Oakcastle DAB500 Bluetooth DAB+ Radio & CD Player, 60W HiFi System for Home

Early days, but nothing really negative. Very, very well double boxed and padded. DAB radio came on by default, I've not checked the stations yet, but it is really clear, with the aerial in a 45° slant. The C.D. player is ok, it's a C.D. player, the USB can take any size stick with up to 5000 tracks on it, the Bluetooth connection is faultless, quick with no dropouts. The sound is great for the size and price of the unit, although, to me, the graphic equalizer is a bit basic. There's Normal, Pop, Jazz, Classical, Speech, Rock and Custom. You can only adjust either Treble or Bass, nothing in-between, it goes from 0-+7, both on +7 sounds, to me, the same as all of the other settings, or very subtle changes. The sound is clear at all volumes, with little to no distortion. All in all I'm favourably impressed, it does everything, including alarm clock and switches to power saving after 15 mins of quiet. The remote has most of the controls on it, if not more, a good range and batteries supplied! I'd recommend

Excellent little stereo. The cd player I used in my garage broke so I ordered this. It’s got really good sound for what it is and looks really nice as well. It came quickly and wasn’t a bad price either.

Good sound quality. Good value for money. Gives me exactly what I was seeking to play my CDs. Easy to set up and use. So pleased with it my husband ordered one got his workroom as well.

Firstly, the weight of this system surprised me, it actually felt like a good quality product, instead of a lightweight attempt at being one, which is so common these days, sadly. I was sceptical at first because it arrived in the manufacturers carton, not in a plain cardboard transit box, just as if it had flown off the shelf to my door! Then I thought more about this, like the saving on weight, packing, and a greener planet, lesser carbon footprint etc, so I put that initial concern aside. Opening this product revealed it had been well packed, but not over the top, just sufficient packing material to protect it in transit, and indeed it arrived in perfect condition, when I removed it from its box. Its overall design is minimalist, not trying to be anything other than a superbly made, competitively priced music system, and nothing else, no pretence here. No wild claims, just honestly described,. It’s a classical black box shape, in a life like dark wood grain, which fits in anywhere, streamlined insomuch that nothing sticks out of its casing, just pride and pure simplicity. I plugged it in, without having looked at the instructions, so far, the display came alive and the DAB radio immediately started playing the station it was already tuned to. I looked at the control panel below the clear cut and well lit ( dimmable) digital screen ( after removing the protective film). I tentatively pressed the scan button and it commenced searching out stations available in my area, finding 98 of them, including most of my favourites from a different area I had just moved from! Still not having checked the instructions, feeling that this intuitively designed music system was just so simple to get to know, I pressed the mode button, impatient to find the CD setting, and it confirmed my curiosity by showing me the modes of AUX input, USB, FM, Bluetooth, DAB radio CD ! The supplied remote is a bonus, ergonomically designed to fit nicely in a hand, with a tactile finish, so won’t slip out easily, and it works so well, the batteries supplied in the box, so full marks. Worldly wise readers will notice from my short video clip of the system playing a CD, will hear a track from a Clifford T Ward album, which immediately gives away my advanced years! The clarity, breadth and crispness of the ‘true to life’ studio like audio response on playback, is truly awe inspiring. The base is bang on, and for me, with elderly hearing, the treble response is like listening to someone in the room, singing to me, which is praise indeed these days with modern lifeless systems out there. I have to admit that in selecting and paging through the equaliser settings, I didn’t notice a tremendous amount of difference between them, they all sounded great to me, but I settled on Rock, but later discovered that the speech setting was obviously pleasingly different when listening to the radio news. Maybe I really do need to go and get my hearing checked! I’m blown away with this music system, truly. I usually try the volume of systems before purchasing one, and at first, when I advanced the volume on this model, it only seemed to change slowly, but towards the last quarter to maximum, the gain comes through swiftly, and powerfully, surprising me, indeed. For such an economically sized all in one system, I found the volume to be more than sufficient. It’s not a linear response curve, with the distortion free punch at the upper end, like a well tuned sports car or motorcycle. I have not at the time of writing this review, tried all the modes yet, but I have complete confidence that they’ll all impress me as much as those I’ve tried already. I understand that this unit is of of UK design, and manufactured abroad, and one reviewer commented that he would be happy to pay more for this unit if it was assembled here in the UK. Obviously, using a company with the production facilities and transport infrastructure already in place seems to be an obvious choice, but overall I agree that it would be great if it was also manufactured and distributed from within the UK, but let’s not forget the importance of utilising trade links abroad, either. Stunning and amazing music system, which I have no hesitation in recommending to anyone thinking of purchasing it. The free extended 3 year warranty was simple enough to initialise, and worked, simply by pointing my iPad camera at the QR code and up popped the registration web site with a list of products covered, took about two minutes, and all done! I’m so happy with my purchase, and it takes a lot to satisfy my quest for good quality, value for money equipment these days. Update 20/10/2024: Thrilled to have found searching for and saving radio stations as presets in preferred order, so easily. Having the facility to swap allocated preset numerical positions is brilliant too, just add another station to preset 1 and it overrides whatever was stored before, so it really is easy to instantly change your priority favourite preset allocations. Bluetooth worked so well with my iPhone 8, again, intuitively. The only difference I found was the volume level was lower on Bluetooth, so it was necessary to advance my volume button on the iPhone or on the music system to compensate. That wasn’t a problem, I just felt that the overall volume was lesser on the Bluetooth setting than playing CD’s or listening to DAB radio. It’s not a criticism, simply an observation. Also, before I sign off again, one reviewer commented that the speakers, or the greater volume of sound, was coming from the rear of the music system, or appeared so. Yes, there are two cones on the rear of the system, and when it’s playing, sound can be heard emitting from them. Without going into the science involved, some of the sound created from the speaker cones vibrating at the different musical frequencies, will, in the main, go forwards through the front facing speakers towards the listener. However, as the speaker cones vibrate forwards and backwards at very high speed, sound vibrations naturally occur BEHIND the speakers, too. In a totally sealed unit, these sounds hit the rear of the case, and bounce back towards the speaker cones, and can cause different effects within the cabinet or casing. Sometimes described as out of phase, ie, original sound bounced back towards the source. There are different methods of reducing these sometimes unwanted effects, and in this music system, the designers have introduced cone like structures on the rear to effectively allow these extraneous sound pressure waves to escape freely. This is an over simplified explanation, which I hope explains why sound comes from the rear. To some it may appear better, according to the efficiency of their own hearing, or to the range of musical frequencies being created by the speaker cones, either way, it’s designed to increase the overall listening pleasure. Judging by the amount of comments from reviewers mentioning how good the system sounds, proves beyond doubt that those conical apertures are doing their job well! ***** September 2025 update ***** It’s still one of the best purchases I’ve made, no problems at all, always goes on for the Radio 4 Today programme every morning, still looks and sounds terrific, stunning piece of radio equipment, and plays my CD’s faultlessly.✅ **************************

The DAB 500 Is a great addition to My bedroom. It enables Me to listen to cd's or USB stick or the included radios in My bedroom, either through the good sounding speakers or via headphones. Bluetooth is another great function added to this system along with the 2 alarms which can be set to come on with the radio stations or a buzzer sound, great for waking you up in a morning if needed, hence why I think this system is excellent for in a bedroom. Overall this is a good sounding, compact music system which has many features that You would expect on something more expensive. The small compact design is Ideal for in My Bedroom to listen to My CD'S which had been gathering dust in the loft, on the quality player ,with a sound You would expect off a more expensive system. The Bluetooth connectivity is also a useful function for if You want to play music off Your Mobile Phone or external I-pod. Overall this compact music system Is highly recommended by Myself especially with the added bonus of a 3 year guarantee. It would be a welcome asset to any household. At any time this would make an ideal present for any age, The DAB Radio is excellent and for anyone who listens to a wide variety of music then there are Various stations that cater for all tastes of Music from Rock, Classical ,80's or dance music. This is a modern looking system that would not look out of place in any room of the house and it is compact so would fit most areas. The good thing with DAB Radio is that it shows the name of the song being played and the artist who it is by, so no more wondering what the track was called or guessing the artist. The sound is phenomenal for such a small system, very modern looking and overall just a fantastic price for such a class item.

Truly an excellent piece of kit for the money, arrived next day. Cd works really well, with very good sound quality. Dab is also excellent, already has preset station store. At currently under £90.00p it’s a very well manufactured unit, five stars from me.

I was looking for something to replace the old transistor DAB radio that my wife was using in her office space, ideally a single unit with CD-playing capacity. And here it is! The standard of finish of the unit is very good - black (why is everything black these days!) woodgrain effect, with no rough corners or edges, no loose of flimsy switches on the unit or on the remote. Stands on four solid (rubber?) feet, and sits firmly on a the desktop. The unit weighs enough that you cannot accidentally nudge it. Moving it requires intent. Very easy to set up, very easy to use. Display panel clear and easy to read. The unit is easy to control via either the front panel or the remote. The built-in speakers are rear-ported, and definitely sound less boxy that some others that I have heard. The amplifier is powerful enough to drive the speakers comfortably and the sound quality, for what this is and for what is costs, is very good, far beyond what you might expect. If you're after hifi quality sound, then buy a hifi separates system, but this is for if you want something more compact. That said, I am quite happy to listen to this. I've heard many one-box systems with separate speakers that sound inferior to this. The sound profile is adjustable, but we've left it unchanged. The CD player works easily and smoothly. Unlike on my mini system, you cannot open this CD tray by accident. Only when you have selected CD mode can you use any of the CD functions. Which is a definite positive. Same applies for radio functions. Radio reception obviously varies according to where you live. So what follows is based entirely on my own experience. Have not tried to use the FM tuner, so cannot comment on its use. But my wife has successfully tuned and stored all sorts of DAB stations (or DAB+, as they are not distinguished), including many that she'd previously not encountered, just to try them out. Reception using the built-in aerial is fine, with no pops or clicks to mar the sound. Just to try it, I have played music from my phone using the bluetooth connectivity, and it is very easy. It just works! There are other connections on the back of the unit, which are not being used. The only one of these I find surprising is the headphone socket. Who wants a headphone socket at the rear! Not an issue for my wife as she'll not be using headphones with it, but surely to be any practical use it needs to be on the front of the unit. As the buyer, I am very pleased with this DAB500, it's everything I hoped it would be. And more to the point, my wife, who is the main user, is very pleased with it and has had no difficulty getting it set up and using it. My only disappointment is that although Majority designs and tests its products at their base in Cambridgeshire, manufacture is in China. I hope I am not the only person who would happily pay more money for something like this to be made in Britain. Packaging: The unit comes contained within a plastic bag for protection against dust, but no compressed squeaky foam, just bespoke-shaped cardboard to hold it secure inside the outer cardboard box. The remote and its batteries fitted neatly with the inner packaging. Well done, Majority! One final point is that the description suggests that it comes with no hard-copy manual. So I downloaded and printed the instruction manual from the website, so that I could give these to my wife with the package. But inside the box was a printed manual, A5 format, which is much easier to use, so I could have saved paper and ink if I'd known. If you buy one of these, check in the box before you print off the instructions. Would I recommend this product? Yes. Would I consider buying another Majority product? Yes.

Unit stopped working after 6 months. Display was frozen and no buttons worked. Had to turn off and on but this only temporarily fixed the problem. Customer support said it needed a software upgrade which is only available for Windows. I own a Mac so this was not a suitable fix. Refund was issued. I bought this radio as it was highly rated on all reviews and to support British industry. Am very disappointed with the unreliability and restricted solution. Will look for a different manufacturer.

la radio funziona benissimo, ha una buona qualità di suono nonostante la compattezza. Sono soddisfatta

Great quality for the price but I wouldn’t expect perfection when it comes to the sound output. The CD tray isn’t the strongest build and the Bluetooth isn’t the greatest. I find your device needs to be within 4 foot to connect well. It’s not a bad sound, just not high end but as I say, at this price point you can’t expect that. Ideal for a kitchen or bedroom but not as your main system but then again I am an audio engineer and you may just want a decent cheap all in one system for background sounds. If that’s the case, I would recommend this system.

La minichaîne est belle avec son placage noir. Elle a été très facile à installer. Le son est très bon. Le porte-cd semble fragile mais il suffit de le charger avec précaution. Une seule remarque : comment fait-on pour l'éteindre ? J'ai beau faire exactement ce qui est indiqué dans le mode d'envoi, elle reste allumée. Mystère...

Also ich bin auf jedenfall positiv überrascht über dieses Gerät. Ich hätte nicht erwartet, für diesen Preis, einen so guten CD Player zu bekommen. Das Radio ist mir egal. Aber der Klang der Lautsprecher bei dem abspielen von CD's ist genial. Es klingt überhaupt nicht so blechern, wie bei vielen anderen Geräten in dieser Preisklasse, sondern richtig klar mit starken Bässen. Auch die Bedienung und Einstellung ist kinderleicht. Also zusammengefasst: Es ist ein geniales Gerät. Jetzt hoffe ich bloss, dass es auch ein Weilchen hält...! Ach ja, auch Kopfhörer kann man problemlos anschliessen. Der Ton ist dann automatisch über die Kopfhörer zu empfangen...!

Basico con calidad, todo funciona , sonido y bluetooth, perfectos radio muy bien, precio bajo calidad media