Emerson Portable CD Player Boombox with Cassette Player Combo, Tape Recorder, AM/FM Radio, AUX, Headphone Jack, Dual Speakers, AC/DC & Battery Operated - Stereo System for Home, Indoor & Outdoor Use

Small Radio With A Great Sound.

love it so retro

PROS: This is a smart mid to small sized boombox at a great price. It supports lots of old fav media formats like cassette and CD. The button layout is simple and laid out in a nice fashion. For me, the choice of boombox color is very welcome. I used to have near perfect vision, but now have darkened vision with some color blindness. So I really liked the lighter color choices of blue, white or lilac.CONS: I was wanting to improve over the current boombox which has an analog tuner. I also have two other boomboxes or clock radios with channel presets for radio tuners. But those other companies offer several buttons dedicated to your absolute fav stations. These work SO MUCH EASIER! When the radio is tuned as desired, you just pick and hold down for a few seconds the desired button you are assigning to the station. But this Emerson had one of those multi[ple button sequences that you had to go through to assign presets. It was very difficult due to my sight limitations. The backlit LCD screen is NOT nearly as bright as depicted in the Amazon illustration, I had to put the boombox between my knees (while sitting down!) and point the screen directly towards a bright overhead light. Then I had to learn two things not mentioned in the overly simple instructions: a) The button that displays the word "Prog" toggles through several messages. 2) The three button sequence that is required a)"Prog" b) a number assignment and c) "Prog" again HAVE TO be hit VERY quickly! It would be much nicer r to give the user much longer, such as a ful 5 to 10 seconds AND the instructions should say what the time restrictions.are. The other method that other companies offer where they have a dedicated button per station, can easily be done by someone who is fully blind OR do you think low vision people would not like radio and would prefer movies and paperback books? Not very likely! It is good that I was very determined. Otherwise the channel preset difficulties were leading me to contemplate a return.

Do not buy! When you try to skip to a different track on a CD, it plays the incorrect track. Seems like not such a big deal, but the point is it should work properly. Just bought it in February so it didn't even last 2 months, but that is outside the 30-day return window for Amazon. Warranty is basically useless. I tried multiple times to initiate a return with Emerson and got the run-around before I finally discovered that you have to send a check for $20 for them to ship you a new one. The unit itself costs $49, so that is nearly half the price of the original item. Not worth it! Protection plan does not go into effect until manufacturer's warranty expires, so that just sends you in a loop back to the manufacturer, who is not helpful and will not just replace the product that is defective for free. Don't waste your money!

As advertised. Works great!

MY DAUGHTER LOVES IT

The only issue I had is the CD play is a little confusing and does not remember the last track played if shut down and restarted. However, I am not a great reader of instructions. I wondered why to play CDs cycling through the options that the display said "OP" not "CD" - though no big thing.However I had one pleasant surprise that out weighs any other issue. The sound quality is superb much to my surprise. I worked for GE Audio Products Department in Utica NY in the 1980s when the "boombox" movement was in it's prime. Then as now the boom boxes had base that was unbearable and detrimental to good listening. This product does not suffer from that and has "sparkling sound quality"'.Thank you for that,brian

Getting it out of the box itselfwasn't easy. It's packed very tight.The booklet and stuff comes in abag that looks sealed but isn't andfalls out on the floor.The twist tie on the cord is weakand slightly difficult to take off.That's just thoughtless nuisances.Now for the real issues.1) Made in China2) It has a poor design.It's front heavy, so using the handleis not the best idea. You can't seethrough the window to the cassette,so I don't know why they even botheredputting a Window there.3) It's VERY NOISY when either playinga cassette or recording to the cassette.4) It doesn't stay paused when switchingtracks. Which is annoying. We want thesong to start when we need it.It also only goes back to the beginningof the track after 3 seconds of playing(though that's better than most othersI've seen lately.It also goes back to the beginning afterhitting stop, which is annoying causeyou have to either keep it on pause orscroll through the tracks if you needto stop a minute.Given the number of issues, 2 starsis a fairly generous rating. As long asthe unit works it will not drop Lower.