Philips WAS6050/05 Wireless Music System with Internet Radio and WooX Speaker Technology

Spotted this online for a bargain price so I thought I would get one, as it promised not only internet radio, but good quality sound, and funky looks, backed up by the Philips brand name. On taking it out of the box, all of that was instantly ruined. I inserted my WEP key, connected to my wifi network. No problems so far. To use internet radio you must register, by typing in an email address and password on the device itself. You are then supposed to receive an activation email to complete registration. Unfortunately, I couldn't get that far as the device repeatedly gave me an "internet server cannot be connected" message. I gave up trying eventually, and got on with other things. A few hours later I came back, but still the same problem: "internet server cannot be connected". My internet connection was working perfectly, i might add. The next day, I tried again, and after much persistence, i eventually got a registration email. Tried to access internet radio, and yet again "internet server cannot be connected". The problem with this radio is that it relies on the Philips server in order to access the links to radio streams in order to listen to internet radio. Unfortunately, the Philips server is completely useless. Over the last 2 weeks since purchasing this product, I would estimate that approximately 40% of the time i have received the "internet server cannot be connected" message. After a bit of trawling around online, I discovered streamiumcafe (google it) and I would advise any potential purchasers of this item to read the experiences of others on this board: many other people reporting the same problem accessing the philips server.

Now back to the device itself, the sound quality is very good for a device little bigger than a clock radio. It looks fantastic... but thats about all there is to recommend this unit. The user interface is clunky and slow. The LCD screen looks nothing like the pictures- it is light grey not black, and strewn with vertical dark lines. If you aren't looking at it head on, it's almost impossible to read. I have seen better LCD screens on 10 year old mobile phones. There is a setting to turn off the backlight on the display (it doesnt turn it off, it just makes it dimmer), but every time you turn the unit off, this setting is not remembered and you must go back and turn the backlight off again when you switch the unit on again. The front panel has touch sensitive buttons, although they are a waste of time to be honest. If you don't lie the unit on its back, it moves around when you try to press the buttons, although the remote control can be used to overcome this.

If you want to listen to the radio in bed, there is a sleep function. Only problem is, if you have the volume on really low as you drift off to sleep, and you want the alarm to wake you up, the alarm comes on at the same volume as the radio was last used at! If you are a heavy sleeper, this renders the alarm useless if you want to listen to the radio quietly before sleeping. It is also not possible to see the clock whilst you have the radio on. It can only be seen when the unit is on standby.

This radio contains an FM tuner with RDS function. However, the RDS function does not display the station name correctly. It usually displays jumbled up letters. There is also an "auto time sync" function which uses RDS to automatically set the clock. However, it doesnt matter which station you choose, it will say "Cannot set time - station is not an RDS station", even though the station clearly is an RDS station. Worth mentioning here that i have a Sony clock radio with RDS, and that works perfectly, so I don't think it is a signal strength issue.

Now to the final problem, I had to unplug the unit to move some furniture. When I plugged it back in a few minutes later, the unit was stuck with the "philips" logo on the start up screen. It took 4-5 attempts at switching it on and off at the mains before I could get the product to restart properly. Last night, we had a power cut here. I know this, because this morning when I woke up, the unit was stuck on the start up screen with the philips logo again. I had to unplug it and plug it back in again 7 times before it would restart. It's a good job I woke up before my alarm was due to go off, or I would have been late for work!

All in all, this is a pretty poorly designed piece of kit, reliant on a very unstable Philips server to operate. Not at all what I would expect from a major manufacturer like Philips. I would not recommend this product at all.

EDIT (April 2010): The ongoing saga with this heap of junk continues... Last week Philips changed the server that they use to provide the links to radio stations from Vtuner to RadioTimer. In the process, they managed to delete half of my favourites, and half of what is left now says "internet station cannot be connected" when I try and play it. Some stations are named incorrectly thanks to RadioTime, and most of the stations that I listen to are not listed at all, so I have had to manually find the links and add them myself via the piece of joy that is the Philips website. I can't even get the BBC stations to work now since this "enhancement". AVOID AT ALL COSTS!!!!

If you are thinking of buying an Internet Radio then don't buy this. It may be ok as part of a Streamium System, but as a stand alone internet radio it is almost useless. To start with it is fiddly to set up to connect to your wireless network. Next it does not (as stated in the manual) return to the last sound source when you switch it on from standby. After navigating through several layers of menu to get to your chosen radio station it spends ages buffering and then frequently drops out. This is not a problem with my network; my Logitech Squeezebox operates perfectly in the same location on the same network and is a doddle to setup and use.

Attempts at contacting Philips Support by email have been futile. After their initial response 'The behaviour of your unit is weird' any follow up communication to Support, using the specified email address and reference number, results in an automated response saying that the email address is unmanned and instructing to return to their support site and start again...........and again.....

Unfortunately I purchased this thing in the UK to take to my home overseas so I don't have the option of returning it.

Do not buy it!!!!

Philips WAS6050/05 Wireless Music System with Internet Radio and WooX Speaker Technology

I bought this for my Husband....
we spent 2 days trying to get it working but to no avail.
Impossible to work and set up.
returning product and would not recommend