AM HD TURNOFF PACE ACCELERATES

[chrish]

My hearing is not what it once was due to severe tinitus but I can hear that disgusting 5 KHZ brickwall immediately

 

[badjef]

My hearing is not what it once was due to severe tinitus but I can hear that disgusting 5 KHZ brickwall immediately

Since you are responding on this board, you are in our minority and don't count.
The average person is turning the radio on, hearing what they want, and turning the dial or turning it off. They are not noticing the lack of fidelity. It is "mental tinitus".

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

 

[rbrucecarter5]

Most AM radios are so bad, an average listener can't tell the brickwall exists.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

I disagree. Most new AM radios only have one cheap ceramic filter in the IF - and as an unexpected consequence are quite broadband. So decent fidelity on AM will be immediately apparent.

 

[rbrucecarter5]

I think KLIF Dallas on 570 is off. Their signal is almost like a local again in Houston. First time in years. In Dallas, they were so weakened by HD that you could null them and get WNAX at night. Their building penetration must be much better now all over Dallas.

 

[KB1OKL]

WTAG 580 Worc MA is off as of 3 pm today, not sure if this is a fluke an early sunset turn off or it is really off, it has been off and on quite a bit over the past few years so I'll monitor it.

 

[chrish]

With 44 years in the business with many years of AM talking to a lot of listeners you find out that often can't they explain why they don't like a station but if you dig further and have them push buttons and tune down the dial most often they pick the rich full sound rather the that than that of the inferior thin sounding signal. They equate the full richness with POWER though they have no clue about technical reasons.

 

[N1WVQ]

WTAG 580 Worc MA is off as of 3 pm today, not sure if this is a fluke an early sunset turn off or it is really off, it has been off and on quite a bit over the past few years so I'll monitor it.

I hope it stays off but am thinking it'll be like WHJJ which has been running it for awhile since their last time with it off.

 

[badjef]

Most AM radios are so bad, an average listener can't tell the brickwall exists.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

I disagree. Most new AM radios only have one cheap ceramic filter in the IF - and as an unexpected consequence are quite broadband. So decent fidelity on AM will be immediately apparent.

I'd hate to think, I've turned into one of those "average listeners".

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

 

[KB1OKL]

WTAG 580 Worc MA is off as of 3 pm today, not sure if this is a fluke an early sunset turn off or it is really off, it has been off and on quite a bit over the past few years so I'll monitor it.

I hope it stays off but am thinking it'll be like WHJJ which has been running it for awhile since their last time with it off.

It's still off today at 10:50 AM, the last time this happened (stayed on 24 hours a day) it was a software glitch or something. Yup WHJJ and WBZ are still hissing away.

 

[jogeedaklown]

Add two more. KDWN 720 & KXNT 840 in the Las Vegas area. I guess I am the only one that noticed.

JogeeDaKlown

 

[Casey]

1450 KMRY seems to have their HD off in Cedar Rapids. They have an FM translator now, so it is possible their HD won't return.

The HD radio site still has KGYM 1600 listed as an HD Station too, but they are clearly not still broadcasting in HD.

 

[Savage]

The whole notion of graveyarders like 1450 running HD at night causes me great mirth. The digital signal at night - 10 throbbing watts of IBOC wonderfulness vs a thundering wall of co-channel interference - must get out about as far as most of us push shopping carts at the grocery store.

 

[badjef]

The whole notion of graveyarders like 1450 running HD at night causes me great mirth. The digital signal at night - 10 throbbing watts of IBOC wonderfulness vs a thundering wall of co-channel interference - must get out about as far as most of us push shopping carts at the grocery store.

We consider that a good thing if people can push their own shopping carts...

...and we DO have a 1450, here.

Jeff in Sa-ra-so-ta!

 

[tomservo]

The whole notion of graveyarders like 1450 running HD at night causes me great mirth. The digital signal at night - 10 throbbing watts of IBOC wonderfulness vs a thundering wall of co-channel interference - must get out about as far as most of us push shopping carts at the grocery store.

That reminds me of the days when WKXG in Greenwood, MS was still on the air; their night authorization was a whopping two watts. The tower was behind the studio and I could sit in the parking lot hearing co-channel stations under the mighty 1540. From less than 150 feet from the transmitter. It was amusing, to say the least. When they ran dead air (which happened a lot at night) it was easy to copy the underlying stations. That two watts just didn't get far!

Running HD anytime in the graveyard band is just madness. I can't believe anyone seriously does it.

 

[N1WVQ]

The whole notion of graveyarders like 1450 running HD at night causes me great mirth. The digital signal at night - 10 throbbing watts of IBOC wonderfulness vs a thundering wall of co-channel interference - must get out about as far as most of us push shopping carts at the grocery store.

That reminds me of the days when WKXG in Greenwood, MS was still on the air; their night authorization was a whopping two watts. The tower was behind the studio and I could sit in the parking lot hearing co-channel stations under the mighty 1540. From less than 150 feet from the transmitter. It was amusing, to say the least. When they ran dead air (which happened a lot at night) it was easy to copy the underlying stations. That two watts just didn't get far!

Running HD anytime in the graveyard band is just madness. I can't believe anyone seriously does it.

The lowest power I saw for an AM HD was KLDC's night power of 11 watts! SO, what's 1% of that? Part 15 (just about)!

 

[satech]

1030 WBZ may not have turned off their IBOC (yet), but I have noticed that they've increased their analog audio bandwidth to 7.5 kHz, and now sound tremendously better than when they were using 5 kHz audio. The improvement is noticeable even on a narrowband receiver.

 

[boiseengineer]

KSL HD was back on over the Christmas weekend. Showed "KSL" on the car radio Friday night.
KOA is running ~9 KHz audio with their IBOC. KBOI ran 8 KHz audio when it ran HD but without those extra set of HD carriers the digital had a lot of artifacts and was't at all "robust".

 

[satech]

It appears that 1280 WADO in New York City has shut off their IBOC. Today on my car radio I was able to tune in distant stations on 1270 and 1290 kHz without any trace of "hash".

 

[Tom Wells]

I keep expecting HD to return on WSCR 670 as there have been limited returns of 1-2 days in the past 6 months, but
they seem to either have decided the bandwidth/linearity of the 670 system just is too brittle/weird to continue.
I have outlined earlier the sound and effect they were fighting, I wonder if the decision to not have it on
is more to do with HD working/notworking vs the weird rasp/lithp on analog receivers when HD was on.
For certain the definition/discernability of consonants locally is +10 db when HD is not present.

I suspect there is some phase "unfortunate-ness" within the local power (rf AND AC mains) distribution/reradiation that "defies"
analysis.

 

[KB1OKL]

WTAG 580 Worc MA's hashmaker has been of now for over a week, it has done this before though so I'll continue to monitor.