Looking at garage radios, suggestions?

[tuner4life]

I currently have an ancient Sony cd/cassette/radio in the garage running 2, scratch that, 1 very small very used up RCA speaker. We just bought a new surround setup for the living room, so the old living room setup can go in the garage. So I will be getting 2 fairly large wood boxes with 3 speakers each in them (not sure of the brand), and 2 decent 6" RCA speakers in small boxes. I want to mount these in the top corners of the garage.

Anyways... Since the prehistoric radio out there is on it's last legs It will be needing a replacement, but I can't really find what I want.

I want:
-FM radio
-cd/mp3 disc player
-a usb port to plug my memory stick into to play from that (many new car stereo's have this and it would be nice to have it in the garage too).
-relatively cheap. <$100.

Anyone have any recommendations?

 

[superspec]

i got nothing but my kicker ipod dock (ik501) rocks the house and people down the street can hear it clearly. it is purely an ipod/aux input dock but it also has outputs to hook up a powered sub. i went through every ipod dock from BB before getting to the kicker and im so pleased with it that im going to buy one to stick in the closet for a backup.

 

[FLgarageDreamer]

I'm using a used (3 year old) Sony Surround Sound/ DVD player I got from my buddy. Has an aux input for my iphone and sounds great.... plus it was free!

 

[vartz04]

if you can find the car deck you want that has the USB you can do what I did.

You will need,

- 1 car deck
- 1 used computer power supply
- 1 switch
- speaker wire
- 2 speakers

You take the computer PSU, and you take the green wire and any black wire and hook them to the switch. This is your on off for the PSU. Then take a yellow wire (test it for 12 volts) and another black wire (ground) and hook that to the cars headunit. Hook up the speakers and enjoy.

 

[ny1]

Shop yard sales, or go to your local dump. I keep upgrading when I see something good and giving the old stuff to friends. Presently I have KLH model 6 speakers that I got at the dump for free and a vintage Mcintosh 1700 from a yard sale. Probably 800.00 worh of vintage high end audio for less then 40.00. Sounds awesome.

 

[ny1]

Rereading the original post. I doubt your going to find something you can plug a memory stick into at the dump.

Vartz04 probably has the best setup for all of that. Great idea btw.

 

[MileHigh]

I got one of these as a house warming present... love it. Good sound, mp3 connect and usb charge, enclosed phone/player housing, lights and 120 plugs up front. Nice gizmo.

B&D Boombox

 

[GN4WHLN]

I use our old surround system and have a pc plugged into that. CD, Mp3, Pandora, and AM/FM.

 

[vartz04]

Thanks, I didnt want to waste much wall space/shelf space with a radio but wanted some decent sound output this was the best solution. The speakers are flush mounted, and the radio fills the 1' gap between the cabinets that I have 7' of and a 8' bench underneath.

You can go as crazy as you want with the car stereo, dvd player, flip out screen, touch screen, or just go cheap. Walmart has a am/fm/digital media player that has aux in, a sd card slot and a usb slot but no cd player. its like $40

 

[KMinAF]

Regardless of the stereo I would suggest using a "J" pole antenna, they work amazingly well. Here is the thread:
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=143610&highlight=POLE+ANTENNA&page=3

 

[mothgrey]

I bought 3 sets of powered speakers from auction for 10 bucks a set. Going to set up a iPhone dock so I can just set my phone in the dock and either run my music from iCloud or Pandora. When the phone rings I'll be able to hear it and ignore it cause I'm in the garage and want to be left alone.

 

[madmanmerc]

i went really old school. i have an old receiver with an 8 track. my buddies always laugh at me but i think its kind of cool, plus it has some rca inputs in the back and i can actually plug in my ipod lol

 

[Lkdelta]

Look in the pawn shops? That gives you a chance to try it and make sure everything works

 

[Maexle]

Buy a used computer / laptop and decent computer speakers and you got everything covered, USB, internet radio, youtube, mp3...etc...

 

[pfctblu]

Im a recovering audiophile (if there is such a thing). Do yourself a favor and look into the Harman Kardon Go + Play (NOT the micro version). If you have an Ipod for source or something similar with FM radio built in, this is the ticket. HUGE clean sound. Im not easy to please with respect to sound quality, this little HK rocks.

 

[D.J.]

I agree with Vartz04 and any thing recycled is a positive in my opinion. This is why I have removed all the stereos from my used DD that are destined for the scrap metal recyclers. Just my $ .02

 

[RECox286]

I found a receiver and two box speakers on the curb. Took it home, and

found out it worked. Not classy nor expensive, but it does provide tunes.

Uncle Bob

 

[BradGC]

I have my vintage electronics system in my basement, along with my LPs. I ran speaker cables through the walls, to Polk RT25 speakers, placed atop my cabinets. I can run the ipod through the inputs on the receiver.

 

[Kevin C]

I hooked up a set of good speakers to the shop computer. Many FM stations stream on the Internet. A good PC will play just about anything from USB drives, CD's or DVD's.

Since my shop already has a computer it made sense to use that for music. The only extra space is for the speakers. With the right speakers it can be a great sound system. The only drawback is you have to boot it up. To get past that I put in a solid state hard drive. It boots and is ready to use in 14 seconds.

Some of the streaming applications need a decent CPU to keep up. A six year old mid range computer may not have enough processing power to stream without stuttering.

 

[d.swanson]

A co-worker and I have ordered one of these:
http://www.dealextreme.com/p/160w-h...r-for-car-motorcycle-blue-silver-sd-usb-90330
I'll see how it works out - Add a solar pannel and battery and I can go green.

 

[mking1865]

A co-worker and I have ordered one of these:
http://www.dealextreme.com/p/160w-h...r-for-car-motorcycle-blue-silver-sd-usb-90330
I'll see how it works out - Add a solar pannel and battery and I can go green.

haha, you'll be a few dB louder than my 60w amp, and I have to keep the volume between 0-1.

 

[PA-Buckeye]

injequeReurge reported

 

[Shadowdog500]

I use an old computer speaker system that I plug into my iPhones headphone jack. I stream music from AOL radio over my WIFI, and of someone calls the music pauses ant the phone rings over the speakers. You can put it in airplane mode with wifi on if you don't want to get calls.

Chris

 

[Drunken Yak inc]

Music - Old iPhone 4 connected to a set of Acoustic Research speakers through a Denon iPod connector.

Talk radio - Old iHome alarm clock.

Never noticed before, but we are practically neighbors, so to speak.

 

[Toomanytools?]

I found a receiver and two box speakers on the curb. Took it home, and

found out it worked. Not classy nor expensive, but it does provide tunes.

Uncle Bob

Hey I set that down to go inside and Pee, wondered where that went.

 

[Hardware02]

I have one of these out in the garage.

Not waterproof but...resistant.

I wipe the sawdust off it every few months - it keeps on working.

I've had it for ~6 years now.

 

[eriksalo]

I've been happy with my Bosch jobsite radio. It has a lot of good features and the best sound of all the ones I looked at. Charges batteries too!

 

[eriksalo]

Oh, and I got the Bosch on eBay for less than $100

 

[tuner4life]

Thanks for the ideas guys. Here's what I came up with:

My dad came up with this old school stereo amp and made up some cables to adapt RCA plugs onto speaker wire. So now I can run the laptop, radio, tv, dvd, etc... all through the garage stereo! I built this little "A/V area" for it all and I am happy with it so far.

Also put the speakers up. On the left I made a neat little shelf over the door to the backroom that the speaker sits on, and on the right side, it just sits on top of the wall mounted cabinet.

 

[Andybull]

After doing some research, I went ahead and purchased an I Kick 501. I will be using my IPhone and will listen to Sirius and Pandora, it's pretty loud.

 

[OGJordan]

I have a nice older set of 2.1 computer speakers. The input plugs right into my iPhone which give me my personal music and Pandora.

 

[dandan111]

I bet that's a rock n garage tuner. You even have a light show!

 

[kartracer23]

I mounted some outdoor speakers next to the garage doors so I could listen to my ipod while washing the car. So what I needed got pretty complicated: something that had an ipod dock, was powered, and had L/R speaker outputs. After looking at receivers (starting at about $175), I ended up going with a Sony bookshelf system for just over $100. It's got radio, CD, and an ipod dock. And enough power to run the speakers. Since they had some funky connectors for the speakers that came with it, I just cut them and plugged the wires into my speaker jack. So now I've got a small shelf at the back of the garage with the system, all the wires run through the walls, and outdoor speakers up by the doors.

 

[tuner4life]

I totally would mount speakers outside! But I have too many neighbors for that right now.

 

[theoldwizard1]

For under $100, check out Goodwill or Salvation Army resale. Probably won't find anything with a USB port.

A garage computer is a good suggestion. No FM radio, but there is music broadcast on the 'net.

 

[cadunkle]

In the past I've used cheapy amps I have laying around and a pair of old floor speakers either hung on a shelf high on the wall or laid up on boards between joists/collar ties in an unfinished ceiling. Thinking garage will eventually be finished with OSB or plywood, and insulated. Thinking some in ceiling speakers in each of the bays with a cheaper, but modern, amp to power them. Music comes from mp3 or Pandora on the garage laptop, but a newer amp would have several inputs so I can plug in a phone, mp3 player, etc. Probably cost a couple hundred bucks but would be nice to do eventually. Anyone ever done in ceiling?

 

[gregusmaxis]

I got mine a local thrift store, works perfectly well!

 

[bts]

This is my setup.
PC,amp and tape deck are second hand stuff I picked up locally. About $150.
Turntable and speakers I have had for about 25 years.
I don`t usually have the tape deck and turntable hooked up but I have been up loading some of my old music to the PC.
I also have one of those small TV tuner things hooked up to th PC so I can play music or watch TV. Radio comes through the amp. Internet connected as well.

I made up some large hooks to support the speakers.

 

[fredybender]

got myself one of these this week...
Not cheap, but sound quality is great!