Sunday, March 26, 2017

Workaround

Long ago I was given a Zenith "Circle of Sound" digital AM/FM clock radio and it has served me well over the years.  Recently however it has developed a bizarre fault.  It has a 3-way switch on the back for setting the time or alarm.  Move the switch one way and you can adjust the time, move it the other way and you can adjust the alarm setting, return the switch to the center position to resume normal operation. But now when I move the switch to adjust the time the time displayed is different from the time displayed in normal operation and adjusting it has no effect on the time displayed once the switch is returned to the center position.  I discovered this when trying to advance the time (spring forward) for daylight savings time.  Fortunately I figured out an alternative way to set the correct time.  If you unplug the radio and then plug it in again the time is set to 12 PM (midnight).  (At one time the radio had a battery that allowed it to keep time across short power failures but this gradually ceased to work.)  So I was able to set the time correctly by unplugging the radio, waiting until midnight and then plugging it in again.  A little inconvenient but fortunately the time doesn't have to be set very often.