Yet, if I asked you – without looking at the labels – to guess what that big shiny button slap bang in the middle of the picture above did, I bet the vast majority of you would plump for the volume knob. Maybe it’s just me, but every time I go to turn the volume up on the Stream 202, I end up scrolling from BBC Radio 2 to Jerusalem FM, or some other remarkably obscure net radio station.

In addition to internet radio, the Stream 202 spits out Dab, FM and streams music from other PCs in your house, making it a versatile beast. And while I’m still struggling to get to grips with the volume controls, the sound it produces is simply sparkling, with every rolled R of the Stephen Fry podcasts, and every thumping beat from 6 Music faithfully reproduced, without the slightest hint of rattle or distortion.

Check out our full review later this week.

Within five minutes of taking the bread-loaf sized device out of the box, we had it connected to our Wi-Fi network, thanks to a commendably simple set-up wizard, although entering our router’s WPA key with the Noxon’s quirky remote control was akin to trying to spell egalitarianism. Backwards.

The Noxon handily places a folder of “local UK radio stations” at the top of the menu, to help you get started. Unfortunately, it was completely devoid of stations, leading us to spend a futile 15 minutes wondering if the radio was actually connecting to our wireless router. A brief blast of Love FM from San Marino (where, incidentally, Mick Hucknall is still very big) confirmed the connection was live, and indeed we eventually managed to locate stations closer to home by digging through the country-by-country menus. Noxon’s UK shortcut is, therefore, something of a cul-de-sac.

Although we’ve only briefly trialled a few radio stations, podcasts and a brief spot of catch-up Radio 2 with Jonathan Ross, the sound quality from the built-in speaker is perfectly capable of filling a room, although it was so base-heavy out of the box that Ross sounded more like Barry White. A tweak with the equaliser restored him to his normal lisp-heavy glory.

Overall, a mildly impressive start, but is there really enough in this black box of tricks to justify the £240 price tag? Keep an eye out for our full review next week.

Not content with merely letting you listen to the latest hit singles from around the world (and several hundred stations intent on playing nothing but Wham! till the world ends), this new entry from Orange brings something new, and somewhat inevitable, to the table.

You see, Orange has an online iTunes-style music store which sells tracks for 99p. In case you weren’t aware, it also has a little mobile phone network across the UK. Now it has an Internet radio too, some bright spark put 1 and 1 and 1 together and came up with £££. Linking the three, when you hear a track you like you just press a magic “Favourite” button on the radio, and the next time you switch on your PC you’ll find the track there ready to download from the Orange store, or even send to your (Orange, obviously) phone.

It’s such a simple, money-spinning idea I was amazed I’d not seen something like it sooner, but apparently it’s all down to metatagging: the info that identifies the artist, track and the rest is only currently broadcast by some radio stations. Orange reckon most major UK and US stations should be compatible, but as the number grows expect to see this service become the norm – and I (for once) am not complaining.

Look out for a full PC Pro review soon.