Hotel was fine in itself, service was acceptable. Rooms have been done to a modern standard with frosted glass everywhere and modern fittings. Although some of these had started to break. Location of the hotel was the main issue why i wouldnt recommend to a friend. Close to the train station - you could hear the annocements. and the area that it was in was covered in grafitti and no too wasy on the eye when compared to the rest of Rome. Once away from this area, Rome was completly different

During my stay in Rome there was a heatwave coming up from Africa with temperatures up to 40 degrees celcius! It was impossibly to go sightseeing during the day so we spend many hours on the rooftop pool which Im SO HAPPY that we had. I dont know how we otherwise would have endured the extremely hot days! There is a "lifeguard" in the poolarea handing out towels, and if all the sunbeds are occupied you can get a matress from him. Big enough pool and lovely atmosphere, I loved it!!
The rooms are quite small, funky interior but not functional. In room safe, good A/C, free wireless internet. The breakfast was disgusting, we had it included in the room but actually went out for breakfast. The historical citycenter is a 15min walk , there is a metro 5 min from the hotel and Termini station just around the corner.
All in all I would say its a great hotel for a warm summer, since you would spend alot of time at the rooftop pool or outside. For the winter I would recommend something closer to the hostorical center.

The neighborhood is not great, but on the plus side, you're right across the street from the airport train terminal -- it took us no more than 10 minutes from the time we left the hotel til the time we were on the train, including a few minutes of grappling with the ticket-dispensing machine (don't forget to stamp your ticket before you board your train!).

Otherwise, we took the metro once, in the morning, and then stuck to cabs the rest of the time.

The hotel itself looks like it was built in the '60s with a "futuristic" theme. There is no privacy in the rooms -- a smoked glass door to the bathroom, and the shower in the middle of the room. The shower curtain doesn't close all the way -- so the floor outside the shower is wet by the time you're done -- and the shower also doesn't drain well, so you're standing in your own shower water most of the time -- it was so gross, I only showered once in the room during our stay and then tried to use the pool's shower room, which was equally yucky.

I still get the skeeves thinking about it.

The pool is nice except that it seems like a popular spot for Italians to have business lunches and after-work drinks, and I'm not a big fan of cavorting around in my bathing suit in front of people in business suits.

Staff was OK. Never tried the restaurant because it was crazy-expensive. Honestly, the best part of the whole hotel was how easy it was to get to the airport train.

I used an online search engine that rated the Radisson SAS as a 5-Star hotel that was costing a 3 or 4-Star price so I couldn't pass it up. The best part of this hotel is it's location. It's directly across the street from the Stazione Termini in Rome. This is the central railway station in Rome where the subway system and the train system both meet up. There's a direct "Leonardo Express" train that will take you from Fuimincino (FCO) airport DIRECTLY to the Stazione for less than $5/pp! That's a great deal (especially since I didn't know it and paid over $50 for a cab!). From there it's easy to get all over town and my wife and I took an open top bus tour of the city that took off in front of the Stazione for around $20 that allowed us to get to all the famous sites in town. But enough about location.

The hotel itself is decent. It's not going to win any "worlds best" awards but at least it was reasonably clean, you felt safe, and the rooms were adequate. Lots of reviews mentioned that it's not in the best neighborhood but I just never felt threatened at all. Not being naive, I just didn't "personally" encounter any of the dangerous characters that I've read about.

After seeing the age of many of the buildings in Rome I can understand why such a relatively modern hotel could appear to be higher-class and given the 5-star rating but comparing it to other 5-Stars I've stayed at around the world, this one doesn't even come close. To be honest, if you were to compare, this one might not even be a 4-Star. it had some neat tricks in the room such as the shower in the middle of the room and the "room remote" control that controlled the curtains, lighting, etc. but that was about it. In fact, the remote in my room was supposed to be connected to a pole but the pole was broken and there were some frayed wires that were exposed. I was sure it was a safety hazard so I stayed away from messing with that remote (it probably 220v running through it!).

The staff were adequate. I really didn't spend much time with them but nothing stood out as exceptional and, conversely, I didn't have any problems.

So I have 3 main grading issues when I go to a hotel: Is it clean enough to sleep in? Yes. Is it clean enough to take a shower in? Yes. Did I feel safe? Yes. Again, probably not the best in town but since I was only staying for one night before getting on my cruise ship the next day it worked out fine.