At Walgreens last week I noticed they had three different models of tiny earphone radio. I've looked for this type of thing before unsuccessfully, so they are new. By earphone radio, I mean a complete radio built into an earpiece. They had two FM-only models and an AM-only model; no AM-FM, sorry. All three versions that they had would easily fit in an Altoids PSK kit and each weighs maybe 1/2 ounce. The FM versions each use two alkaline LR44 button cells and the AM version uses one LR44. I bought the AM version. My previous experiments with small radios make me estimate that the LR44's should last for several hours, but not several days or anything like that. LR44's are very cheap batteries, like 25 cents each from batterystation.com, and you can stash a few spares in very little space. They are not much bigger than aspirin tablets. The radios were $5.99 each or $10.00 for two. I might investigate modding the AM radio so it can be alternately powered from an AA cell. One AA ought to be able to run it for days on end. You could also use #357 or SR44 silver oxide cells (direct replacement for LR44) and they should last longer than LR44's, but they cost more.

One FM version had a digital scanning system that's shown up in a lot of cheap headset radios lately. Basically you press a button and the radio scans upward to the next signal that it can find. You can't really tell what station you're tuned to, without waiting for them to announce it. But the radios do work ok. The other FM version had an analog tuning knob that might make it easier to re-locate a given station. I think it had no tuning scale printed on it though. The AM version has analog tuning again with no scale. The FM versions had small pieces of wire (retractable on one of them) sticking out for use as antennas. The AM version had a squarish plastic part that looked like a small ferrite bar antenna was inside. None of the radios had volume controls as far as I noticed.

In my city environment, reception from the AM unit was acceptable but not great. Selectivity between stations wasn't so hot, and the audio was somewhat tinny. But it was certainly good enough to get news updates in the event of a blackout, hurricane, or whatever. I don't know how well it would work out in the boonies.

I can't report on the FM units since I didn't try them. However I have a few larger versions of the digital scan radios and their reception is actually pretty decent.

Anyway, any of these might make a nice addition to an EDC kit. If you're not after completely minimal size though, you might find a bigger radio more useable.

I saw the same radios and was thinking about picking one up myself.

Thanks for the review!

I wonder if it is one of the radios I was asking about earlier. I hope so, I haven't seen them in forever......

Is it just like a small rectangular housing connected to an earbud?

These sound pretty neat for a disaster scenario.

What factors should be considered when deciding between AM and FM capability? There are certainly a lot more FM stations where I live, but I believe AM signals travel farther into unpopulated areas. How did you decide?

By the way, if you want larger battery capability, I saw a tiny FM radio at WalMart with plug-in ear bud headphones that took one or two AAA batteries and had digital scanning tuning. It was only $1, but I don't think it is a normally stocked item. It would probably fit in an Altoids tin, but would take up most of the space, so not as compact as what you describe.

In smaller towns when the power goes out the stations sometimes broadcats at a reduced level depending on how much of a budget they have for a generator. Some of the AM even go off the air completely. I have noticed that the FM stations, having more of the 'popular' programming and therefore more listeners and therefore more $ have usually stay on the air as they have the most budget for generators since they loose the most $ if off the air.

Sony makes a small radio with TV, weather, AM, and FM.
http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHO...an_RadioWalkman

It is 3-3/8" x 2-1/2" x 1-5/16" and runs on 1 AAA battery. It's considerably more expensive at $29.95 Sony List price. This is one of the smallest radios I've seen with the weather bands and digital tuning. The sound is good for the quality of headphones I've used with it.

nice lookin radio, only thing i wish they would have added is a small speaker in case you loose the headphones.

Definately would have been an improvement. If they made it large enough to be useful, it would have meant increasing the size. For emergency use at low volume, they could have put a speaker like is used on PDA's in the case. The sound quality on these is good but even at maximum volume they leave more than a little to be desired. I guess some of the compromise for quality and size was in the designed volume.

The Sony is a nice radio but it's at least 5x the size of this earphone thing.

I don't think weather band is really necessary for an emergency radio unless you're on a boat or something. If it's the type of emergency where the weather is doing something interesting, you'll hear plenty of forecasts on regular news stations.

Radios with tiny little speakers aren't so useful either. The main advantage of a speaker is several people can listen at once. The Countycomm $5 radios are just about minimal, with a 1.5" speaker or so. For a household radio, you want something bigger, like a small boom box, or the GE SuperRadio that's been mentioned before. That will play loud enough to fill a room, so people can listen to it and converse at the same time, etc.

I quite agree on the size. I also saw them @ Walgreens. If I hadn't already had the Sony, I would have added one to the bookbag for school nights that stays in the truck most other times. It's amazing what size they can routinely fit what would have been several inches square by an inch thick 20 years ago into.