TESTED: Tangent Quattro WiFi Internet Radio

Sampling Internet Radio’s Olympic Village

I felt a little bit like a kid on Christmas morning when I recently “unwrapped” my candy-apple-red Tangent Quattro Internet radio. Manufactured by Danish company Tangent Audio, which obviously has high standards for build quality, the Quattro first got my attention at CEDIA 2008 at Canadian audio company Kevro International’s booth. (Kevro has recently begun distributing Tangent products in North America.)

I was excited because I love the discovery-factor of Internet radio. Like Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates, you never know what you’re going to get, but it’s very likely going to be delicious. And so it is with the Tangent Quattro.

OVERVIEW

Consider this HDTV if: you like exploring world music, want to work on your language skills, are intrigued by Internet radio, and love the convenience of Wi-Fi. 

Look elsewhere if: you don’t turn into Zorba, moving your feet involuntarily, when you hear bouncy dance rhythms from Greece or you can’t fathom spending $349 on a table-top radio.

Ratings:

• Setup/ease of use: 10
  
• Features: 8
  
• Audio quality: 7
  
• Value: 8

FEATURES

• Metal enclosure with substantive front-panel buttons and knobs
  
• Choice of wired broadband connection or 802.11b/g wireless
  
• One-button Internet station downloading
  
• Ability to customize station selections, Podcasts, and streams through your own station profile at reciva.com
  
• Ability to screen stations via country, decade, genre, discussion, alternative, and so on
  
• FM tuner
  
• Clear and concise owner’s manual (written in 10 languages)

EASY-AS-PIE WI-FI

Few things interest me more than getting some insight into different cultures. Olympics after Olympics, there I am at the opening ceremonies, noting all of the countries, their colorful outfits, how some send armies of athletes and other less-developed countries only send a few. Even so, those few march with obvious pride and have been known to snag a Gold medal or two.

The Tangent Quattro is very much like a parade of culture and color, except in this case it’s a pa rade of Internet radio stations—more than 15,000 of them from more than 200 countries. Getting this cornucopia of music stations unlocked by the Tangent Quattro couldn’t be easier.  

If you prefer to go wireless (which I did), you’ll need to get your Quattro onto your network. Using my Lynksys 802.11g 2.4GHz router, I merely had to power up my Quattro, and in a few seconds, the display window showed that it was searching for networks. It found mine in seconds, and then asked me to enter the WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) key, which I did. Alternatively, your router might use a WAP (Wi-Fi Protected Access) key, but the Quattro will recognize which you need. If you have the key handy, you’ll be connected in just a minute or two.