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Jackson's New 87.7 FM

Some of the major components have been pulled for recalibration ― around mid-week 87.7's quality [and processing] issue should be "fixed.” Right now the station is on the air mainly to test the range. One report said the signal could be heard 30 miles outside of Jackson (toward Meridian).
 
30 miles ain't bad. I can pick it up good with an outside TV antenna or a car radio. but no luck on a portable radio. Nice selection of music.
 
This morning I heard the signal that you were alluding to but I heard it on 87.8. I have a very good radio for Short Wave DXing and a sensitive FM tuner for listening to most anything that comes along. The digital readout read at 87.8 In my neck of the woods in Forest. It can't be 87.9 because of PRN in Rose Hill (which isn't very far from me) is strong enough to interfere with a signal at 87.9 and I get nothing on 87.7. Has anyone got a ID on this station? I also wonder if this is a Studio to Transmitter link. It is worth investigating further. By the way my radio is a Grundig G4000A. I also disconnected my Digital converter and put it on the antenna of my analog TV and got some interference on my TV.
 
I believe the actual frequency for analog TV channel 6 is 87.75 Since digital readouts on most radios won't display that frequency it probally just shows the closet thing too it, which is 87.7. Since most radios these days have some sort of AFC circuit it will lock in on the signal anyway.
 
I am hearing this station tonight from Fort Walton Beach, Florida. about 250 miles away. There is good tropospheric enhancement this evening. Including across the gulf into Mexico. The audio on EZ 87.7 sounds horrible, very distorted. I'm using a Denon TU1500RD tuner and a 8 element directional log periodic antenna.
 
I've picked up the Jackson MS 87.75 audio-carrier signal on Sangean HDT-1 tuner /RS VU190 "TV" antenna near Star City AR (20mi S-SE of Pine Bluff AR) during tropo enhancements. Sometimes, I have to null out the Memphis station depending on conditions.
 
Once the drop-dead date passes, music videos would, of course, be digital. All one would hear on a car radio would be some digital hash.

These FrankenFMs will be garden-variety low-power digitals in due time.

DE
 
the odd thing about 87.7. I can pick it up clear on my car radio and a little in the house, but even with an outside antenna I can barely get it on TV. I can sometimes get a weak audio signal, but the video is barely visible. It looks like a slide with the call letters on it.
 
flytrap said:
the odd thing about 87.7. I can pick it up clear on my car radio and a little in the house, but even with an outside antenna I can barely get it on TV. I can sometimes get a weak audio signal, but the video is barely visible. It looks like a slide with the call letters on it.
Click to expand...

The audio power of this station, as a proportion of the video power, is probably MUCH MUCH higher than it was for "ordinary" analog TV stations before the transition.

There's a loophole in the FCC regulations for these low-power TV stations. Full-power stations' audio transmitters were limited to no more than 22% of the power of the video transmitter. (in practice, many many stations operated closer to 10% of video power. That's all they needed to ensure the audio reached any place where a viewable picture could be received.) If this Jackson station were subject to those rules, its audio power would be limited to no more than 440 watts and in practice probably would have operated at 200 watts.

That regulation doesn't apply to these LPTV stations. By my reading of the rules, the audio power for a LPTV can be as much as equal to the video power, in this case 2,000 watts. That's far more than is necessary to ensure the sound reaches everywhere the picture does -- indeed, it ensures the sound reaches many places where the picture *doesn't*. It looks like your home is one of those places!

Another regulation that doesn't apply to LPTV stations is the one limiting modulation. The definition of "100% modulation" for an FM radio station is 75KHz. For full-power analog TV sound, the definition is 25KHz. That means if you were to listen to an FM radio station on the sound portion of a TV set, that station would appear to be modulated 300%. It would be jumping completely out of the passband of your TV's filters; to your TV, the station would appear to be off the air about 50% of the time. However, listen to the same station on an FM radio and it's within the (3x wider) passband 100% of the time; your FM radio believes it's on the air continuously.
 
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