BioBrite Sunrise Clock Advanced Model with White Noise, Pearl
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Our Price: $133.00 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Health Care See more product details |
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Customer Reviews of BioBrite Sunrise Clock Advanced Model with White Noise, Pearl
Customer Review: Very nice except for one thing
Summary: 4 Stars
After several years struggling to wake up nearly every morning and not sleeping normaly I finally figured out I have delayed sleep phase disorder. Clocks like this are suggested for people with this disorder (if people call you a nightowl, you probably have this too). I gather from reading the other reviews that this is the same reason a lot of other people bought this thing.
It works fine and the light definately gets me up where a normal alarm clock just made me want to go turn the thing off. Which is what I did most mornings. I'd get up, walk across the room, turn the thing off and go back to bed.
The only thing I don't like about the clock is that the light shuts off after 15 minutes at full brightness. Because of this I didn't give it the full number of stars. I rarely sleep past the 15 minutes anyway, but it did happen once. I have the alarm set for 6 am with a one-hour fade up. I am usually awake by 5.30 am.
One morning though, the light shut off and I fell back asleep. And, of course, I was late for class. ... I solved this problem by having a second alarm clock (the radio) that goes off 10 minutes after the thing reaches full brightness. The light starts coming on at 5 am, it reaches full brightness at 6 am, and then the radio comes on at 6.10 am. I rarely sleep past the 15 minutes and I am usually up well before it reaches full brightness, but some nights I just don't sleep well and I'm tired as hell at 6 am. Having to use the old alarm radio isnt bad. NPR comes on and I get the day's news. And the morning I used this it wasn't like the old days with the jarring sound of the alarm. I was already half awake when it went off. So, all in all, it's worth the money, but keep your old alarm just as a back up. Just in general, in all areas of life, you should always back yourself up, because nobody else will. Your co workers/ classmates might like you, but it's not their problem if you get sacked / flunked.
And speaking of money. I priced several dawn simulators. I have no idea why they are all so damned expensive, but they are all nearly a hundred dollars or more. I saw some that were cheaper than this one, but had awful reviews.
REMEMBER: the cheapest thing in the store is the cheapest thing in the store for a resaon! So, find the cheapest, then go one or two up from there.
Some people reported problems. I think, now that I have mine and have used it for a few weeks, that most of them are either the ocassional lemon, or not reading the manual. There's just no such thing as a perfect quality control program, expect a few to slip through. Some people said something about not being able to turn off some feature or other (I think it was the white noise) but whatever it was my feeling is the person didn't read the manual. Read it. I know manuals are boring, but do it anyway. Not just for this product, but all of them. ... trust me it will solve a lot of problems for you.
Bottom line: Buy it, it works, but keep a backup handy for the rare times you sleep past the auto shutoff. And read the manual.
Customer Review: Nope, had to return it, too
Summary: 1 Stars
I was looking forward to this clock. I found that I'm highly suseptable to sunlight (i.e., when visiting Europe, I adjusted to the 8 hour difference abrupt time change very quickly, concluding that the sun effects my internal clock,) so... since I live outside the windy city and we tend to have sheer darkness the entire winter season, it seemed like a good idea.
Little expensive, sure, not too bad and when I received it I set it up immediately. Yes, the instructions are a bit confusing. You have some four buttons to push to scroll through the menus and select what you need, such as the sundown feature (the light dims over the length of time you have) as well as the time to wake up and ect. I say that its a bit confusing because everyone is usually adaptable to how a normal alarm clock sets and this is pretty different.
Loved the dimming feature, and loved how soft it was when it did the "sundown" feature. But unfortunately, all I was able to experience was one night. After that, the alarm simply did not work. I tried everything for five days and nothing. Luckily for me, I didn't trust it at first and set my old alarm as backup. So... after reading their policy on returns I was determined to just simply get my money back.
In regards to returns, I am convinced this is run by a mom 'n' pop company. There seems to be one person in their customer service department and she's not always at the phone. I told her my situation and said simply: "I want my money back." She replied: "That's funny... mine's been working 20 years." Well, good for her! I told her that she should check out the customer complaints on the web and that the mechanical difficulties are unacceptable - but honestly, it didn't seem as if she even understood what I was talking about. I got what I needed in terms of how to return the product and sent it back.
If you want to try this anyway, remember this: They will give you your money back if it is returned 30 days after PURCHASE - not after it was received. So, I made sure I enclosed my receipt, highlighting the date it was bought vs. the tracking receipt from the Post Office which told them that it was returned within the 30 days.
Waited awhile and didn't hear a thing, so I called their customer service again, this time a man answered. I told him the circumstances, said I haven't been refunded and that it needed to be done immediately. He said: "Oh, Janet's been out of the office sick for awhile... I guess this slipped through the cracks," which I wasn't too thrilled about. He said he'd look into it personally and credit my card. After a week, it was.
Conclusion: Interesting concept of a product, great when it works, not worth it when it busts after 1 week and the customer service seems like Ma and Pa Kettle running the show. Don't bother, look into something else.
Customer Review: a MUST-have for sound sleepers and shift workers
Summary: 5 Stars
I've been a very sound sleeper all my life. Likewise, all my life, I've been in search of an alarm clock guaranteed to wake me up. No sound-based clock could ever be counted on because I could (and frequently did) get up, walk across the room, silence whatever was blaring, ringing, or buzzing, and get back into bed and go back to sleep and never know I'd done it till I woke up having seriously overslept. I'm also a night person who, for much of my life, has had to live on day people's schedules. It's a bad combination.
Sound familiar? If so, this clock may be the answer for you as it was for me. I love this clock. (Note: Mine doesn't have the white noise generator so I can't comment on that; otherwise, it's identical to this model.)
The light gets brighter in a way much like the sun brightens the morning sky - consistently, over a set time span. The light it produces is very natural, very "sun-like". Experiment with where in the room it's best for you. I have it on the bedside table, not quite where it shines right into my face but close enough for it to register, as if I had an eastern-facing window right by the bed and there was never a cloud in the sky at sunrise...and sunrise is whenever I need it to be.
You can also set it to begin beeping, but I seldom need that; if you like a snooze-alarm, it has that too. Once it starts beeping, you can hit a button to turn the light down and a few minutes later it'll get brighter again. Nice.
The reliability has been great. I'm on my second one of these, having gotten one of the disc ones first, from a Sharper Image catalogue in the mid-1990s. It finally played out after about 8 years, and I replaced it with this model from Bio-Brite which I liked better only for cosmetic reasons, not because of any dissatisfaction with the first one's performance.
I truly depend on it, and when I moved 1200 miles in the late 1990s, this was one of the things that came with me in the car, instead of going on the moving van.
My only regret is that I didn't find it sooner in my working life, especially when I was working rotating shifts. Ugh. Now that I've had a job with "normal" (ha) hours for a few years, I still don't enjoy getting up at what feels like a wrong time for me, but I can and DO get up when I have to and it's not the miserable experience it used to be.
I STRONGLY recommend this product for anyone who has a hard time waking up to a noise alarm OR who would just rather not be jangled out of sleep OR who has to wake up at some time other than natural dawn OR has to get up at a time other than when their own internal clock would have them wake up...or all of those, like me. Yes, it costs more than a battery-operated clock from a discount store, but it does what it says it will do.
Customer Review: Despite the faults, can't live without it
Summary: 4 Stars
One of the most unnatural (and unnerving) experiences I can think of is being blasted out of a sound sleep by the blaring of an alarm clock, and I felt this way even before owning a sunrise alarm. Waking suddenly to a radio station, no matter how soothing the music they might be playing at the time, is not much better.
The key to a sunrise alarm is it wakes you GRADUALLY, by slowly brightening a room, the way a natural sunrise does. I cannot stress enough what a satisfying, comfortable and refreshing way to wake up this is. Most mornings I sloooowly come out of sleep, crack an eyelid, notice the room is brightening, close my eye and drift off a bit . . . this happens three or four times, each time I'm more and more awake. By the time the light is full on and the *gentle* alarm beeper sounds I'm usually stretching, fully awake. I've come to love this alarm as one of those gadgets I can't imagine doing without.
My friend was skeptical about using a sunrise alarm since he is a VERY deep sleeper. He bought one on my recommendation and found it only wakes him up about half of the time. He has to use a conventional clock radio as a backup. He's happy to put up with this though, because even the times when the sunrise alarm isn't enough to wake him, they seem to bring him up to a much lighter level of sleep, so that the clock radio is not nearly so jolting. He loves it and swears by it even though it's not enough to always wake him up by itself.
Still, there are a few cons:
It's expensive. Seems way overpriced for what is essentially a 60watt lamp, digital clock, timer and dimmer circuit. While the globe is of high quality, the base, display and controls look and feel cheap.
Setting the time and programming the alarm is a bit counter-intuitive, it takes some time to get used to it. You'll get plenty of practice though, for two reasons. The clock keeps lousy time. Mine seems to gain almost a half-minute a day. Also there is no battery back up. You must re-program it every time there is a power interruption, which is unforgivable at this price.
Even with these complaints, I wouldn't hesitate to buy another - I dread the idea of having to go back to a conventional alarm clock.
Customer Review: I love the clock Bio-Brite sunrise clock and I will purchase again
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought Bio-Brite sunrise clock about 10 years ago.
I was a medical student at the time and had to get up so early, but with this clock, I was able to get up so fresh! It was of this clock, I was able to go through the vigorous training.
Now 10 years later, the bulb went out. (I think I only needed to replace the bulb one time in the 10 years.) I could not find the same bulb anymore, and Bio-brite did not carry it. (They said I can buy it anywhere, but I couldn't find it.)
Now the clock is working as a regular alarm clock without the sunrise part, which is OK because I don't need to wake up so early anymore, but I still miss the dimming feature and rising in a bright light.
I figure after 10 years of use, I am happy to buy a new (and hopefully improved) sunrise clock.
If I remember, I'll post my review again after trying this model.
---Update---
Overall, I really enjoy having the new sunrise clock back in my life. I usually wake up nicely in a gentle glowing light without hearing the artificial alarm sound. This new version allows me to set how many minutes I want the clock to glow to full or to diminish (this is when you go to sleep.)I think there is a feature where the light comes on and off automatically to let potential thieves know that somebody is there when you are actually out of town.
I really like the time display. When you set the alarm for the morning, it dims, so it does not disturb my sleep, yet when I wake up in the middle of the night, I can see exactly when I got up. This was not possible with the old version.
The only thing I might complain about is that when you set up time etc, it is very cumbersome. You have to push the bottons multiple times to get to where you want it, and also once one function is set, you have to wait 7 sec (?) to set another function.
If you basically wake up the same time every day, it should not bother you. Once the first setting up is done, all I do is to push one alarm bottom, and I'm ready to go.