Device and method for trainable radio scanning

A radio comprising:

• a receiver to receive an RF signal and convert the RF signal to an audio signal;
• a phase-locked oscillator controllable to select a tuner frequency of the receiver;
• a scanning circuit operable to control the phase-locked oscillator;
• and
• a radio scanner to control the scanning circuit such that only preferred radio stations are tuned in by the receiver during a scanning procedure;
• said radio scanner comprising:
• a station monitoring circuit to scan a plurality of radio frequencies and extract audio samples of a predetermined duration from each one of the plurality of radio frequencies having a signal strength above a reception threshold;
• a memory to store audio classification data and the plurality of audio samples;
• and
• an audio analyzer to analyze each one of the plurality of audio samples using the audio classification data and classify each audio sample into a musical style category.

A method of scanning only preferred radio stations in a radio, said method comprising the steps of:

• scanning a plurality of radio station frequencies and extracting audio samples from each one of the plurality of radio stations;
• classifying each of the audio samples into one of a plurality of musical style categories;
• determining a user's preferred musical styles;
• storing a list of station identification data of radio stations having corresponding audio samples classified in the user's preferred musical styles;
• and
• scanning only the stations identified in said list during a scanning procedure of the radio.