"Like many Ryobi users, I have been waiting for a radio/boom box from Ryobi for quite some time.
The radio works quite well for my situation. I needed something small and compact (portable) that I could carry with me on my maintenace jobs. I didn't want to lug around the larger boom box offerings from Milwaukee or Bosch. So this newest offering from Ryobi suited my needs very well. I would imagine at some point, Ryobi will come out with a larger version of this unit with a charger, but because of current product copyrights, their hands are tied (from what I have read online).
This product is a true radio (not a boom box) with a radio quality sound. It will go as loud as you want and will 'cut' though background noise. However, the speaker in the unit is small and has a slightly 'cold' sound. The small hole for the 'tweeter' appears to be purely cosmetic (I don't believe there are any additional components besides the single speaker).
Since my job is local, I broadcast tunes from a computer (with winamp) to provide my own commercial free radio station. I am able to 'warm' up the speaker with some slight eq'ing which helps the audio quality...
The digital tuner on the unit is excellent (I was so tired of my old radio with analog tuning) and the mp3 input jack is a nice feature. It is unfortunate that Ryobi decided not to include AM in the radio (the circuitry would have been inexpensive to include), but someone in a meeting at Ryobi must have said that AM is a thing of the past and I partially agree, but I would have paid an extra couple of bucks for AM inlcuded. AM radio talk listeners are left out on this model.
Again, overall this model fits my usage quite well. I decided to purchase two because it is so inexpensive and I assume that someday my first unit will meet with an unfortunate construction project demise.
Be sure to purchase couple of extra batteries to beef up your battery arsenal. Although the unit uses very little battery life, you don't want to compromise your battery selection just because you want to listen to some tunes...
All in all a great product, but I would expect Ryobi to come out with a replacement in the future which would be beefier with a battery charger (once the rights become available)."