Eton FR370 Solarlink Radio (Red)

Comments about Eton FR370 Solarlink Radio (Red):

I bought this at RadioShack on black Friday. For the most part, it's a great little radio, but does have it quirks.

Con's:

First, the USB port to charge your peripherals will charge everything but the iPhone. I make this point because of the phones' popularity. The USB charge / data cable, from Apple, will not work. (I did try to charge my iPhone while cranking the generator - that didn't work either) I tried two different cable's, both OEM. But it would power an external hard drive (USB powered hard drive). Odd.

Do know that the USB port is powered from the NI-MH battery pack included with the radio.

The instruction manual is pointless - it was a waste of paper.

Second, using a 5v, 500ma wall charger, I charged the radio for a full 24 hrs. The red L.E.D illuminated, showing that power was being applied. The led does NOT change color to green when the battery is done charging. After 24 hours, the battery was charged.

As a side note, after the 24 hours, the battery meter showed full. However, after a day or two, It only showed two battery bars. I did not use the flashlight, radio, USB power port...anything. It sat in the garage. The only thing that was running was the clock. There are other reviews on here saying it constantly is "listening" for weather alerts, which does use battery power. I don't know it that true or not.

Third, it feels a little cheap; the power knob on the side feels like it may break if I turn it too fast / hard. The same is true for the front volume knob. But it's not a rugged radio and not meant to be used for play. I'd be iffy to take it camping. It would be perfect for it - solar panel, weather, flashlight, usb charger... but it's not rugged.

Pro's:

First, it can be powered by the following ways: Solar, crank, 3aaa batteries (not included, but easy to get - buy the better batteries - you never know when you will need it), the included NI-MH battery pack (3.6v / 600 mah (3 x 2/3 AA batteries)) and a Mini-USB input for charging and powering the radio. The last is nice - you can charge it with a computer, old phone charger, ect...
Second, the front display is large and super easy to read. Whenever you press a button, the entire front display lights up a nice white. There are buttons underneath the handle (time, weather AM/FM, ect...) that also illuminate. It does have an alarm clock; a nice feature if you in Michigan, in a cabin and getting up early to get your buck!

Third, it utilizes a digital tuner for everything (AF, FM & WX) and will scan for stations in the AM/FM mode. The antenna long, but not too long. The flashlight is decently bright. It's composed of fourwhite L.E.D's. It will also do S.O.S in morse code via a single but bright red L.E.D in the middle.

Overall, it's a good little emergency, Dec 21, 2012 (never happened), we lost power radio.

Comments about Eton FR370 Solarlink Radio (Red):

Numerous options for power source are helpful, though the optional a/c power source adapter itself is pricey.
Purchased it for emergency backup as I live in Maine. We have numerous opportunities for wind and snow outages.
The power lasts a decent amount of time with a minimum amount of cranking. Not very long lasting with solar. Eats up batteries rather quickly so would suggest using heavy duty version.
The biggest complaint is that the construction of the unit appears to be rather flimsy, nor is it waterproof. I doubt that it would hold up well under daily usage.
I bought it on sale at half price. Would not pay full retail.

Comments about Eton FR370 Solarlink Radio (Red):

I got the Eton radio because the city where I lived was without power due to a storm for a week and we had no battery powered radio to stay tuned to events or weather alerts, in that regard the radio works great. The radio also needed to be powered by different sources in case the batteries died and the Eton does that too. The Eton can be turned off and it will activate itself with a siren sound in the event of a weather alert, a pretty cool feature.

But the quality of the knobs and switches is poor, made of cheap plastic and cheap internal switching; and considering it's suppose to be an emergency radio why wasn't it built water resistant? That makes no sense to me. It also sounds decent enough, keep in mind it's just a single small speaker with human voice frequency in mind, it wasn't design to rock out the house!

Despite it's glaring shortcomings it is a radio that will work for emergencies and camping, and you don't have to rely on the batteries either to get it to work, just don't leave it out in the rain.

I gave it an average rating because of what it can do, it would have received a higher ratings if the switches were better quality and it was water resistant. I never owned a similar radio to compare with either.