until i get one that's not defective.

I've owned this clock for several months and I still haven't been able to get the thing figured out...lots of push button 1, then push button 2 6 times, blah, blah. Suffice it to say, set-up ain't easy.
Next, the reception is almost non-existent. The antenna is nothing more than a flimsy black wire you pull out of the back! AM/FM, it doesn't matter. All I hear is a bunch of static and I'm less than 50 miles from NYC.
Finally, the nature sounds? More annoying then soothing. They sound anything but natural.
Needless to say, less than 2 months later, I'm back on Amazon looking to replace this clock. 'Nuff said.

I have recently recieved this alarm clock and I was excited to be able to wake up to the sound of nature instead of that LOUD anouying buzzing, or unpredictable radio which you don't know If the music will be loud enough for you to wake up to or to stay alseep. Waking up to the samples of nature is a 5 star plus, plus also having the choice of the buzzer or radio to wake up are aslo outstanding. Other plusses are that you have three choices of light so not to blind yourself in the middle of the night and the sleep on the radio or 4 nature sound choices. On the bad side of thing is that there are many buttons to fumble around on, and steps to take to get to certain features. The nature sounds are ocean, brook, forest, and wind. These sounds are ok, but you only have a total of 5-8 seconds of each and then it repeats itself, which can get annoying if you here a bird or owl repeating its same song or tune over and over and over agian. But all in all I am keping this alarm clock but if I was to buy another agian, I would definetliy want to check the sound to see how long it went before they repeated themselves.

But then agian your buying, so you take the risk