HD Radio is getting popular!

[nd2023]

I tried to buy a few Insignia portable HD radios which were on sale at Best Buy on black Friday, and they were sold out. I had never seen that before.

I want to give the HD radios as gifts to people I think would enjoy the format of a local HD2.

 

[tomservo]

Weird.

Maybe there's a new software version coming. They pulled them off the shelves for a week or two when the last update was released.

 

[BRNout]

I don't know, there were plenty of both models of Insignia HD portables available at my local Best Buy. The limited amount of space that's dedicated to them is still dedicated to them.

 

[KB1OKL]

Weird.

Maybe there's a new software version coming. They pulled them off the shelves for a week or two when the last update was released.

Well there has to be some logical explanation.

 

[radioskeptic]

Could that "update" be the "Persona Radio" projetc that Tom Taylor mentioned last week?

"iBiquity continues work on the “Persona Radio” concept for an advanced HD Radio receiver."
(Seventh item on http://www.radio-info.com/newsletter/html/tri-11232010 -- and be sure to follow the link at the end of it.)

Of course, the personalized music thing has already been done with MP3 players -- and MP3 players never drop the signal. But then, neither does analog radio!

 

[L. DeForest]

Nick old boy - There were probably only two or three on the hanger. Depending on where you live it's usually only radio insiders that pick them up. Where I live the original three are still sitting there. The sales clerk said that the older insignias didn't sell either so they moved them on to another store. So tell me again how digital radio is getting popular?

 

[tomservo]

Of course, the personalized music thing has already been done with MP3 players -- and MP3 players never drop the signal. But then, neither does analog radio!

Well yes, analog radio is full of tiny annoying dropouts, it's called static.

If you peer just above the tree lines from my residence, you'd see a good half dozen tall blinking towers that hold 90% of my market's FM and TV signals. Signal strength is not a problem here but picket fencing and drop outs and overload are. Being that I'm one of the lucky few within sight of the towers, HD does actually work and doesn't drop out… except on the one station I actually want to listen to (go figure). It also is proving its worth since Clear Channel slapped their AM talker on an HD-2. I can actually listen to Coast to Coast AM clearly and get my conspiracy theory and aliens fix without having to DX WOAI out of San Antonio. CC's AM doesn't cover me at night at all, and barely during the day.

I'm to the point now where I actively avoid the analog only stations because of all the noise. I never thought I'd say this, but the low bit rate crappy audio of digital broadcasting is now preferred over staticy but clean sounding analog.

Of course, neither analog FM nor HD can hold a candle to my personal music collection, encoded at whatever bitrate I desire in whatever format I desire. (Right now I just finished migrating the majority of my player's music from mp3@192 kbps to m4a@136 kbps and it's smaller AND sounds better. Whatever's not in m4a is in FLAC.)

 

[nd2023]

The only place where HD is superior to analog is near the transmitter where there's a lot of multipath. But once the signal gets weaker, the HD drops out but the analog is still clear for many more miles. At the point where the analog is dropping out to static, the HD is long gone.

People wouldn't spend $50 for a radio, especially if they don't know what HD radio is. $20 is a good price.

I can't believe they used the "give HD radio as a holiday gift" marketing campaign for the past 5 years. No average person has HD radio on their Christmas wish list

 

[Savage]

I don't understand your analog reception problems, Zach. You live within eyeshot of the transmitter sites but you have picket-fencing and dropouts? You must be listening on the world's worst receivers.

In actuality, consistent reception quality is simply not a problem for the vast majority of radio listeners. It's one of many reasons why radio remains the dominant entertainment and information choice and provides the countervailing argument against HD, which performs far more weakly than analog.

Combining the marginal (to most, undetectable) difference in audio quality provided by the digital signal with its lack of robustness - hence the need for analog backup (FM never required an AM backup in the event of signal loss) - it's immediately apparent why HD Radio is irrelevant, unwanted, unneeded and heading nowhere.

 

[tomservo]

I don't understand your analog reception problems, Zach. You live within eyeshot of the transmitter sites but you have picket-fencing and dropouts? You must be listening on the world's worst receivers.

My radios run the gamut from miserable to decent. I'm eyeshot if I'm above the tree line, about 50 feet. So no, not directly LOS but close. At my particular residence, I do have rejection issues with a 250 watt translator atop an AM tower less than a mile from here. But that is not a big deal. The good Insignia HD portable has no problems with it, but other crappier radios do. The picket fencing and dropouts happen down at the beach where one side of the road is lined with tall condos. The TX farm is ~25 miles away but it's all flat terrain so the signal strength is great. The noise… either from the buildings or the power line noise (yes, on FM) really makes listening a challenge.

The HD feed does drop some there, but for the most part, it eliminates all that noise.

Combining the marginal (to most, undetectable) difference in audio quality provided by the digital signal with its lack of robustness - hence the need for analog backup (FM never required an AM backup in the event of signal loss) - it's immediately apparent why HD Radio is irrelevant, unwanted, unneeded and heading nowhere.

Oh, there's a difference. Everyone who's heard my HD radios has noticed the difference. Though not necessarily a better difference.

 

[satech]

The little Insignia is great for analog FM -- very sensitive for its size, and it even decodes RDS text (although usually slowly and glitch-ily). But for HD, it's pretty much worthless. If you live outside the station's city grade contour, you need to stretch out the headphone cord and hold it in a certain position to get it to lock onto the HD stream. As soon as you start moving around -- which is the whole point of a "walkman" type radio -- the digital will drop out.

So, I bet most of the people buying it are getting it primarily for its good analog FM reception, and not so much for its feeble HD capability.

 

[tomservo]

The little Insignia is great for analog FM -- very sensitive for its size, and it even decodes RDS text (although usually slowly and glitch-ily). But for HD, it's pretty much worthless. If you live outside the station's city grade contour, you need to stretch out the headphone cord and hold it in a certain position to get it to lock onto the HD stream. As soon as you start moving around -- which is the whole point of a "walkman" type radio -- the digital will drop out.

So, I bet most of the people buying it are getting it primarily for its good analog FM reception, and not so much for its feeble HD capability.

It's not the radio, it's the flea power HD transmissions that are to blame.

I've had good luck with the Insignia portable getting WKQK outside the imaginary red coverage line as depicted on the R-L website. KQK runs more than 1% power, though. Inside the line, it's about 99% dropout free.

 

[nd2023]

You can get multipath even within a mile from the transmitter. New York City for instance has bad radio reception within 10 blocks of Empire because of multipath. It's impossible not to have multipath with all the buildings reflecting radio waves. HD does eliminate the picket fencing in the city itself.

 

[Savage]

You know what? This thread graphically illustrates why HD is going nowhere. Your HD doesn't work? It's the radios. It's the digital power levels being too low. It's interference. It's the headset cord-antenna that needs to be adjusted or stretched out or something. It's terrain obstructions. It's the station engineer not keeping the delay for the analog in sync. It's the firmware upgrades. It's....blah, blah, blah.....

The listeners and advertisers don't care about the reasons. At the end of the day, HD has to work acceptably for the marketplace, and provide a value which is positively perceived by the end consumers.

It doesn't. It won't. It has also had about three more chances to succeed than the market generally affords a new electronics innovation. So: it's done. Time to move on.

Want digital? Get it now via the internet. Want digital OTA? The only way it will work is on new frequencies in a new band. Fail to learn this lesson now at your peril.

 

[ddsparxx]

There's a new major electronics chain called HHGregg. I went to one of their stores and saw no HD radios in there, and
I would have to disagree with Nick about HD Radio's popularity.

 

[BRNout]

There's a new major electronics chain called HHGregg. I went to one of their stores and saw no HD radios in there, and
I would have to disagree with Nick about HD Radio's popularity.

I think that Nick's affection for his Insignia portable and the enthusiasm that generates is causing him to make leaping general assumptions about HD that aren't warranted. For one thing - and N can correct me if I am wrong - I believe that he lives in New Jersey. That's an area of the country where a radio with great selectivity (like the Insignia HD001) can seem like a superstar. In fact, it's probably a showcase environment for such a radio - many moderate to strong signals that tend to step all over each other on less selective radios.

However, my own spot tests have clearly shown that this radio is not as sensitive as the likes of a Grundig G8, Degen 1103, Tecsun PL-310, Eton E5 or a Tecsun PL-600. And it is not as selective as the G8 nor the PL-310. Don;t get me wrong, for it's size, it's great. But it's also not the be-all and end-all as far as reception is concerned.

What's more, the reception characteristics of this little radio still aren't going to impress the average Joe listener. First off, when it's in analog mode, the stereo sound sounds washed-out and dull. Only in HD does it sound crisp. And, once again, even the newer versions have the HD cutting out periodically in all but the strongest signal areas. It's annoying but bearable for HD-1s, but unbearable when you're trying to listen to HD-2 or HD-3 stations. And, you could be seated in a chair - not moving - and have an HD-2 abruptly cut out into silence for no apparent reason. I had that happen on Sunday while TRYING to hear the first half of the Bears game on WCFS-105.9 HD-2 (WBBM).

Savage is exactly right, the technology is flawed and - I might add - it's 10 years obsolete. I find my iPhone apps (like Iheartradio and others) to provide a much more rewarding radio listening experience than I get from an HD Radio. And the smart phone/internet based technology is where things are headed, like it or not. Analog radio can survive because it's very robust, cheap and easy to use. Internet-based digital audio provides a plethora of choices from around the world. HD radio, on the other hand, does neither thing well. It doesn't offer enough options to be worth the price of entry and what it does offer is flawed by poor reception characteristics. Lose-lose.

 

[satech]

What's more, the reception characteristics of this little radio still aren't going to impress the average Joe listener. First off, when it's in analog mode, the stereo sound sounds washed-out and dull. Only in HD does it sound crisp. And, once again, even the newer versions have the HD cutting out periodically in all but the strongest signal areas.

The Insignia has a rather aggressive high-blend and stereo-blend on its analog FM audio, so anything less than a full-quieting city-grade signal will tend to sound dull and narrow.

Have any firmware updates for the NS-HD01 been released, or is it even possible to update the firmware? Mine is version "01.00.00", and it seems like the USB port is only used to charge the battery, because when I plug it into my computer, it is not recognized as a USB device.

 

[hubcity]

Have any firmware updates for the NS-HD01 been released, or is it even possible to update the firmware? Mine is version "01.00.00", and it seems like the USB port is only used to charge the battery, because when I plug it into my computer, it is not recognized as a USB device.

Same for me for my 1.00.00 Insignia all it does is happily charge itself, with no acknowledgment from the computer. The one that shipped with the 4.x firmware does cause the computer to recognize it, so I wonder if there's a "there" there, USB-wise, for that version of the hardware?

 

[tomservo]

I don't think the manufacturers of this Insignia branded radio have the forethought to include a USB upgrade path. I get a "device not recognized/error" when I plug up the 4.0 version and nothing at all on the other version (3.0).

Unfortunately, Savage is right - the consumer won't care WHY it doesn't work, they just expect it to work, period. And HD even on FM simply does not work under most conditions. While I live in a relatively flat market and am within strong signals of all but the fleapoweriest of flea power stations, HD doesn't lock long enough to do any long drive listening here.

After spending a day in Birmingham with nothing for entertainment but my little Insignias, I can see why HD has generated so much outrage. In that hilly, mountainous terrain, HD was a huge joke and I was the butt of that joke. It didn't lock hardly anywhere, it didn't work anywhere where real people live and it didn't stay locked even when it did work.

At least down here in Mobile, stationary reception is a breeze; no fiddling with wires required. Up there? Holy cow, what a mess. Utterly useless.

 

[FreddyE1977]

There's a new major electronics chain called HHGregg. I went to one of their stores and saw no HD radios in there, and
I would have to disagree with Nick about HD Radio's popularity.

I personally don't know a single person who owns one. People who want the added service
seem more than happy to pay for Sirius or XM instead. All my local stations are constantly
hawking them on-air this time of year....like a ticket scalper five minutes before kickoff.