iHome iP90 iPhone and iPod Dual Alarm Clock review

iHome has been synonymous with iPod and iPhone alarm clocks for years now, and they recently released their new iP90 dual alarm clock system for the Apple devices. If you’re an owner of an iPhone or iPod and you are looking for your next clock radio, should the iP90 be your next purchase? At $99.99 (or $85.30 on Amazon) it isn’t an impulse buy. Journey with us as we review the iHome iP90 after the break for our thoughts.

So as we said, iHome has been around for a while, and while we haven’t used every iteration of every product they’ve ever released, we’d be comfortable saying we have a fairly thorough knowledge of their product line. One problem we’ve had in the past is that we felt that, while functional, they could have done a better job in the looks department. Hey, their products are meant to be paired up with Apple portable devices which, apart from how you may feel about them, are universally recognized for the design. Well, with the iP90, it looks like things have changed a bit. The iP90 alarm clock looks sleek, modern, and matches up well with the iPod touch, iPhone, or other iPod versions. iHome’s previous iPod/iPhone clock radios have left something to be desired in the style department, but this one changed all that. We just wanted to give that those kudos up front.

The other thing about an alarm clock is that it really does need to be easy to program. No need wasting time trying to figure out how to set the thing. The iP90 wins here as well, and it was easy to set both alarms. It’s not even confusing to go between the multiple setting they offer for weekdays, weekends, and every day. Yeah, you can program this thing once, and have dual alarms go off at different times every weekday, every weekend, and every day of the week. We didn’t need to go that overboard with it, but it’s definitely nice to have all those options. One thing we didn’t like is that every button that isn’t the Snooze button will turn off the alarm. Our belief is that turning off an alarm should be more on the hard side than the easy side, so you definitely don’t just wanna slap at this thing haphazardly, because you may end up being late.

You also get multiple volume settings, so that you can have one for, say, normal listening and another for when you are falling asleep. Or you can choose to have the music slowly fade out as you are falling asleep, and then fade back in when it’s time to get up. For an alarm clock, the sound quality is really good. We aren’t just talking about for waking you out of a slumber, where sound quality really isn’t all that important, but if you actually just want to listen to some music from the radio or iPod, it really does the trick in a bedroom environment. Aside from having an iPod dock, the unit also has an aux in jack, which allows you to use audio devices other than an iPod—you know, something like a disc player, Zune, or the like.

The display is nice and readable, with big characters for the digits. You won’t have trouble seeing the time from across the room. In fact, the whole face of the clock is illuminated, not just the numbers, so some may think that the display is a big brighter than it needs to be.

Lastly, the iHome iP90 comes with a remote control, but we really didn’t find much use for that at all—but hey, to each their own on that one.

All-in-all, we think this is a fantastic addition to the iHome lineup. The iP90 really does feel like way more than your average clock radio, as well it should. It does its job, and even goes above and beyond at times. For that, we recommend it. You can find the iHome iP90 on Amazon.