Our very old Midland weather radio expired, and we went to Radio Shack for a new one, only to find that they were out of stock. No reasonably-priced weather radios on hand at all. So we turned to the internet, ordering a Reecom R-1630 Alert Radio from Weather Connect.
Bottom line: It works as advertised; I'm quite pleased with it.
- It has S.A.M.E. technology, allowing us to program it to sound off only when our own county is included in an alert, whereas the old radio sounded off for any county within the range of the Twin Cities NOAA radio transmitter, a much larger area which included several large Wisconsin counties.
- I have actually programmed it for our county and several counties to the west, where storms usually come from, and recent alerts have confirmed that it works correctly. In fact, the memory now shows 18 alerts in the three weeks that we have owned the radio.
- The owner's manual is a little clumsy, and the radio would be hard to program without it, but I actually had no trouble with the programming.
- Siren (alarm) volume is separately adjustable from radio volume; that's nice.
- Alert duration (time until the radio goes silent again) is not adjustable but is short; that's even nicer.
I saw part of an advertisement on TV yesterday that Rainbow stores (or one particular store?) will be selling this radio in the Twin Cities this weekend for $30. If so, that's a much better deal that I got on the internet. This is the time of year to have one; in Minnesota, there are more tornados in June than any other month.
5 comments:
Don, I have the same Reecom weather alert radio, and am likewise pleased with it. It took a long time, though, to figure out why I don't receive alerts from the counties west of me. I'm on the eastern side of the coverage area for the NOAA transmitter that covers my county. So I think I'd have to tune to a different channel to receive alerts for the others. Other than that, no complaints at all. I agree with all of your talking points. Good job.
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Don, I am glad that you posted the message and I picked up one Reecom Radio at the rainbow store. I completely satisfied with this radio as you mentioned. I did find the low battery icon when the battery is running low on the display as stated in the manual. The most impressive part of the radio is the EOM (End of Message) feature that the radio will shut itself off after the alert message ends, very nice.
My county's Dept. of Emergency Management is giving away a bunch of Reecom R-1630s to low income families next week. I qualify, but I already have a Midland WR-30. I'm not sure if the R1630 is an upgrade for me.
The WR-30 still works, but I've never been happy with its battery backup feature. It can't use rechargeable batteries, and regular batteries get drained within 24 hours, even in standby mode and even while plugged into the A/C outlet. I have to keep regular batteries with it, but not in it. The WR-30 is useless without a working A/C connection.
The R-1630 Programming Guide says, "More Than 180 Hours Battery Back-up Operation
When A/C Power Failure During Emergency Period.
This Unique Feature Is Very Important To All Users !!"
Has anyone tested the R-1630 on battery backup? Does the battery last a week in active mode, or only in standby? Does it use rechargeable batteries? Does it keep the batteries fully charged, or do you have to take them out for recharging every couple of months? How much of the 180 hours is left when the "low bat" indicator comes on?
I haven't run on batteries for a week, but have for several hours, the length of a typical outage here.
I don't think that the unit is capable of charging rechargable batteries, so I use ordinary alkaline batteries. They do NOT drain themselves while the unit is on AC power.
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