Along with all of the clothes I got for Christmas, Santa also hooked me up with an iHome, essentially an alarm clock that will play music from and charge your iPod or iPhone.  I’m totally digging this thing.  I’ve seen them in a handful of hotels that I’ve stayed in over the last year and thought they were pretty cool. You wouldn’t think that an alarm clock would be all that exciting, but I’m really enjoying it.

There aren’t a ton of bells and whistles to the iHome; in many ways its just an alarm clock. The thing that I like the most is that I can wake up to music I like as opposed to a really annoying buzzer or crappy radio reception. I’ve been amazed at how much that difference has made in my mood in the morning. I think its simply a matter of not being jerked awake by the buzzer. You can also decide what song you wake up to so you can be sure that its a good one.

I’ve also been pretty impressed with the quality of the sound that you get out of the iHome.  I’m far from an audiophile, but I can appreciate better quality sound as much as the next guy and I’m pretty pleased with the speakers on this thing.  Many alarm clocks will have a bit of a tinny sound to them, but they have a reasonable amount of base to the iHome speakers.

However, I will admit that there are a couple of things that I don’t like about it. It has a sleep function like a TV where you can set it to play music for a certain amount of time before it shuts itself off. I’d love to use this function, but I can’t turn the volume quiet enough to go to sleep while its playing.  In a way this makes sense though, because if you could turn it quiet enough to allow you to go to sleep, chances are it wouldn’t be loud enough to wake you up in the morning.

The other thing that I’m not really a fan of is that the dock for the iPod doesn’t feel as sturdy as I’d like it to. Its probably stronger than I feel like it is, but I still wouldn’t complain about it having a sturdier feel to give me a little more piece of mind.

If anyone is in the market for a new alarm clock and they have an iPod or an iPhone I would definitely recommend this unit.