Sylvania iPod Dock Clock Radio

I picked this up thinking it would be a nicer wake-up than morning radio shows. I set it up, flipped it to the ipod setting and plugged in my ipod. My music played but when I tested the alarm, it didn't do anything, so I pulled out the one page manual. The alarm set-up is not intuitive -- you have to power off, turn off the alarm, set the time, then turn the alarm back on...kind of annoying but not my biggest gripe. Much more problematic was that the device had to stay powered off for the alarm to work. But the back-lighting is only active when the device is powered on (when you hit power, everything turns on and it's like a speaker dock). I tried keeping it powered on but pausing the ipod, but no alarm function in that case. So in other words, it doesn't function as a normal bedside clock if I want it to act as an alarm. Or vice versa. Ridiculous. Strangely, the manual also says the snooze function doesn't work when using the ipod for the alarm...it actually did work for me, but after reading that, wouldn't trust it. Also, the speakers are terrible. I didn't expect anything too special, but playing from my ipod, it sounded like a radio station, tinny and with static. Anyway, not being able to see the clock at night was already a deal-breaker for me, so it's going back.