livio

You may already be familiar with the maxim, "Less is more." Clearly the infotainment engineers over at General Motors are, because it seems that they've taken this approach to designing the dashboard of the 2013 Chevrolet Spark LT.

There are only four buttons for volume up and down, power, and home below the 7-inch touch screen. There are only three knobs for the basic climate control system. There isn't even a CD player -- GM's betting that you probably won't even notice that last bit, because its target market carries music around on phones … Read more

Livio Radio, developer of a free car Internet radio app for iPhone and Android, and Dice, developer of audio integration kits for OEM car stereos, have teamed up to provide a solution for streaming Internet radio to your car without ripping out the stock receiver. It starts with an app on your iPhone and ends with hardware that takes over your car's satellite radio input.

Livio's app delivers more than 45,000 Internet radio stations and Internet streaming AM and FM radio stations via your smartphone's data connection. (The app's free version steps down to 300 … Read more

Livio, which used to be known for its tabletop Internet radios, is going to be taking a bigger plunge into the Internet car radio market this summer with its upcoming $99 Kit, a Bluetooth wireless "head unit" that plugs into your cigarette lighter adapter and includes a mic and speakerphone, as well as a built-in USB port for charging your phone.

Basically, it works like this: Upon entering your car, you pair your iPhone or Android smartphone with the Kit (via Bluetooth), and the Livio Car Internet Radio app automatically launches. You then stream the Internet radio station … Read more

Livio broke onto the Wi-Fi radio scene with the Livio Radio, featuring a "less is more" design philosophy that focused on Pandora's streaming music service. Today the company has announced a new Wi-Fi radio in the same vein, The NPR Radio ($200), which puts the focus on easily finding NPR content.

The backbone of The NPR Radio is the NPR menu, which is programmed by NPR and aggregates all of the company's content into a single menu, so you can easily find the NPR station you're looking for without having to know the station's … Read more

For this week's Crave giveaway, we have the Livio Radio, a Wi-Fi Internet radio optimized for listening to Pandora without a PC. Our reviewer Matthew Moskovciak said this about the product: "The Livio Radio is the first Wi-Fi radio we've tested that is designed completely around the Pandora service, offering all the standard functions--like 'thumbs up/down'--right on the front panel. The gorgeous design is outstanding for the price; it's easy to use and you won't find anything that looks this good until … Read more

The iPod may have killed AM/FM radio for the latest generation of music fans, but the classic version of Apple's ubergadget only lets you listen to your own music collection--there's no hipster DJ introducing you to your new favorite band. Music fans still crave new sounds, and personalized Internet radio services such as Pandora and Last.fm have filled the "music discovery" gap by taking note of your music preferences and playing songs they'll think you'll like. Pandora's a great service, but--portable devices notwithstanding--it's not easy to listen to away from … Read more

The new Livio Radio certainly isn't the first Wi-Fi radio to feature Pandora access--the Squeezebox Boom and the Grace GDI-IR2000 both offer the functionality--but it's certainly the first model seemingly designed around the streaming Internet music service.

With a standard tabletop radio design, the Livio gives you full access to Pandora, and also makes it easy to interact with the service by putting "thumbs up" and "thumbs down" buttons on the front panel and the remote. The Livio can connect to your home network using either the integrated Wi-Fi or the Ethernet port around … Read more