Sure, but statistically they represent a tiny minority as compared with Millennial 'cord-cutters' who primarily stream content. David's point is valid, in so far as some Latino and viewers on the lower-income side of the economic scale settle for what's available via OTA. Those numbers are still inside the 16% OTA viewership figure. My original point stands; that consumer figures for cord-cutters are not aligned with just OTA viewing and in fact, OTA represents a smaller overall percentage than streaming.
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Hubbard Testing All-Digital AM on WWFD
- Thread starter rbc
- Start date
Sure, but statistically they represent a tiny minority as compared with Millennial 'cord-cutters' who primarily stream content. David's point is valid, in so far as some Latino and viewers on the lower-income side of the economic scale settle for what's available via OTA. Those numbers are still inside the 16% OTA viewership figure. My original point stands; that consumer figures for cord-cutters are not aligned with just OTA viewing and in fact, OTA represents a smaller overall percentage than streaming.
What do you consider "young people"? That could be a pretty big number.
Looks like the Commission is seriously considering allowing AM stations to go all digital at will:
https://www.radioworld.com/news-and...5wp36aKXVcE3ofQSWWW7DwjpppL&M_BT=512578631511
That’s interesting! I wonder how the power output of a digital-only signal would compare with current analog signals? Maybe the better version of that question is: I wonder how coverage and receive range would compare once a station made the switch?
If a station went to all-digital, wouldn’t they be able to improve audio quality even more (vs current analog) than the current hybrid digital signal does?
Do you think it would be mostly smaller (coverage area or audience) stations that would find a switchover appealing, or would the bigger stations be interested, do you think?
I’d have no access to all-digital AM in my pickup, which would be disappointing, but I’d have it everywhere else. Maybe a switchover would be the final push I need to swap out the pickup’s radio.
If a station went to all-digital, wouldn’t they be able to improve audio quality even more (vs current analog) than the current hybrid digital signal does?
Do you think it would be mostly smaller (coverage area or audience) stations that would find a switchover appealing, or would the bigger stations be interested, do you think?
I’d have no access to all-digital AM in my pickup, which would be disappointing, but I’d have it everywhere else. Maybe a switchover would be the final push I need to swap out the pickup’s radio.
What I've heard about The Gamut's all-digital testing is that the digital coverage area during the day has far exceeded the usable analog signal.
Whether the audio quality is better is subjective, though. A clean analog AM broadcast with full 10 kHz frequency response sounds pretty good on the right radio. The problem is finding those tiny areas where the signal is clean AND finding a radio that doesn't neuter the audio to reduce noise. I'm behind the wheel of a Hyundai sedan while travelling at the moment and the AM section sounds like it might not even be making 5 kHz.
With HD, you get better frequency response and a low noise floor, but the trade-off is digital artifacts in the audio. From what little I've heard, even in all-digital mode it's pretty harsh sounding.
Whether the audio quality is better is subjective, though. A clean analog AM broadcast with full 10 kHz frequency response sounds pretty good on the right radio. The problem is finding those tiny areas where the signal is clean AND finding a radio that doesn't neuter the audio to reduce noise. I'm behind the wheel of a Hyundai sedan while travelling at the moment and the AM section sounds like it might not even be making 5 kHz.
With HD, you get better frequency response and a low noise floor, but the trade-off is digital artifacts in the audio. From what little I've heard, even in all-digital mode it's pretty harsh sounding.
Much of that is because the digital modulation is one solid data stream causing the transmitter to output 100% continuous power all the time, rather than AM modulation which reaches peak power when an audio peak of 100% occurs. Digital modulation is measured RMS, where AM modulation is peak.
That's the problem with making the argument that AM could sound as good as FM stereo...IF there was the perfect radio and transmission setup. There is neither, nor has there ever been. Complete fallacy. If nobody makes perfect AM tuners, and not every AM station has a broad-banded antenna system and perfectly matched transmitter, then the point is moot.
Signal to noise ratio for AM reception because of various levels of terrestrial and atmospheric noise has always been worse than analog FM. Just one of the advantages to digital transmission, is the receiver doesn't listen for noise, only digital packets, so terrestrial noise is completely eliminated from the equation.
The maximum audio frequency response for AM is 10Khz. Just as with FM, tuner filters start rolling off audio at about 7Khz in order to reduce noise. Just as AM, no FM tuner ever made has a brick wall 15Khz low pass filter. Most roll-off high frequencies around 13Khz. To that point, to the AM fans who claim MW sounds as good as FM, I argue that they need their hearing tested, because there is a big audible difference between 7Khz and 13Khz.
Most of the digital artifacts are because the station is playing audio files that are either Mp3s, or some other lossy encoded format that isn't compatible with not only the Ibquity decoding algorithm, but probably even with the station digital audio processor. Other than WWFD, most stations don't pay attention to that kind of thing.
Judging by what I heard, WWFD wasn't paying attention, either. That, or they were and IBOC just sounds that awful. It wasn't any better than satellite radio. That said, I would love for someone to actually make a recording of WWFD direct from the line-out or headphone jack of a compatible radio so we're not hearing audio recorded off someone's smartphone, just to give the audio the best chance to sound as good as it can.
I know I'm in the minority when it comes to audio quality, but I would rank clean analog 10 kHz wide AM as "better" than highly compressed lossy digital audio from satellite radio or HD radio broadcasts. But I'd take the lossy awful digital audio in stereo and "full fidelity" over the poorly processed and lopped off at the knees 5 kHz audio that most car radios present on AM.
Then again, I'm listening to a two-hour music show on shortwave as I write this, and it sounds fine even though it's also only 5 kHz of bandwidth, with all the atmospheric twisting and bending and fluttering that comes with a 125 kW signal beamed to Alabama via Germany, so maybe I am way out of touch with reality.
Just curious: How does someone in Alabama judge the transmission quality of WWFD in Maryland? I doubt the propagation is so good that you could pick up the station DX.
There are a video or two floating around of people receiving it locally. Or semi-locally.
All recorded on via phone in a vehicle or in front of a Sangean radio with tiny speaker. None of them a good example of how the station sounds.
I agree, and I am pretty sure I said as much somewhere else in this thread.
But… I have heard hybrid mode on AM through direct audio recordings and it didn't sound any different than what I heard in those videos, so I doubt the actual sound quality of full digital is any better than hybrid mode. What's better seems to be coverage and dropouts, or lack thereof.
How far can the MA3 AM signal go?
Here's the daytime coverage map according to radio-locator.com:
https://radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/pat?call=WWFD&service=AM&h=D
The local coverage reaches as far as Hagerstown, Germantown and Leesburg.
Has anyone recorded the all digital AM signal of this station? For that matter, comparing the FM HD and internet signal in terms of sound quality would be a great idea.
The sound quality of AM HD has not impressed me thus far. At my QTH, KFUO runs it. It does operate in stereo, but the AM digital sound quality is more like a 32k stream. This currently takes up 20 kHz on either side of the 850 kHz frequency, and often falls back on its analog AM if not in the immediate area of the signal. Things get worse when the ionosphere works its magic late in the local afternoon/evening.
KMOX, which has shut off its HD transmitter (lack of available parts and maintenance issues apparently play a role for them here), was the most reliable to get a locked signal on the road in the St. Louis metro. They ran mono on their AM signal, and their internet feed sounded massively better, and uses stereo.
The sound quality of AM HD has not impressed me thus far. At my QTH, KFUO runs it. It does operate in stereo, but the AM digital sound quality is more like a 32k stream. This currently takes up 20 kHz on either side of the 850 kHz frequency, and often falls back on its analog AM if not in the immediate area of the signal. Things get worse when the ionosphere works its magic late in the local afternoon/evening.
KMOX, which has shut off its HD transmitter (lack of available parts and maintenance issues apparently play a role for them here), was the most reliable to get a locked signal on the road in the St. Louis metro. They ran mono on their AM signal, and their internet feed sounded massively better, and uses stereo.
That's odd, given that AM hybrid HD (MA-1) does not support stereo. Only the full HD (MA-3, as used by WWFD) supports stereo.
You may be right about that. I checked KFUO on my Sangean portable and heard only mono. I may roll tape on them and their stream at the same time for those interested in comparing the two
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