M
maximumradio
Guest
I finally decided to go and give HD a listen. All of the stations I am involved with are not HD and I thought it was time to do some due dilligence on the matter. I went to several of the retailers that are advertising heavily the availability of HD receivers.
Radio Shack: Forget them. The 5 stores in Central and South Florida that I visited did not have the Boston Acoustics or the "house" brand hooked up. When the "house" brand was connected it was unable to see the HD signal and stayed in analog. The store manager in one location in Metro Miami told me that HD is a subscription service and thats why--I explained that it is not and admitted that I am in the Broadcasting business. At that point he admitted that the store personnel had received no training about the units and made a point that they both sound like $20 Walmart boomboxes and told me that they had never had an inquiry until mine about the HD receivers. Except in the store where I identified myself as a broadcaster I was always told that Sirius is much better and the attempt to sell me on Sat radio was made.
Circuit City: Orlando, Tampa, and Lakeland car audio sales people all told me that they can not demo the units because they do not connect any antennas to the items except to the demos for Sirius and XM. I checked and it is so. Once again the pitch to move me to XM or Sirius was made. That being the case I went over to the home radio department. Wonder of wonders the Boston Acoustics unit was operational. The unit could barely receive a 50kw Radio Disney affiliate in Orlando several miles away from their transmitter site. That was in analog. I had been in a meeting with a Broadcast Electronics sales rep a few months back where I was told that HD-AM can go through walls and that steel and concrete mean nothing to it. Guess that isn't quite so..... The FM analog reception was not much better and the audio was really disappointing when compared to the analog -albeit larger-mini systems next to it.
Best Buy: I found a JVC car radio actually hooked up and working at the Altamonte Springs, FL Best Buy. The sales guy again confirmed that I was the first person to have any interest in HD and that he had no idea how to tune in the HD-2 channels. He was kind enough to get a user manual from a boxed unit and go through the steps. Only half of the FM stations in the market using HD would actually read on the receiver as HD.The audio on several different speakers was good but nothing to cause me to run out of the store screaming HD's audio virtues to the world. In fact it seemed that the audio was using a nano second of echo and some use of Aphex to brighten it up when compared to the analog signal. The difference was no so dramatic as I expected. In fact it was possible to find some analog signals dialing around that were almost as clean. The HD-2 channels were an experience in patience to receive. It was a three step process of button pushing different buttons on the face of the receiver to get to the HD-2 channel and then after all of that work the audio seemed to be really limited in bandwidth on some of stations and decent on others which goes to show that processing is the most important part of the audio chain. I can see that tuning the HD-2 channel when driving could be as hazardous as texting.
Walmart: Haven't gone yet and will only repost if the experience warrants doing so.
My overall impression is that HD if not made the operating standard is going to be in a lot of trouble unless the retailers get up to speed . The product does not sound that great in a retail setting if the HD signal is receivable at all and the sales people are un, under, or misinformed. In addition unless one is buying a realllly expensive system it appears that the digital audio benefits are extremly mitigated.
As a broadcaster I was on the verge of buying HD or recommending it to some stations I consult. Now I personally will wait to see what happens down the road unless I can get a good AM demo in which case I will also repost and in the meantime tell my clients to go out and experience the retail experience of shopping the receivers and to listen to them and then to draw their own conclusions.
Radio Shack: Forget them. The 5 stores in Central and South Florida that I visited did not have the Boston Acoustics or the "house" brand hooked up. When the "house" brand was connected it was unable to see the HD signal and stayed in analog. The store manager in one location in Metro Miami told me that HD is a subscription service and thats why--I explained that it is not and admitted that I am in the Broadcasting business. At that point he admitted that the store personnel had received no training about the units and made a point that they both sound like $20 Walmart boomboxes and told me that they had never had an inquiry until mine about the HD receivers. Except in the store where I identified myself as a broadcaster I was always told that Sirius is much better and the attempt to sell me on Sat radio was made.
Circuit City: Orlando, Tampa, and Lakeland car audio sales people all told me that they can not demo the units because they do not connect any antennas to the items except to the demos for Sirius and XM. I checked and it is so. Once again the pitch to move me to XM or Sirius was made. That being the case I went over to the home radio department. Wonder of wonders the Boston Acoustics unit was operational. The unit could barely receive a 50kw Radio Disney affiliate in Orlando several miles away from their transmitter site. That was in analog. I had been in a meeting with a Broadcast Electronics sales rep a few months back where I was told that HD-AM can go through walls and that steel and concrete mean nothing to it. Guess that isn't quite so..... The FM analog reception was not much better and the audio was really disappointing when compared to the analog -albeit larger-mini systems next to it.
Best Buy: I found a JVC car radio actually hooked up and working at the Altamonte Springs, FL Best Buy. The sales guy again confirmed that I was the first person to have any interest in HD and that he had no idea how to tune in the HD-2 channels. He was kind enough to get a user manual from a boxed unit and go through the steps. Only half of the FM stations in the market using HD would actually read on the receiver as HD.The audio on several different speakers was good but nothing to cause me to run out of the store screaming HD's audio virtues to the world. In fact it seemed that the audio was using a nano second of echo and some use of Aphex to brighten it up when compared to the analog signal. The difference was no so dramatic as I expected. In fact it was possible to find some analog signals dialing around that were almost as clean. The HD-2 channels were an experience in patience to receive. It was a three step process of button pushing different buttons on the face of the receiver to get to the HD-2 channel and then after all of that work the audio seemed to be really limited in bandwidth on some of stations and decent on others which goes to show that processing is the most important part of the audio chain. I can see that tuning the HD-2 channel when driving could be as hazardous as texting.
Walmart: Haven't gone yet and will only repost if the experience warrants doing so.
My overall impression is that HD if not made the operating standard is going to be in a lot of trouble unless the retailers get up to speed . The product does not sound that great in a retail setting if the HD signal is receivable at all and the sales people are un, under, or misinformed. In addition unless one is buying a realllly expensive system it appears that the digital audio benefits are extremly mitigated.
As a broadcaster I was on the verge of buying HD or recommending it to some stations I consult. Now I personally will wait to see what happens down the road unless I can get a good AM demo in which case I will also repost and in the meantime tell my clients to go out and experience the retail experience of shopping the receivers and to listen to them and then to draw their own conclusions.
