Comments from engineers about HD Radio and it's "much smarter brother"

[SUPERCASTER]

Here are comments from the engineering section about HD Radio and a much better, wiser alternative.

That signal also sounds GOOD! I have also heard these channels in a moving car with a 19 inch whip antenna on its roof and the coverage (from that class A) is FAR better then any IBOC signal would be!

FM Extra kicks IBOC's lamaa's ass!

IBOC should GO AWAY and be replaced by FM Extra!

and

Too many broadcasters have gotten in bed with IBOC I am afraid. The technology is so bad we can hope it dies a death quicker than say AM Stereo that had great potential. (And sounded great).

http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,95241.0.html

 

[LinoNYC]

Here are comments from the engineering section about HD Radio and a much better, wiser alternative.

That signal also sounds GOOD! I have also heard these channels in a moving car with a 19 inch whip antenna on its roof and the coverage (from that class A) is FAR better then any IBOC signal would be!

FM Extra kicks IBOC's lamaa's ass!

IBOC should GO AWAY and be replaced by FM Extra!

and

Too many broadcasters have gotten in bed with IBOC I am afraid. The technology is so bad we can hope it dies a death quicker than say AM Stereo that had great potential. (And sounded great).

http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,95241.0.html

This again.

No radios.

Less than a half dozen stations, Nationwide.

No AM counterpart to bundle.

Lower digital bandwidth unless you kill FM stereo pilot.

I like the concept and remember discussing this possibility with an engineer/group owner in the Midwest some 7-8 years ago.

It's too late now.

Lino

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

No radios.

500,000 HD radios vs. 800,000,000 analog radios (IOW, the installed universe of HD radios is 0.0625% of the installed universe of analog radios)? Might as well be no radios.

Less than a half dozen stations, Nationwide.

Irrelevant. If a tree falls in the forest (if an HD transmitter is turned on) and no one hears it (too few people have HD radios), does it make a noise?

No AM counterpart to bundle.

As opposed to the current noise generator known as HD-AM, whose end result is that it's being turned off and kept off by all but a handful of broadcasters, and those who've kept it on are interfering with other signals hundreds of miles away? I'll take the "no AM" side any day. And for those who keep arguing that something needs to be done about AM to draw younger listeners back: You're too late. Anyone who's worked in radio for more than about ten minutes already understands that it takes years, if not decades, to build an audience, assuming the product is compelling and there's room for it in the marketplace. AM is firmly fixed in the brains of today's young people as old, obsolete, irrelevant and "our father's radio." Its demos are horrible. You will NOT build that audience back with young people before AM stations start going bankrupt en masse, especially given the number of alternatives that young people have already embraced. The quality argument is also irrelevant. Young people seem to have no problem whatsoever with low-bitrate, data-compressed MP3 files, so quality is not the issue.

Lower digital bandwidth unless you kill FM stereo pilot.

HD: Lower digital bandwidth once you start adding secondary channels. You can only subdivide a data stream so many times before quality starts to suffer.

 

[LinoNYC]

500,000 HD radios vs. 800,000,000 analog radios (IOW, the installed universe of HD radios is 0.0625% of the installed universe of analog radios)? Might as well be no radios.

At this point. The system is approved, being implemented and hardware (chips and receivers) being produced in the sort of devices that, hopefully will sell.

Irrelevant. If a tree falls in the forest (if an HD transmitter is turned on) and no one hears it (too few people have HD radios), does it make a noise?

According to soem of you the answer is, yes, hundreds of miles outside it contour.

AM is firmly fixed in the brains of today's young people as old, obsolete, irrelevant and "our father's radio." Its demos are horrible. You will NOT build that audience back with young people before AM stations start going bankrupt en masse, especially given the number of alternatives that young people have already embraced.

Sadly, this was the conversation I was having with a friend in Bangkok last night, spurred by Bob Savage's optimistic remarks yesterday. The situation over there for AM is about as bleak as here and while the Thai government has adopted our iboc system for FM it seems resigned to AM's slow demise.

The quality argument is also irrelevant. Young people seem to have no problem whatsoever with low-bitrate, data-compressed MP3 files, so quality is not the issue.

Here you are wrong. All but one of my friends are in their 20s-early 30s, I interact with those even younger daily. When I first saw MP3 filesharing in 1998 bitrates as low as 64K were common and 128 was "the standard" -now with faster connections, 320 is the quality norm and is undistinguishable from redbook CD to most ears.

Even Youtube's crappy 64K audio is far superior to analog Am as received by most people.

I have repeatedly demonstrated AM iboc to friends and all have been amazed that AM can sound that good.

I don't expect this to turn the tide for AM but it can offer an alternative to the migrating of sucessful AM formats to FM and there is a huge and growing ethnic audience that will listen, and buy these radios. I know this for a fact.

AM doesn't have to die.

Lino

 

[calstymes]

My new friend LinoNYC suggested:

AM doesn't have to die.

No it doesn't! And it won't die soon if AM stations which are using IBOC turn if OFF.

If they leave it on, then that will surely speed up AM's demise.

Thank you dumber than a box of hair for being in the industry and telling it like it is!

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

All but one of my friends are in their 20s-early 30s, I interact with those even younger daily.

Come on, Lino. A "me and all my friends" argument is beneath you.

there is a huge and growing ethnic audience that will listen, and buy these radios. I know this for a fact.

Ah! You have facts! Let's see 'em!

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

My new friend LinoNYC suggested:

AM doesn't have to die.

No it doesn't! And it won't die soon if AM stations which are using IBOC turn if OFF.

If they leave it on, then that will surely speed up AM's demise.

Something which Bob Savage can corroborate, I'm sure. AM is not going to be saved, if that's even possible at this point, by overloading it with interference. So many AM operations are marginal or not profitable, and they're not going to be helped by noise generators that wreck reception and drive away what few listeners they have. Whether we like it or not, whatever money is made from AM operations is made on their analog signals. Gumming them up with even more noise than the current RF environment produces is not going to help.

 

[LinoNYC]

All but one of my friends are in their 20s-early 30s, I interact with those even younger daily.

Come on, Lino. A "me and all my friends" argument is beneath you.

With my remarks in-context and plainly visible, what's the point of a weak response like this?.

So many AM operations are marginal or not profitable, and they're not going to be helped by noise generators that wreck reception and drive away what few listeners they have.

Now look who is making an unproven assertion.

I have checked repeatedly over the recent years for any hard ratings evidence, as you are well aware, there is none.

Whether we like it or not, whatever money is made from AM operations is made on their analog signals. Gumming them up with even more noise than the current RF environment produces is not going to help

You, and others have tried to argue that essentially quality audio doesn't really matter to young potential listeners...where the hell have you been this past thirty years.

Quality killed AM for youngsters and they never came back because things never improved.

Your own company presides over a once-legendary 50K in upstate NY which has spent the last 3 decades going pillar-to-post trying to find a viable format and, if rumors are true, will soon meet an unfortunate end.

With status quo, this will happen to most AM's.

Is that the coda you want to a 40 year career?

I can not understand this block-headed opposition to the one technology that can turn things around, it's like someone whose house is on fire complaining about the water damage in putting it out.

It is time to get out of the way.

Lino

 

[SUPERCASTER]

Lino said:

I can not understand this block-headed opposition to the one technology that can turn things around,

A problematic, short range, hiss generating, interfering, adjacent channel new modulation scheme requiring the public purchase and replace 800,000,000 radios in order to listen to it, is going to quickly and magically "turn things around"?
Not likely. HD Radio has been an ignorant block-headed idea from the start.
HD Radio is been based on a whole series of false assumptions, defective technology, and gross deceptions.

and

Quality killed AM for youngsters and they never came back because things never improved.

Since the same younger audience has also abandoned higher quality stereo FM in favor of lower quality MP3 and iPod streams where is there any proof that lack of fidelity was what drove them away?
Logic dictates it was lack of compelling content appealing to the younger age group, personal content control, and on demand availability, not the modulation method that was what drove the younger audience away from radio.

 

[Savage]

The argument "AM is dead/dying and IBOC is the band's only hope" is not only tiresome - it's a fallacy and an unsupportable claim all at once.

First of all, analog AM's health is absolutely robust compared with HD-AM's. Since The Much-Heralded Nighttime IBOC Rollout on 9/14/07, "a date which will live in infamy," there have been NO new IBOC installs. NONE. Zero. Zip. HD-AM operation has flatlined with slightly less than 5% of operating AM stations using it. At night it's under 2 percent, with a slight DECREASE in the number of stations using HD at night. One by one operators are turning their exciters off at sundown because of skywave interference problems. Often it's done to protect co-owned stations in distant markets. I've cited the examples here previously

Lino: news flash for you. Have you noticed?

You are the ONLY person left in recent weeks pressing the argument that "HD-AM offers the last hope for AM radio." One by one the system's most ardent supporters have edged towards the exits, quietly going away as IBOC's unsolveable problems become more and more apparent.

Outside in the real world, away from industry blogs, the indifference the public shows towards IBOC (FM as well as AM) is exceeded only by its total ignorance of HD Radio, what it is and what it offers. Receiver sales are an embarassingly tiny fraction of projections which iBiquity tries desperately to suppress. And even THAT sad performance is slowing.

Radio will be consumed digitally through alternative delivery channels, as opposed to an OTA hybrid system that offers more expense and problems than real-world solutions.

It's over for AM-HD. O-V-E-R. As opposed to AM analog radio which continues to have a hope so long as station owners wake up and tailor programming to potential listeners' needs. AM-HD will stumble lamely along until operators tire of the constant tinkering, listener complaints, trying to use profanity delays to match their analog and digital signals, and utter lack of tangible benefits, all to cater to digital audiences numbering under a hundred listeners in all but top-ten markets. One by one they'll abandon IBOC to concentrate on more productive efforts - which will be as it should be.

 

[LinoNYC]

A problematic, short range, hiss generating, interfering, adjacent channel new modulation scheme requiring the public purchase and replace 800,000,000 radios in order to listen to it, is going to quickly and magically "turn things around"......

As an old acquaintance said in his most famous role: etcetera, etcetera

I see you are back to the cut n' paste files.

Since the same younger audience has also abandoned higher quality stereo FM in favor of lower quality MP3 and iPod streams where is there any proof that lack of fidelity was what drove them away?
Logic dictates it was lack of compelling content appealing to the younger age group, personal content control, and on demand availability, not the modulation method that was what drove the younger audience away from radio.

Do you really want to make this argument...I guess so...OK.

AM lost the youth (and most other music listeners) back in the mid-seventies to FM stations that played exactly the same music, had the same formatics and even some of the same DJ's.

Why?

I don't have to say it, do I.

If your parents imbued their offspring with even a modicum of sense and honesty , you wouldn't be trying to make this argument.

Good luck with your Superradio in about five years.


Lino

 

[SUPERCASTER]

Lino said:

Good luck with your Superradio in about five years.

Yes, WiMax is just around the corner, so you'll need much more then good luck with your expensive HD Radio.

I'd say the GE SuperRadio is enjoying a much longer run.

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

Your own company presides over a once-legendary 50K in upstate NY which has spent the last 3 decades going pillar-to-post trying to find a viable format and, if rumors are true, will soon meet an unfortunate end.

Precisely what company do I work for? I've never posted it here. Tell me.

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

I have checked repeatedly over the recent years for any hard ratings evidence, as you are well aware, there is none.

There are none so blind as those who will not see. The ratings evidence is right in front of you. Demographics. Find me the number of listeners to AM radio under the age of 50. Keep moving the age down. Look at the evidence.

You, and others have tried to argue that essentially quality audio doesn't really matter to young potential listeners...where the hell have you been this past thirty years.

Quality killed AM for youngsters and they never came back because things never improved.

Wrong. When music formats moved over to FM, what formats were put on AMs? Talk. News. Sports. Formats that young people have no interest in. Again, the ratings are the evidence. Talk/news/sports formats, with precious few exceptions, have no listeners under age 50. AM stations abandoned music formats, and that's why the young people abandoned AM. After all, they put up with inferior audio quality for decades before the switch, even when they had LP records and Dolby cassette tapes available to them.

It's not better audio that's going to bring them back, and it's not going to happen overnight, even if HD-AM could fly...which it can't.

 

[mimo]

I have checked repeatedly over the recent years for any hard ratings evidence, as you are well aware, there is none.

There are none so blind as those who will not see. The ratings evidence is right in front of you. Demographics. Find me the number of listeners to AM radio under the age of 50. Keep moving the age down. Look at the evidence.

You, and others have tried to argue that essentially quality audio doesn't really matter to young potential listeners...where the hell have you been this past thirty years.

Quality killed AM for youngsters and they never came back because things never improved.

Wrong. When music formats moved over to FM, what formats were put on AMs? Talk. News. Sports. Formats that young people have no interest in. Again, the ratings are the evidence. Talk/news/sports formats, with precious few exceptions, have no listeners under age 50. AM stations abandoned music formats, and that's why the young people abandoned AM. After all, they put up with inferior audio quality for decades before the switch, even when they had LP records and Dolby cassette tapes available to them.

It's not better audio that's going to bring them back, and it's not going to happen overnight, even if HD-AM could fly...which it can't.

I'm going to give an example to what Dumber Than A Box Of Hair is saying: Back in 1987 I lived in a Suburb of Vancouver, B.C. literally on the U.S. border. We had the option of tuning in the Seattle FM stations, along with those out of Bellingham and our own FM's. We also had 4 top forty signals on AM, 3 locally and one from Victoria. If you wanted to include the soul station at 1250 from Seattle, Alternative/goth rocker KJET 1590 (also Seattle) and Calgary's AM 106, there were even more options. While the Seattle stations were limited to those who lived on the hill, the reception was not that great, so unless you were willing to put up with the hiss of a distant stereo FM station, they weren't a factor. Bellingham Washington had 2 hit music stations that couldn't attract the teen audience where I was. The reason? According to my friends, they weren't playing as much variety as the Canadian stations. I showed a friend all these top 40 FM stations we could get..and while talking about radio, she said her 17 year old sister "only listened to AM because the music was better". That was what many of my classmates also said. If FM played what they wanted to hear, then they would have tuned in. FM was considered their "parents music". I've asked younger friends if they'd ever listen to AM today, they all answer "if there's a station playing my music, I wouldn't hesitate". It's CONTENT..always has been, always will be.

 

[BRNout]

I may regret this, but I am going to wade in here on the issue pertaining to the future viability of AM. Basically, every move that the FCC has permitted since about 1986 has conspired to smother this platform. Breaking up the clear channels was the first big nail in the coffin. Why? Not because it ruins the experience for us dxers - but because it tries to deny the science of MW radio transmissions. They bounce at night and, sometimes, during the daytime too. In doing so, they can interfere with other signals that are close by in frequency. And, this happens over a range of hundreds of miles. Yes, I know that all of us here get that. But, the FCC doesn't seem to.

Why do I make such a seemingly absurd comment? Because the FCC has pushed localism over all else on AM for 20+ years now. Earlier iterations of that bureaucracy got it - but these guys are more interested in representing the supposed interests of station owners (big ones, really) over all else. In doing so, they've shoehorned stations into frequencies and geographical carve-outs where they never belonged. They permitted daytime-only stations to operate at night, even though the original license was issued with more wisdom than that. And, more recently, they permitted AM IBOC transmissions.

Each of these things has contributed, point by point, to a degradation of the AM listening experience. Go back to the 1960s and you could listen to AM on a wide-band radio, which sounded pretty good. You didn't have all of the interference. And, yes, you could listen to the clears for most of the night with only minimal fading in many cases. IF the AM band still had proper spacing, maybe AM IBOC could be made to work. Trouble is, there are probably 3 times more stations on the band in the USA than should be allowed there.

If you want to make IBOC work on AM, you would need to revoke licenses from most of the little guys. Because the band is too damn crowded on AM in analogue and there's no real space to steal the sidebands for IBOC. Yes, I know, market by market I would seem to be wrong. But, AM signals don't neatly stay in one market over another in the way that FM and TV stations usually do (though there are some big exceptions to this too). Once you turn the noise generator on, the analog signal sounds even thinner - further contributing to poor sound quality on AM. As you can see, every move made in this band in the past 20-30 years has been technically foolish and each has contributed to the slow death of AM.

You know, there are AM stations that still get great ratings. With great content and a solid signal, people still listen. But, all of the above issues contribute to AM's bad rap among younger demos. And, forget the ethnic newcomers - by and large, they already hate AM and most never listened in their home countries. That too is because of poor sound/signal quality AND poor content. Most latinos, for example, would never tune to AM. Which is ironic, because so many AM stations try to program ethnic formats. But, most seem to draw only small audiences. The successful Spanish stations are on FM, not AM.

I'm of the opinion that the AM band can be saved by thinning out the herd (pulling in licenses) and by recognizing the reality that AM signals bounce when the sun is set (or low). Any technical changes to signal quality must take this concept into account to be viable. AM IBOC does not seem to recognize this reality, which is why it should be scrapped OR the band realigned to make space for it. One or the other. If AM is allowed to continue along this path, it will die because it sounds like crap. Too much interference between stations, making it too hard to listen to in many cases.

 

[BRNout]

One additional note about this (the last post was too long!). I finally splurged and bought an HD Radio bookshelf system at Best Buy. I live 20 miles away from the Roxborough towers that house most of the tx units for Philly stations - and on a hill from which I can literally see those towers (when trees aren't in the way). A straight shot - and I sometimes have trouble with radios overloading a bit from the strong local signals. Yet I still had to noodle around with the FM antenna for about 30 minutes before I could get most local FM HD stations to decode. A couple of HD signals came in right away, but many did not. For some reason WOGL was particularly difficult, but we finally got it.

As for AM, the rock solid daytime signal of KYW barely decodes (it flickers in and out like a bad cellphone). You can't listen to it. At night, forget it. Not one other Philadelphia market AM station can be received in HD, no matter what I do with various antennae. Mind you, I have a wire AM antenna hooked up to the thing and am a radio geek. The average listener isn't going to mess with this. On the other hand, the analog signals come in ok.

Basically, this AM IBOC technology sucks for the end user. All you're doing is badly compromising the analog signal for a minimal benefit. The sidebands interfere badly with analog reception, yet you need to have an 8+/10 signal to make the HD signal decode. Basically, you need to be right on top of the transmitter site for it to work. And, you have to set up your system properly for it to receive the signal. Any impurity at all and you don't get the HD benefit on AM. It's appalling and absurd. A total lose-lose. For what? Because it sounds good in a laboratory setting? Ridiculous. If it doesn't work in a real world situation, it's a failure. And no, it doesn't seem to.

The only HD signal I can listen to from an AM station is KYW's - because it's simulcast on WYSP 94.1 HD-2. Perhaps that's the answer.

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

Basically, every move that the FCC has permitted since about 1986 has conspired to smother this platform.

Heck, you can go back further than that. The original plan for commercial radio in the US was that a maximum of 25-30 stations would serve the entire country. Just about every modification of that plan (from the 1920s, IIRC), many of those changes being politically motivated, has resulted in more stations and ultimately more interference. Add to that all the poorly-filtered electronic equipment now in the hands of consumers, the horrendous LED traffic signals with poorly- or non-filtered switching power supplies (not the only culprits, of course...anyone remember diathermy machines?), and you have a recipe for chaos.

The FCC now uses a plan called "ratcheting," which basically means that AM stations seeking to modify their facilities must also take certain actions to reduce interference between their station and others nearby on the AM dial. WOR got hit with that when they were forced to move their transmitter site, even though the move was only about a mile. (Tom Ray, please correct me if I'm wrong on that.) That's only going to make a difference over time...a loooooooong time...and with the ratcheting rules in place, AM stations won't be making modifications that they don't have to make, because it will mean a reduction in coverage for them.

 

[vsa]

The only HD signal I can listen to from an AM station is KYW's - because it's simulcast on WYSP 94.1 HD-2.   Perhaps that's the answer.

Here in Los Angeles, California, I have no problem listening digitally to KYW. Rock solid - DAY & NIGHT!

http://provisioning.streamtheworld.com/pls/KYWAMDIALUP.pls

No radio neccessary either.  ;D

 

[LinoNYC]

Your own company presides over a once-legendary 50K in upstate NY which has spent the last 3 decades going pillar-to-post trying to find a viable format and, if rumors are true, will soon meet an unfortunate end.

Precisely what company do I work for? I've never posted it here. Tell me.

Entercom.