Tivoli Audio Music System (walnut/beige)

With few exceptions, Tivoli Audio sticks to what it knows best--making tabletop radios that look and sound great. Having hit many of the niche markets--satellite radio, portable, and iPod-friendly--Tivoli has gone in the other direction and come out with a tabletop radio for the Lexus set, the Tivoli Audio Music System. Though the price is certainly high-end--$600 list price--feature-hungry buyers are certain to feel shortchanged: the Music System offers only an AM/FM radio, a CD player, an alarm clock, and an auxiliary input. While that's competitive with tabletop CD radio stalwarts such as Bose, Boston Acoustics, and Cambridge SoundWorks, the feature set is downright meager compared with our current tabletop favorite, the Polk I-Sonic. Of course, there's a certain segment of the population who prefers elegant simplicity over a bullet list of features they'll never use, and we suspect that will be the primary target demographic for the Music System. Its extremely attractive design is the Tivoli's headline attraction--the look and feel is arguably best in class, though there's room for improvement insofar as the controls and ergonomics are concerned. The audio quality didn't blow us away; it was fine, but we were just a bit disappointed relative to the extremely high expectations generated by the luxurious design and price. At the end of the day, we were looking for more features and even better sound to justify that hefty price tag. But if you're looking for dead simple operation and the best-looking radio in town--and price isn't an object--the Tivoli Audio Music System is worthy of consideration.

Design
The Tivoli Audio Music System comes in three colors: dark walnut/classic beige, piano black/silver, and piano white/silver. Our review sample was dark walnut/classic beige, and when we first pulled away the cloth sheath it came wrapped in--a nice touch, by the way--we were immediately wowed by the finish. In fact, almost everyone who saw the lacquered wood exterior was impressed. Similar to most glossy products we review, the Music System is susceptible to dust and fingerprints, but Tivoli includes a small cloth to keep it looking fresh.

While there's no denying the exterior cabinet oozes with style, the front panel is more of a mixed bag. We had no problem with the vintage color scheme, but what did turn us off slightly were the numerous small buttons that littered the front panel. We're not sure why Tivoli went in this direction, and it definitely brought our excitement down a notch--we couldn't help but notice a more-than-slight resemblance to Lasonic's dud, the MSU-2020.

Aesthetics aside, small buttons aren't our favorite way to interact with electronics. We would have preferred, for instance, a couple of knobs to handle source selection and tuning--the latter is particularly clumsy to handle with a couple of buttons. While the smallish keys all having the same size does give the player a nice symmetry, we prefer when more important buttons are more easily distinguished. However, even with our knocks, the Tivoli Audio system is by no means difficult to use. In fact, we think it is a good middle ground between the extremely easy but untweakable Bose Acoustic Wave Music System II and the customizable but sometimes difficult Polk Audio I-Sonic.

Aside from the small buttons, there's also a large knob on the front that's used for adjusting volume, as well as (with a quick click) adjusting the treble. Above the knob, there's an LCD screen that displays both the date and time when the unit is off. Further up is the slot-loading CD drive, with an eject button to the right. At the top of the unit is a large button that doubles as both a snooze for the alarm and a mute button for everything else. We definitely liked how easily accessible it was, especially for shutting off the early morning alarm. The rest of the controls are around the back of the unit--a knob to control the subwoofer level as well as a switch to alternate between using the internal and external FM antenna.

Also included is a remote control, which has the slim credit-card style design common with tabletop radios. For the most part, it does its job, although we wish there was some more differentiation between the buttons. Additionally, some of the buttons are oddly placed--for example, play and stop are on opposing sides of the remote--but it's nothing too egregious.

Features
The Tivoli Audio Music System has a strictly basic feature set for a tabletop radio. There's the aforementioned slot-loading CD drive up front, which can play audio CDs and home-burned CDs encoded with MP3 or WMA files burned on them. It can also pull in both AM and FM signals using its digital tuner and can hold six FM and six AM presets. For a product this expensive, we would have liked to see more of each, but in reality there's not enough good stuff on AM or FM that we'd realistically use more than six of each. Sound is pumped through the two 3-inch speakers up front, backed up by a down-firing subwoofer with bass ports in the rear.

In terms of connectivity, the Music System is about average. There's a 1/8-inch stereo auxiliary input in the back, which can be used to connect an MP3 player or other audio device. There's also a mix input, which allows you to hear an external device intermixed with the Music System's primary audio stream (CD, radio). With the mix input having little use beyond doubling as a PC speaker, we would've preferred a second dedicated input instead of the mixer.The rest of the connectivity is rounded out by a 1/8-inch stereo output--which can used for recording with an external device--as well as a headphone output upfront, which mutes the main speakers when used.

As mentioned above, the Music System offers EQ controls in form of both treble and bass knobs--the former on the front panel and the latter on the rear. Additionally, you can also choose among stereo, mono, and SpacePhase Wide mode audio settings--the latter artificially widens the sound stage. One slight annoyance is that regardless of what you set the Music System to, it will automatically revert to the SpacePhase mode whenever it is turned on. This happens despite the fact the manual states that stereo or mono delivers the most accurate sound at high volume levels. Since we felt like we'd probably do most of our listening in stereo, we'd have to change the setting each time we used the radio.

Along with its audio capabilities, the Tivoli Audio Music System is also a fully functional alarm clock. It has dual-alarm capability, which means you can set two separate alarm times each with its own alarm volume. For nighttime, it has a sleep timer as well as a nifty light sensor that automatically adjusts the brightness of the LCD display when the room goes dark--not a huge feature, but it's the kind of extra we like to see on an expensive unit like this. The LCD can also be set to static or scrolling text when displaying CD Text and RDS (Radio Data Service) information on compatible discs and stations--artist, song titles, and the like. Rounding things out is a slot for two AA batteries so the alarm will still sound if the power goes out.

When looked at in a vacuum--or even against most tabletop radios--the feature set of the Music System is solid. However, once you look at the identically priced Polk I-Sonic, its deficiencies become more apparent. The I-Sonic essentially does everything the Music System does but adds HD Radio, XM radio (with a subscription and antenna accessory), an additional analog input, and DVD playback. We thought the Polk sounded better, too--though it does lack the Tivoli's retro-flavored good looks.

Performance
We started off our listening tests by listening to the Legends of Jazz CD. Our first impressions were the Tivoli didn't quite sound as good as we thought it would. Maybe we were expecting too much with its swanky finish, but we thought it sounded too much like, well, a tabletop radio for our taste. To be fair, it definitely sounded better than Tivoli's iPod speaker system, the half as expensive iYiYi--which is to be expected considering the price difference. To put the sound in perspective, we pitted it against our current tabletop radio sound-quality king, the Polk I-Sonic. The difference was definitely slighter than we've heard versus other products, but the result was clear: the I-Sonic produced a bigger sound that was more enjoyable to listen to. But again, that's not to say the Tivoli Audio Music System sounds bad. We were just hoping for more considering Tivoli's reputation and the high price tag.

Where does all this leave the Music System? While the gadget hound and pure audiophile will probably gravitate toward the Polk I-Sonic, we think there's a lot to like in the Tivoli Audio Music System. We think it offers a much better bang for its buck than the extremely high-priced Bose Acoustic Wave Music System II, and (to our taste) it looks a lot nicer too. And while its interface isn't without its quirks, it's definitely easier to use that the sometimes confusing I-Sonic. If you're looking for a great-looking, easy-to-use tabletop radio and don't care about whiz-bang extra features, the Tivoli Audio Music System will fit the bill.

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