radio SHARK is a computer

Computer

A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...

-controlled radio designed by Griffin Technology

Griffin Technology

Griffin Technology is a privately held U.S. company founded in Nashville, Tennessee in 1992 by Paul Griffin. The company designs and manufactures computer peripherals, consumer electronics, and accessories, the first products being primarily video adapters, in particular those to enable the...

, introduced in late 2004. A second generation (radio SHARK 2) superseded it in 2007; they are distinguishable by color (the first model is white, the second is black). The radio connects the computer through a USB interface, which also supplies power to the radio. The device is shaped like a shark fin

Shark

Sharks are a type of fish with a full cartilaginous skeleton and a highly streamlined body. The earliest known sharks date from more than 420 million years ago....

, which includes four internal LED

LEd

LEd is a TeX/LaTeX editing software working under Microsoft Windows. It is a freeware product....

 lights attached to three pieces of clear plastic on each side of the device's case, two LEDs of which glow blue when plugged in, the other two of which glow red when recording radio.

Software designed for radio SHARK allows users to record radio programs at specific times and frequencies. The software also facilitates listening of "live" radio using time-shifting technology. Using the time-shifting features of the software, users can pause, rewind, and fast-forward "live" radio, in a manner similar to how users of Tivo

TiVo

TiVo is a digital video recorder developed and marketed by TiVo, Inc. and introduced in 1999. TiVo provides an on-screen guide of scheduled broadcast programming television programs, whose features include "Season Pass" schedules which record every new episode of a series, and "WishList"...

 or other digital video recorder

Digital video recorder

A digital video recorder , sometimes referred to by the merchandising term personal video recorder , is a consumer electronics device or application software that records video in a digital format to a disk drive, USB flash drive, SD memory card or other local or networked mass storage device...

s can time-shift video. The radio SHARK uses the computer's hard drive to store audio files that allow for the time-shifting functionality.

The radio SHARK tunes 87.5 through 108.1 MHz FM

FM broadcasting

FM broadcasting is a broadcasting technology pioneered by Edwin Howard Armstrong which uses frequency modulation to provide high-fidelity sound over broadcast radio. The term "FM band" describes the "frequency band in which FM is used for broadcasting"...

, and 530 through 1710 kHz AM

AM broadcasting

AM broadcasting is the process of radio broadcasting using amplitude modulation. AM was the first method of impressing sound on a radio signal and is still widely used today. Commercial and public AM broadcasting is carried out in the medium wave band world wide, and on long wave and short wave...

. radio SHARK can tune both odd and even increments of FM frequencies, and either 9 or 10 kHz increments on AM.

Currently, radio SHARK is compatible with both Macintosh and Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...

. The Macintosh version of the radio SHARK software can load recorded audio files directly into iTunes

ITunes

iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....

, facilitating easy transfer of recorded radio programs to an iPod

IPod

iPod is a line of portable media players created and marketed by Apple Inc. The product line-up currently consists of the hard drive-based iPod Classic, the touchscreen iPod Touch, the compact iPod Nano, and the ultra-compact iPod Shuffle...

 or CD. The product has now been discontinued by the manufacturer.

External links

• radio Shark - official site
• radio Shark 2 - official site
• Macworld review
• Ars Technica review
• iLounge review of version 2
• Snaptune One a 3rd party tool Snaptune One records the radio and identifies the songs playing on it. (bad link)