Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)The Excellent.
Battery or no battery, you have light and radio.If you have some AAs to stoke it with you won't have to crank it.If you already have or buy separate a 6V AC wall charger and plug it in, you can charge the internal battery for a few hours of use.I think this is a great radio for the price to put away in your emergency kit.When the power goes out you will have some news, weather, or music and some light even if your batteries are missing or dead.
The Good.
This is a very reasonably priced radio for the features that it has.The crank charges an internal battery, so it will work even if you don't have AAs handy to load it up with.The light is brighter than I expected, it will light a bedroom or kitchen enough to navigate in the glow.When held and directed toward reading material it is plenty bright enough to read a book from.A minute of cranking will give lots of minutes of light and even more of radio.you can run the radio and the light at the same time.You can charge it with a 6V wall wart, I did that overnight and got about 2 hours of light and about another 30 minutes of radio.The hand crank is easy to turn and you don't have to turn it too hard or fast to get the charge light to light up bright.It will run off of AA "dry cells". I haven't tested the run times on this but I expect based on the comparative sizes of the internal battery you should get A couple dozen hours of radio and perhaps the same of light from 2 AA.I was able to tune some powerful AM stations at night that are about 500 miles away.FM from 50 miles away in the daytime is just fine.Ear phones work in both ears and the FM appears to be Stereo and the sound isn't too bad for music or voice on earphones, much more fidelity than the speaker very nice for the price.I can't receive the weather band stations where I live, on this radio nor on any of my others, so I can't test this.I do get static and it seems to work the same on WX as my other WX radios.
The Bad.
This is a cheap radio.It isn't of great build quality. The plastic is kind of old school cheap feeling.The sound is a bit thin from the speaker, The tuning knob is the small middle knob and you will pass over stations back and forth to find what you want.When you run on "dry cells" as they call it AA batteries, the LED light is not as bright as the internal battery, perhaps a 30% reduction in light output.Still useful light.
The Ugly.
The knobs are funky and stick out at various angles like they are bent, they work OK, but don't feel very positive in the band selection especially on AM.Sometimes the tuning seems to skip out and you get no signal when turning the tuning knob, a quick wiggle of the tuning knob seems to restore the reception.
Summary.
I'm buying a few more for emergency kits.I think you would be glad to have this after an earthquake or storm takes out power and your batteries are used up, you will still have light and radio with a minute of turning the crank.I give this 3.5 stars, I would go 4 stars if the knobs weren't so funky.You can't buy anything else with these features for this price.For something infrequently used this should be good enough. Stick it in your emergency kit and throw in some Energizer E2 Lithium batteries with a 10+ year shelf life (leave them out of the radio to avoid accidental discharge) and you can ignore this radio for years and it should be there for you when you need it.
I loaded two AA rechargeable NiMh batteries, they are about 2700mah but a few years old.I turned on the radio and the light for 24 hours.At the end of 24 hours the light was dim but usable.I then left the radio on for a full week (7 days X 24 hrs/day or 168 hours total) FM some AM stations generally loud enough to hear anywhere in a room.After a week it is still running and I think it could go several more days.The light is very dim after a week.To get a bright light all you do is switch from "dry cell" AA batteries to the dynamo internal battery after winding and the light is extremely bright for reading or other uses. My dog jumped on the antenna and bent it, real world stuff, still works great.So while inexpensive it has amazingly long lasting battery life which is important for an emergency use radio.
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Product Description:
The KA001 is ultra-compact portable radio that fits into your hand perfectly. Powered by two AA batteries, it picks up AM, FM and NOAA weather forecasts. In the case of an emergency or disaster, the radio powered by the internal rechargeable batteries that are charged by the easy hand crank. One minute of cranking can generate enough power to run the radio for 15 to 20 minutes. The radio also features a 3-LED flashlight, which can be very handy for emergencies or general outdoor activities.
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