Grace Digital Mondo Elite Classic Smart Internet Radio Bluetooth Wi-Fi Qi-Wireless Fast Charger 7-Day Alarm – Microphone-Free (Walnut)

This is my fourth Grace radio, starting many years ago with their first model. This one has much to recommend it over the predecessors.1. It is heaver. This is important for me as the radio is on my bedside table. With all the previous radios if I would lean over from the bed to press a preset or the power button, often the whole radio would slide on the table and make it necessary I use a hand to hold the radio steady. This may seem to be a minor point but it is important on the basis of daily use and convenience.2. It is more attractive with the wood appearance instead of plastic. Also the buttons are now easier to read because of the contrast of black on light tan instead of the prior gray on black. These improvements make the radio much more functional and easy to use.3. The Mondo Elite models now integrate Pandora, as the earliest models did. The previous model, the Mondo+, allows casting Pandora to the radio from a smartphone or other source but the absence of an integrated Pandora is not user-friendly. Grace indicated it was a major effort to add Pandora to the Mondo Elite due to complex coding. I asked tech support if they were going to add Pandora to the Mondo+ models but they did not reply to this question.4. The sound quality is rich but has too much bass for my 69-year-old ears. I adjusted the sound with the equalizer which helped some. Still I prefer the sound of the plastic models. Again, this is probably due to hearing loss or changes that occur when one ages.5. The interface is very much like previous Grace radios, especially the Mondo+. Grace has added functionality in many small ways. I especially like how easy it is now to quickly adjust the sleep time with the large button on top.6. The wireless charger is a bonus. It was not a determining factor in my decision to purchase the radio but since it is present I do use it.7. I like the opportunity to set separate alarms for each day of the week, plus weekend and weekdays. Previously one could just set them for weekends and weekdays. One option that I use is to set overlapping alarms. If I want to get up at 7:00am to my local NPR station, say, I set an alarm for 6:50 for a new age channel at soft volume. I also set an alarm at 7:00 at normal volume. Then I awake gently.All in all, this is the best Grace radio I have owned.

My unit matches the current images that don't have external antennas in the rear I see on other reivews. But the internal antenna seems quite sufficient (my wifi signal is strong). I use in the kitchen, so I cannot comment on the alarm features.The unit boots up very quick and connects pretty quick to a radio station if that is what you were last listening to. This was important to me as I just want to flip the radio on and immediately hear music, like old school over the air radios. I do occasionally listen to an app on the phone over bluetooth, which doesn't take too long to select/connect.I've got no problem with the speaker quality for the size. Sure it would be nice being a little wider with 2 internal speakers for stereo. But what really degrades the sound is dependent on the selected radio station. I don't know if it's bitrate or something else, but some stations don't sound as good as others or are low volume. Stations with strong/clean signals sound fine for me as I don't expect extreme high fidelity in a unit this size at this price point.The navigation is okay - not too hard but could use improvement. Getting to presets 1-5 is very easy, 6-10 is a 2-button affair on the unit or direct from the remote. Presets over 11 are a bit cumbersome to get to. I wouldn't even bother researching/saving stations off of the unit itself. Use the Grace portal via a browser for that. I usually research radio stations of interest through google searches, and find that most of them broadcast over the internet and can be selected by this unit. The remote works fine but feels cheap compared to the unit.Overall I'm very happy with the unit. I think it's main feature is as a stand-alone internet radio. If all I wanted was to listen to apps from my phone, many external speaker devices serve that purpose. The great thing is the variety of music stations available. I discover many bands that I don't normally encounter through Pandora/Spotify/Youtube suggestions.

I am very pleased with this purchase the set up was easy and the sound quality is excellent for a small room. I am using in a home office and the big advantage is the ability to have multiple streaming options in addition to Internet radio, it has built-in Chromecast support which expands capability to vritually every music app you have in a smartphone or tablet, in addition to streaming support right on the radio for all the other major music services like Spotify, Amazon music, Pandora, and iHeart radio. I bought this specifically for the SiriusXM capability, with the streaming option as part of an existing satellite radio subscription, this has allowed me to use satellite radio outside the car into the house which has been seamless and easy to set up. It adds value to the annual cost of the satellite radio subscription.