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could not take it anymore

I could not take it anymore all the drop outs so I took the HD radio out of my car and ran that garbage over..and I went out and got me an XM radio I am extremely happy now..
 
You really drove your car on your HD radio??

The drop-outs are the reason why I don't have an HD head unit in my car, though that could change in the future (even with drop-outs expected) if my current radio quits and if Pioneer cheaps out on its Supertuner IIID (the built-in tuner in Pioneer's head units).

I did subscribe to XM radio before the Sirius/XM merger but I quit that because I don't like paying to hear the satellite stations.

Sorry to hear about the frustrations with HD subchannel receptions.
 
tommygraser said:
I could not take it anymore all the drop outs so I took the HD radio out of my car and ran that garbage over..and I went out and got me an XM radio I am extremely happy now..

If you actually did that, I truly wish you could have filmed it and posted it on You Tube! :D
 
tommygraser said:
I could not take it anymore all the drop outs so I took the HD radio out of my car and ran that garbage over..and I went out and got me an XM radio I am extremely happy now..

Why would you destroy an otherwise working radio because of dropouts? Wouldn't it make more sense to have it repaired? By the way, The sound quality from Sirius/Xm....how can I put this gently?.......SUCKS!@!

I'm no fan of the artifacts heard on some FM HD sub channels and most AM HD stations but aside from buying the radio, I don't have to pay for it. Why would anyone be willing to pay for the artifact laden awful audio coming from the satellite? Maybe instead of purchasing a monthly subscription, an analyst would have been a better investment
 
R.F. Burns said:
Why would you destroy an otherwise working radio because of dropouts? Wouldn't it make more sense to have it repaired?

Why would repairing the radio make more sense, when the problem isn't the radio?

The problem, gentle reader, is the system. When FM-HD1 or AM-HD drops out, you get analog, and the smoothness of the transition depends on whether or not the station can be bothered to keep the analog and HD in sync. When an HD secondary drops out, the fall-back is SILENCE. And by most accounts, the just-recently-permitted power increase on the FM side will make little or no difference in coverage, so the drop-outs will continue.
 
R.F. Burns said:
Why would you destroy an otherwise working radio because of dropouts? Wouldn't it make more sense to have it repaired? By the way, The sound quality from Sirius/Xm....how can I put this gently?.......SUCKS!@!
I find the sound quality of XM to be far better any FM radio station in my area, analog or HD.
 
dumber than a box of hair said:
R.F. Burns said:
Why would you destroy an otherwise working radio because of dropouts? Wouldn't it make more sense to have it repaired?

Why would repairing the radio make more sense, when the problem isn't the radio?

The problem, gentle reader, is the system. When FM-HD1 or AM-HD drops out, you get analog, and the smoothness of the transition depends on whether or not the station can be bothered to keep the analog and HD in sync. When an HD secondary drops out, the fall-back is SILENCE. And by most accounts, the just-recently-permitted power increase on the FM side will make little or no difference in coverage, so the drop-outs will continue.

You have such hatred toward IBOC that you don't see that what you said makes no sense. Any reasonable preson would not make such assuumptions especially when you have no idea what his circumstances are, I'd hope you'd be aware of alll of the problems associated with wave soldering which is the method used to build all mass produced electronic items.
 
DuckBlue said:
R.F. Burns said:
Why would you destroy an otherwise working radio because of dropouts? Wouldn't it make more sense to have it repaired? By the way, The sound quality from Sirius/Xm....how can I put this gently?.......SUCKS!@!
I find the sound quality of XM to be far better any FM radio station in my area, analog or HD.

Any person who has heard both would respectfully disagree. My Ipod, whihch uses AAC coding has much better audio than XM. XM artifact ridden due to the low bit rate assigned to each channel. Their problem is, too many channels for the bandwidth they have access to. Some channels such as the local weather info channels are basically inaudible.
 
I would have tried a better antenna first.
Much of the negative talk I hear about HD Radio is exactly the same kind of thing I've heard from DTV viewers.
 
kenglish said:
I would have tried a better antenna first.
Much of the negative talk I hear about HD Radio is exactly the same kind of thing I've heard from DTV viewers.


To be totally honest Ken, the video improvement for HD TV (and the addition of 5.1 audio) is significant. One of the problems with HD TV is power levels. Granted the digital cliff (all or nothing) is something the public has to learn to accept, but I believe the calculations used to convert analog power levels to digital are in error. That said, what digital radio has to offer is not improved audio but the possibility of multicasting. AM IBOC is a failed experiment for a few reasons, interference not being one of them. The problem I have with AM IBOC is the addition of unacceptable artifacts in the audio. If the analog portion of the signal were to disappear the added spectrum would allow for a greater bit rate which in turn would significantly improve the artifact issue. The problem is that at this time we're compromising the digital portion to maintain the analog element.

For that reason alone additional spectrum should have been assigned to migrate AM broadcasters to the new digital system. In an ideal world the FCC would part with a few Mhz of spectrum and officially given AM ops a time line after which all AM transmitters would be shut down. They could auction off the current medium wave spectrum to the highest bidder and brought AM operators into the 21 century.

Perhaps AM broadcasters could be moved to the old channel 1 (The original FM band). It's being underused today and
mobile operators are looking for other spectrum for their 2-way communications and moving away from the 44 Mhz Armstrong band.

Wouldn't that be ironic if AM broadcasters were to migrate there?


For those who say that doing so would make all current radios obsolete. The same thing just happened to the nations analog television receivers. I'm sure some manufacturer could design an inexpensive convertor so that those who didn't want to part with their old radios could still use them.

Of course I'm talking an ideal world. Knowing the FCC and their history they'd treat the new AM band like the current expanded band operators. They'd allow operators to broadcast on both bands instead of shutting down the current medium wave transmitters.
 
kenglish said:
I would have tried a better antenna first.

I have a hard time believing it, frankly. Spend money on thing, get dissatisfied, destroy thing that you could at least throw on Ebay. Rational?

I call shenanigans.

/shenanigans, I say.
 
tommygraser said:
I could not take it anymore all the drop outs so I took the HD radio out of my car and ran that garbage over..and I went out and got me an XM radio I am extremely happy now..

Now that's what I call taking the bull by the horns! haha!

I've had XM radio since I bought my new car a year and a half ago, in fact I just re-upped for life time subscriptions for both me and my girlfriend who also has it in her car.

HD radio? I've got one in an advanced state of decomposition from disuse sitting on top of my Marantz receiver. It's been blinking at me since the power went out last year I think.

As far as sound quality goes, I know that for home use XM is 128 kbps which sounds much better than any HD station does and it never drops out. In the car FM probably sounds better but put up with drop outs, 10-20 mile range and lousy repetitive programming for the most part? Right.

I still listen to AM radio however.
 
hubcity said:
kenglish said:
I would have tried a better antenna first.

I have a hard time believing it, frankly. Spend money on thing, get dissatisfied, destroy thing that you could at least throw on Ebay. Rational?

I call shenanigans.

/shenanigans, I say.

What, put it on ebay and risk getting a negative? ;D
 
R.F. Burns said:
You have such hatred toward IBOC that you don't see that what you said makes no sense. Any reasonable preson would not make such assuumptions especially when you have no idea what his circumstances are, I'd hope you'd be aware of alll of the problems associated with wave soldering which is the method used to build all mass produced electronic items.

And here we have the perfect case of just wishing something away. The evidence is all too clear about why HD dropouts occur, and covering your ears and singing "la la la la la la" at the top of your lungs isn't going to make that problem go away. The system's design is flawed, was flawed from the beginning, and every study that's been done by disinterested parties proves that raising the HD power isn't going to magically make everything work perfectly.

Blaming wave soldering is just laughable. A manufacturer that can't get that right won't be in business for very long.
 
But of course, the problem isn't wave soldering intself, it's the tin/antimony solder now used.
Bring back the lead, or offer a lead solder version of consumer crap at a higher price for those who expect more than two years of life
from a device.

I have a vision... of some HD gear perched up on a tee, about 24 inches high, between the rails, with an oncoming Amtrak at 79 mph.
It would be a great Youtube video.
" How to repair an iboc exciter".
 
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