HD Portable Review

[clone]

My car radio came with an Ipod input, so I'm curious how performance will be affected while driving.

I bit the bullet and just picked one up at the Bloomingdale, IL Best Buy. It was the only one on the rack, not sure if that was done on purpose to make it appear "in demand", or if people actually were buying them.

At about 20-25 miles out from the big Chicago sticks, the in-car performance wasn't great. Most of the usually-strong analog signals (WLS, WNUA, WILV) would decode and stay locked *most* of the time, but there were still frequent drop outs. WBBM, which is usually one of the weaker signals for whatever reason, wouldn't even decode.

Heading back east down Army Trail Road (for those of you who know where this is), I could actually see the skyline, but there was little to no HD lock on many stations. Back in my 1st floor living room, I could get HD lock from most of the stations if I sat still and/or positioned the headphone cable just right. Moving around indoors provided a mediocre experience. And this is at about 20 miles out. Outdoor performance isn't too bad at this distance, however. I would guess at around 10-15 miles out would probably be the sweet spot, as I did notice a bit of an overload issue out near the WLEY site.

For $50, it is what it is, but I would say it's a step in the right direction if you care about HD, anyway. As much as I still think IBOC is bad science, this one *kind of* works... Like others have said, it's great for niches and people who like playing with radios, otherwise pretty useless unless you need a new portable radio anyway, which I'm guessing most people don't.

 

[ddsparxx]

My car radio came with an Ipod input, so I'm curious how performance will be affected while driving.

I bit the bullet and just picked one up at the Bloomingdale, IL Best Buy. It was the only one on the rack, not sure if that was done on purpose to make it appear "in demand", or if people actually were buying them.

At about 20-25 miles out from the big Chicago sticks, the in-car performance wasn't great. Most of the usually-strong analog signals (WLS, WNUA, WILV) would decode and stay locked *most* of the time, but there were still frequent drop outs. WBBM, which is usually one of the weaker signals for whatever reason, wouldn't even decode.

Heading back east down Army Trail Road (for those of you who know where this is), I could actually see the skyline, but there was little to no HD lock on many stations. Back in my 1st floor living room, I could get HD lock from most of the stations if I sat still and/or positioned the headphone cable just right. Moving around indoors provided a mediocre experience. And this is at about 20 miles out. Outdoor performance isn't too bad at this distance, however. I would guess at around 10-15 miles out would probably be the sweet spot, as I did notice a bit of an overload issue out near the WLEY site.

For $50, it is what it is, but I would say it's a step in the right direction if you care about HD, anyway. As much as I still think IBOC is bad science, this one *kind of* works... Like others have said, it's great for niches and people who like playing with radios, otherwise pretty useless unless you need a new portable radio anyway, which I'm guessing most people don't.

The store I went to is within a major metropolitan area (Wash DC) which had only 1 which I took, and another Best Buy store farther away from had 2 on the shelf...so my guess, maybe low demand and intentionally low on supply. I never bothered asking any salespeople because I didn't think they would know anything about this radio.

 

[KB1OKL]

The store I went to is within a major metropolitan area (Wash DC) which had only 1 which I took, and another Best Buy store farther away from had 2 on the shelf...so my guess, maybe low demand and intentionally low on supply. I never bothered asking any salespeople because I didn't think they would know anything about this radio.

The phrase "once bitten twice shy" comes to mind. Who did the original of that anyway, Mott The Hoople?

 

[ddsparxx]

I know this is off topic but "once bitten twice shy" reminds me of Great White and Mott the Hoople reminds me of REM's Man of the Moon.

 

[KB1OKL]

I know this is off topic but "once bitten twice shy" reminds me of Great White and Mott the Hoople reminds me of REM's Man of the Moon.

Again off topic, but Great White covered it and Ian Hunter wrote it and performed it first in 1975 after his band Mott The Hoople broke up, (All the Young Dudes was their biggest hit but they had better stuff). I was too lazy to look it up. Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

 

[XavierRenegade]

See for me I don't have an Ipod. If I had the money maybe I would buy an I-Pod and download a bunch of songs I like. I feel like it's something I can do without. I don't need to spend money on an I-Pod I would rather have something else. I also though of Satellite but not sure about paying a monthly fee. For $50 this isn't too bad.

I have tried other radios for my enjoyment. I got multiple portable shortwave radios. From time to time stores like Circuit City and Radio Shack have sold radios like the Eton E10 or E100 for $50. I remember when I could have gotten a nice shortwave radio with 200 something presets for $50. Probably a better deal than this HD radio but I live in Southern California.

I have a Sangean ATS 404. I can get things like Radio Australia but usually I doesn't receive stuff very well outside. So it's more of an AM/FM radio than good radio for Shortwave where I live. I don't really get much out of it. I figure getting this little HD radio shouldn't be so bad. I could spending $100+ on I-Pod or pay for Satellite radio. I could also get something like a slacker radio but I don't want only music. I want to be also able to hear News, Talk, and Sports.

 

[SteveScott]

I bought the Insignia yesterday, at the Best Buy at 44th/5th in Manhattan. 23rd/6th did not have them in stock.

So far, all is well. I work at an AM station (WCBS 880), and AM reception can sometimes be challenging in Manhattan...especially for a portable. So, I'm listening to WCBS 880 on CBS-FM 101.1 HD-3. Sounds pretty good. Yes, I know the HD-3 band is a little thin...but, the AM signal sounds good. It is on a hefty (approximiately 1 minute) delay, compared to the air signal on WCBS 880. So, my "Traffic and Weather on the 8s" is actually on the 9s. ;D

By the way...I also have a Sangean HD table radio. I listen to WCBS 880 on AM-HD on that radio. Sounds fabulous. I don't even bother with listening to the 101.1 FM HD-3 on the table radio. The AM-HD is excellent.

And, while I enjoy listening the WCBS 880 stream on my Palm Treo 700w, I like being able to hear the actual air signal on the Insignia portable.

So far, so good!

 

[Savage]

At this juncture we should observe the tendency of us radio types - I include myself in this - to "navel-gaze" about purported innovations such as HD and the Insignia portable.

Of course there is an enormous push on right now for the digital power increase. HD-AM doesn't work - Steve Scott's testimony here is witness to that, since if HD-AM was so wonderful he'd be listening to his station's 50kw local signal in HD instead of listening to a one-minute delayed FM subchannel simulcast. Of course the nighttime interference is horrible. HD-FM isn't working acceptably. So the power increase is the HD Hail-Mary pass, and the excuse being pushed for the need for more digital power is "availability of portable devices." And - just like THAT! Enter the Insignia portable device from Best Buy.

Relate this to the real world. Sure, we radio types, particularly those who believe in the HD religion, tend to see this as noteworthy: "It doesn't look like a prototype! It actually works, more or less! It doesn't cost $100 or $200!" And so forth.

But to Joe Six-Pack or Suzie Nurse, is the Insignia portable the kind of product to make them wiggle out to BB and plunk down half a C-note plus tax? I don't think so. It's a little FM-only radio with no speaker. Are you gonna see family gatherings at the local Friendly's where somebody proudly whips out their Insignia, like they would the latest iPhone, just to show it off?

"What's that?" "It's my new Insignia portable FM radio." "Yeah....so....?" "This one's got HD RADIO." "What's HD Radio?" "Here, listen...." "I don't hear anything." "Wiggle the earbuds around and it will come right in..."

(Pause here for family to witness the experimentation. Everyone watches patiently for a few seconds. Then...)

"What the hell's wrong with the Yankees this year??"

Maybe the Insignia is interesting to us, but to most it's just another free-standing, purpose-specific radio. And even at $50, I really don't think it represents a wonderful value.

 

[SteveScott]

HD-AM doesn't work - Steve Scott's testimony here is witness to that, since if HD-AM was so wonderful he'd be listening to his station's 50kw local signal in HD instead of listening to a one-minute delayed FM subchannel simulcast.

Mr. Savage, I invite you to please re-read my post. In my business, if you're going to reference some one, you had better get it right. You did not. Get it right!

I NEVER indicated AM-HD "doesn't work." Just the opposite. I said the AM-HD signal sounds fabulous (my word) on my Sangean HD table radio. I'm listening to the AM-HD right now. Sounds like good FM quality to me.

I don't listen to the FM HD-3 on my table radio because there's no need to. The AM-HD sound is excellent.

I DO listen to FM HD-3 on my new Insignia portable...because it offers only FM and FM HD. If it offered AM-HD, I would listen to that.

And, THAT, as Mr. Cronkite would have said, is the way it is.

 

[SUPERCASTER]

See for me I don't have an Ipod. If I had the money maybe I would buy an I-Pod and download a bunch of songs I like. I feel like it's something I can do without. I don't need to spend money on an I-Pod I would rather have something else. I also though of Satellite but not sure about paying a monthly fee. For $50 this isn't too bad.

I have tried other radios for my enjoyment. I got multiple portable shortwave radios. From time to time stores like Circuit City and Radio Shack have sold radios like the Eton E10 or E100 for $50. I remember when I could have gotten a nice shortwave radio with 200 something presets for $50. Probably a better deal than this HD radio but I live in Southern California.

I have a Sangean ATS 404. I can get things like Radio Australia but usually I doesn't receive stuff very well outside. So it's more of an AM/FM radio than good radio for Shortwave where I live. I don't really get much out of it. I figure getting this little HD radio shouldn't be so bad. I could spending $100+ on I-Pod or pay for Satellite radio. I could also get something like a slacker radio but I don't want only music. I want to be also able to hear News, Talk, and Sports.

Or you could just listen to your choice of any of hundreds of thousands of FREE internet radio stations and podcasts in all formats from around the world including many HD radio stations and HD2 and HD3 radio streams on the computer you are sitting in front of right now. Wow, what a deal!

Perhaps these links will help get you started:

http://www.ex-designz.net/radiostations.asp

http://www.shoutcast.com/

http://www.tuner2.com/

http://www.podomatic.com/directory

 

[Savage]

Steve, I'm in the same business you are. And in OUR business, don't report on things if your emotions get in the way of accuracy. If you check my post you will see I never claimed you said "HD-AM doesn't work." That was my observation and was so stated succinctly.

It is implicit (and obviously so) from your comments that you apparently have problems listening to WCBS 880 in Manhattan (I believe your observation was "AM reception can be challenging in Manhattan...so I'm listening to WCBS 880 on WCBS-FM 101.3 HD-3." You go on to observe that "the HD-3 band is a little thin..." which I believe you mean as a reference to audio quality, but feel free to clarify.)

After getting on my case publicly like this perhaps you'd like to explain how anybody would reasonably conclude OTHER THAN you're choosing to listen to the HD-3 FM sub rather than the main AM signal because of reception problems. My point being: if HD-AM was all its few proponents claim it is, the FM sub wouldn't be necessary. Instead, HD-AM offers no real solutions to the problems of the band and creates serious new ones.

Hey, don't get angry. If you like HD Radio, fine with me. Enjoy it while it's here.

 

[SteveScott]

The only thing I got angry about is you mis-attributing.

I stand by everything I wrote.

Have a good day, Mr. "Savage."

 

[Savage]

I'm not spending another word on this lest this valuable thread get kicked to TIO. Anyone can go back to my post at Reply #27 and draw their own conclusions.

Super, right you are....and here's another one:

www.warpradio.com

With warpradio's massive bandwidth, WYSL can reach as many listeners as are practically available...last month our internet simulcast racked up more than 41,000 hours of listening from over 20,000 individual listeners with an average TSL of almost 2 hours. And: for the $50 cost of an additional sound card for encoding, WYSL can....(tympani roll).....MULTICAST!! Yes, multicasting is available for AM stations and both our simultaneous web stream(s) afford 96 kbps sound quality.

On some nights we find we have more than one live sports play-by-play event to broadcast...so we just activate the second stream, running promos for the alternate program on-air.

Compare this with HD-AM which supposedly "cures" imaginary ills. We can multicast, offer superior audio quality, not spend tens of thousands of dollars for the typical daytime-only digital operation and can do vastly better than HD's equivalent of 16 kbps.

And we create adjacent-channel interference nightmares for....nobody. Unlike the losers at CBS Radio.

 

[Play Freebird]

Compare this with HD-AM which supposedly "cures" imaginary ills. We can multicast, offer superior audio quality, not spend tens of thousands of dollars for the typical daytime-only digital operation and can do vastly better than HD's equivalent of 16 kbps.

To me, this is one of the biggest advantages of internet delivery over HD Radio -- you aren't forced to use a proprietary codec at an insufficient rate to provide high quality. And when improved codecs or ancillary services are developed, most "WiFi radios" have the ability to be programmed with new firmware to take advantage of the improvements. Of course, if you listen on a PC, simply download a new version of the player.

I'm not aware of any HD receivers that can be upgraded in the field. But why would iBiquity allow that, when they get a substantial royalty for every unit that's sold? They would rather ask the consumer to toss the old radio into a landfill and buy a new one.

 

[1q2w3e]

I remember why I dont visit this site much. All of the childish ramblings....

I purchased one of these units. I do not like ear buds so I didnt use thoise. I am using a pair of $9 Sony headphones.

I have been getting an HD station 60+ miles away in a metal warehouse. 65+ miles in a house in heavy woods. I find the audio to be rather decent. The radio seems to really open up when the RDS kicks in on analog stations, and has very good separation on the HD stations. I have picked up stations with RDS 100+ miles away. Yes I am sure there was some tropo to help. The analog RDS is nice, though it isnt as sensitive as I would like it to be. The battery has lasted a few days and still shows a full charge. I do not notice it getting warm at all.

Now I wish I had some HD3s around.....

 

[stormy01]

Once WiMax takes off, HD Radio will be dead! Anyone mobile (and stationary) will be able to listen to stations around the block and around the globe in crystal clear, non-dropout sound.

I'm not aware of any HD receivers that can be upgraded in the field. But why would iBiquity allow that, when they get a substantial royalty for every unit that's sold? They would rather ask the consumer to toss the old radio into a landfill and buy a new one.

I hope "INiquity" does not claim they are a "green" company - if they allow "planned obsolescence" like that! We'll hold their feet to the fire on that one!

 

[Play Freebird]

I'm not aware of any HD receivers that can be upgraded in the field. But why would iBiquity allow that, when they get a substantial royalty for every unit that's sold? They would rather ask the consumer to toss the old radio into a landfill and buy a new one.

I hope "INiquity" does not claim they are a "green" company - if they allow "planned obsolescence" like that! We'll hold their feet to the fire on that one!

Not just the "green" thing, I thought one real benefit of digital equipment was supposed to be the ability to fix mistakes and add new features through firmware updates. Bob Struble likes to tell people how great HD radio is (you know, because "digital is better") so why don't HD receivers have this basic flexibility, like my Roku and Sangean internet radios?

Planned obsolescence is also a problem with the transmitting equipment; talk to anyone with the "Death Star". Many of us would argue that the IBOC system was obsolete before it was ever turned on.

 

[XavierRenegade]

I actually have Magix Movie Edit Pro 12. It comes there music manger which includes a list of hundreds of internet radio stations. Many of them don't work but I can enjoy listening to the Russian station that has lots of pop and Russian dance music. There are dozens of other stations I can also listen to which makes it nice not having to actually search the internet for these stations.

I want the HD radio for is portability. So when I'm not at home and out somewhere like a park I have the ability to listen to HD radio. I have a Sansa Clip 1GB MP3 player that can receive FM. Like many cheaper MP3 players it can recieve FM but it doesn't have an external antenna to really improve the signal. I would imagine on this Insignia player to be about the same or a little better. The Sansa Clip MP3 player is considerably smaller than the Insignia HD radio.

 

[KB1OKL]

I remember why I dont visit this site much. All of the childish ramblings....

I purchased one of these units. I do not like ear buds so I didnt use thoise. I am using a pair of $9 Sony headphones.

I have been getting an HD station 60+ miles away in a metal warehouse. 65+ miles in a house in heavy woods. I find the audio to be rather decent. The radio seems to really open up when the RDS kicks in on analog stations, and has very good separation on the HD stations. I have picked up stations with RDS 100+ miles away. Yes I am sure there was some tropo to help. The analog RDS is nice, though it isnt as sensitive as I would like it to be. The battery has lasted a few days and still shows a full charge. I do not notice it getting warm at all.

Now I wish I had some HD3s around.....

Tropo?? I'm getting HD on moonbounce, this radio runs so cool it chills my lunch cooler : HD stations sound so good on this little gem I'm going to use it with my McIntosh equipment as my main FM tuner. Oh wait a minute I actually don't own one and actually won't. Hmm might as well not waste a good post though.

 

[XavierRenegade]

I was thinking I could just go down to my local Best Buy and they probably have at least a couple of these HD radios. I noticed on the Best Buy Website it says 1-2 weeks for delivery. I check to see if any stores in Southern California and it seems like no one has this radio. Is this really true? What exactly is going on here? Are more people wanting this radio than what they have in stock? Maybe there weren't even expecting anyone who would want one of these HD radios?

It seems like something I would like to get. $50 isn't too bad for a portable FM radio that can recieve HD. It has 10 presets but does it allow you to save presets for the HD stations. If I wanted to listen to KROQ 106.7 FM HD-2 would it allow me to preset the HD station or not. Someone said that it would but once turned off and turned on again it reverts the preset to the normal non HD station. What does it do?