Less Noisy Version of AM iBOC !

[Tom Wells]

I mentioned in some other threads the changes made in the Chicago AM 50kw iBOCs.
WSCR, WGN, WBBM, and WLS have all had an upgrade applied which results in about 4 or 5 db less noise in analog reception,
and also returns some of the lost brilliance. It is possible now to listen to these at a fairly low level and NOT hear the hissing above
ambient noise. By comparing these signals to two other iBOCs in the area (not upgraded are AM 1300 and 1390), it is easy to hear the difference. The hiss is higher pitched, and sounds now much like transistor noise hiss, not the "pink" noise.
The digital sidebands seem to have less energy in the region that would translate to 5-10 khz noise, or they have changed the
distribution of sidebands, or figured out how to balance them better.
Less noise is evident when tuning in, and less hiss occurs as result of driving in varying signals, where the sidebands "change".

Is ibiquity applying this upgrade in other markets?
I'd like to think that ibiquity has heard the message, and realized the former mode was truly obnoxious.
Someone else with wideband AM radios, please let us know when you hear this change in your market.

If our critique had anything to do with this quieter mode, I'd like to thank ibiquity for rolling it out here first.
I can hear a noteworthy improvement.
I'm not going to go all crazy and say it's wonderful, but it's a good step in the right direction, and probably enough to
make the difference between acceptable and unacceptable local listening on radios with normal (wide) bandwidths.

 

[rbrucecarter5]

I mentioned in some other threads the changes made in the Chicago AM 50kw iBOCs.

Interesting - the timing of this. Days before full nighttime operation commences. It could well be that Ibiquity knows how persistant the sidebands will be in the nighttime skywave - and is taking steps now to mitigate it and avoid litigation from jammed stations and foreign countries.

My experience with the sidebands has been that you can hear sideband pairs hundreds, perhaps a thousand miles from their parent station in the DAYTIME. All you need is a car radio in a remote area of the West. If they have that type of persistance in the daytime - I can only imagine what the potential will be at night.

 

[davideduardo]

Is ibiquity applying this upgrade in other markets?
I'd like to think that ibiquity has heard the message, and realized the former mode was truly obnoxious.
Someone else with wideband AM radios, please let us know when you hear this change in your market.

The software is being upgraded constantly, and there are frequent updates that make the system better in many ways, both for AM and FM.

 

[Len14043]

I just hope this "less noisy" version doesn't reduce the effectiveness of the AM IBOC signal.

 

[4dude]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

 

[awj223]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

The only type of IBOC that belongs on the AM band is a version that runs the subcarriers at -30 dBc @ 5 kHz away from the center frequency and at -50 dBc @ 10 kHz away. It's time to live up to the consequences of giving each station only 10 kHz of space. Protection criteria should be adjusted accordingly and, reflecting today's receiver technology, should be increased to at least the 0.1 mV/m contour. Mediumwave must be cleared of clutter. Class A stations should get priority. Any smaller B and D stations on the clears falling inside the 0.1 mV/m contours should be required to vacate the AM band and move to FM*. The same goes for the lower powered Class B stations. All stations that operate at such low powers or protection levels that they serve geographic areas small enough to cover on FM frequencies should move to FM.

*So where do we get the space on FM? Oh, that's easy! Our friend HD Radio has created additional channels on the FM dial called HD-2 stations. Those additional channels ought to go to stations who must vacate the AM band to make room for changes, rather than to the same large corporations who already own the FM stations. Why should they be allowed to triple the number of channels they broadcast for free? Alternately, HD-2 channels should count toward the station ownership limits, which should not be changed, and companies required to divest the remaining channels to the previous owners of the small AMs.

 

[Tom Wells]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

The only type of IBOC that belongs on the AM band is a version that runs the subcarriers at -30 dBc @ 5 kHz away from the center frequency and at -50 dBc @ 10 kHz away. It's time to live up to the consequences of giving each station only 10 kHz of space. Protection criteria should be adjusted accordingly and, reflecting today's receiver technology, should be increased to at least the 0.1 mV/m contour. Mediumwave must be cleared of clutter. Class A stations should get priority. Any smaller B and D stations on the clears falling inside the 0.1 mV/m contours should be required to vacate the AM band and move to FM*. The same goes for the lower powered Class B stations. All stations that operate at such low powers or protection levels that they serve geographic areas small enough to cover on FM frequencies should move to FM.

*So where do we get the space on FM? Oh, that's easy! Our friend HD Radio has created additional channels on the FM dial called HD-2 stations. Those additional channels ought to go to stations who must vacate the AM band to make room for changes, rather than to the same large corporations who already own the FM stations. Why should they be allowed to triple the number of channels they broadcast for free? Alternately, HD-2 channels should count toward the station ownership limits, which should not be changed, and companies required to divest the remaining channels to the previous owners of the small AMs.

I hereby nominate awj223 for FCC broadcast bandplan czar.

Way to go! Now there's some thinking that could make a honking improvement!

Start the petition for rulemaking!

Somebody with a dour outlook should now tell us why this can't work........

 

[hipporadio]

I second that motion, awj... GUTSY – but brilliant!

So where do we get the space on FM? Oh, that's easy! Our friend HD Radio has created additional channels on the FM dial called HD-2 stations.

...but I wouldn’t hold my breath... You’ve just sinned-against the “Holy Grail” of “HD” Radio – the sacred [and over-proselytized] “stations between the stations”. EVERYTHING else aside, the multicast services are THE ONLY benefit related to the current flavor of digital terrestrial radio – and THE ONLY one that’s remotely marketable to ANYONE not consumed by the interests of corporate radio and their impending financial boondoggle.

Try this idea on for size... [the so-called] TRANLATORS are classified as a “secondary” service – eligible for immediate preemption by anything deemed “primary”. The FCC needs to start “deeming”; get out that big rubber “CANCEL” stamp; and commence destruction on the FOURTEEN-THOUSAND-plus “virtuous” translator applications it has granted and/or accepted – what a sterling example of regulatory-agency incompetence that was : I can’t think of a more-productive “anything” than a service that allows for a transplant of the most-offensive in the “AM herd” over to an above-flea-power FM outlet. And while they’re at it, they can also migrate those small-market [so-called “full-time service”] AMs with nighttime flea-power over to something genuinely-effective on the FM band. In MANY cases, these very-demure AMs are ALL THAT REMAIN in their communities after the Executive-Branch FCC permitted corporate radio to poach and move their only FM assignment into the downtown cluster.

I just hope this "less noisy" version doesn't reduce the effectiveness of the AM IBOC signal.

I’ll suggest the most-beneficial “upgrade” is one that sneaks in a Trojan and renders the firmware in AM IBOC exciters NON-FUNCTIONAL!

“Effectiveness of the AM IBOC signal” say you, Len ??? How many times do we need to endure this drive thru the cornfield? I can find ONLY TWO – you [Len] with your JVC [the RS Accurian of the car] and D.E. with his $500 “HD option” in the Beemer, that dare-offer positive testimony to a robust “HD” AM signal. Call me blind if you must – but deaf I’m not, and I’m just not hearing ANY reasonable facsimile of your claim. What I am hearing are obnoxious sidebands that sound even-louder than the analog signal one tries to tolerate [with its telephone-grade audio].

 

[Len14043]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

That is for the FCC to decide.

 

[Len14043]

“Effectiveness of the AM IBOC signal” say you, Len ??? How many times do we need to endure this drive thru the cornfield? I can find ONLY TWO – you [Len] with your JVC [the RS Accurian of the car] and D.E. with his $500 “HD option” in the Beemer, that dare-offer positive testimony to a robust “HD” AM signal. Call me blind if you must – but deaf I’m not, and I’m just not hearing ANY reasonable facsimile of your claim. What I am hearing are obnoxious sidebands that sound even-louder than the analog signal one tries to tolerate [with its telephone-grade audio].

If you read some of my posts, you will see that I support hybrid IBOC for FM, but not for AM. I previously said that IBOC works well for the 50KW stations during the day, but had doubts about nighttime performance - especially for graveyard stations. Instead of tinkering with the sidebands, a system should be devised to allow an all-digital signal to be broadcasted 1600-1700. For instance, if an AM stations wants to broadcast a digital signal, they should be able to simulcast an all-digital signal in the extended band.

 

[4dude]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

That is for the FCC to decide.

The FCC doesnt care about anything but $$$$ (They are making mucho $$$ outta this)

 

[R.F. Burns]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

That is for the FCC to decide.

The FCC doesnt care about anything but $$$$ (They are making mucho $$$ outta this)

Can you back up your statement with facts? It would be libelous to make such claims against an individual without proof.

 

[clouseau]

The FCC doesnt care about anything but $$$$ (They are making mucho $$$ outta this)

Just how is the FCC making any money on this? There are no additional regulatory fees that I know of. There was no application fees or anything else that is known to have been charged to Ibiquity for being named "the system". Or are you alledging that members of the FCC have been bribed to enact the system?

Who's doing the bribing, the owners of Ibiquity? aka "The Broadcast Industry".

There may not be a full moon, but the crazies are still out.

Clouseau

 

[SUPERCASTER]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

That is for the FCC to decide.

No. The marketplace will finally decide, just as with c-quam and all the other broadcast fiasco's and escapades.

 

[SUPERCASTER]

The FCC doesnt care about anything but $$$$ (They are making mucho $$$ outta this)

Just how is the FCC making any money on this? There are no additional regulatory fees that I know of. There was no application fees or anything else that is known to have been charged to Ibiquity for being named "the system". Or are you alledging that members of the FCC have been bribed to enact the system?

Who's doing the bribing, the owners of Ibiquity? aka "The Broadcast Industry".

There may not be a full moon, but the crazies are still out.

Clouseau

FCC chairman Kevin Martin in bed with lobbyists:
http://www.freepress.net/docs/martin_2.jpg
Are you still out clouseau, or have you been "NABed".

 

[Len14043]

Who cares......IBOC doesnt belong on the am band!!

That is for the FCC to decide.

No. The marketplace will finally decide, just as with c-quam and all the other broadcast fiasco's and escapades.

The FCC made a ruling that IBOC will be the digital system for terrestrial radio. End of discussion. The marketplace will slowly respond just like it did with FM. When the cost and power consumption of chips come down, HD will be incorporated into more radios. At that point, consumers that purchase radios will be HD compatable - even if they do not intend to buy an HD radio.

 

[ropertex]

It's time to live up to the consequences of giving each station only 10 kHz of space.

AM stations have 30 kHz of space. (+/- 15 Khz)

http://www.nrscstandards.org/Standards/nrsc-1.pdf (See fig 3)

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

Somebody with a dour outlook should now tell us why this can't work........

No one is going to mistake me for an HD apologist, but I am obligated to repeat something I have said on this board more than once: You cannot double, triple or otherwise multiply the number of signals on the FM band and pretend there will be no economic consequences to doing that. What exactly is it going to take to make the broadcasting industry get it through their thick skulls that each station taking a smaller piece of the pie is NOT going to be their salvation?

Besides, who wants to volunteer to be the one to tell broadcasters that they MUST lease out their secondary channels (which, let's remember, are part and parcel of the total digital data stream, including the HD-1 channel which must simlucast the main analog channel) to their competitors?

 

[LinoNYC]

Somebody with a dour outlook should now tell us why this can't work........

No one is going to mistake me for an HD apologist, but I am obligated to repeat something I have said on this board more than once: You cannot double, triple or otherwise multiply the number of signals on the FM band and pretend there will be no economic consequences to doing that. What exactly is it going to take to make the broadcasting industry get it through their thick skulls that each station taking a smaller piece of the pie is NOT going to be their salvation?

Besides, who wants to volunteer to be the one to tell broadcasters that they MUST lease out their secondary channels (which, let's remember, are part and parcel of the total digital data stream, including the HD-1 channel which must simlucast the main analog channel) to their competitors?

Please correct if I'am wrong, won't all major markets soon be passively (PPM) measured, eliminating the need for the participant to remember/specify what he was listening to?

Since these subs will probaby carry fare that is viable but not worthy of a main carrier, would't it then be a case of taking a small amount of money from one pocket, adding a little and placing in the other? These subs are still going to be owned by the existing license holders.

Lino

 

[Len14043]

Somebody with a dour outlook should now tell us why this can't work........

No one is going to mistake me for an HD apologist, but I am obligated to repeat something I have said on this board more than once: You cannot double, triple or otherwise multiply the number of signals on the FM band and pretend there will be no economic consequences to doing that. What exactly is it going to take to make the broadcasting industry get it through their thick skulls that each station taking a smaller piece of the pie is NOT going to be their salvation?

Besides, who wants to volunteer to be the one to tell broadcasters that they MUST lease out their secondary channels (which, let's remember, are part and parcel of the total digital data stream, including the HD-1 channel which must simlucast the main analog channel) to their competitors?

IBOC on FM could evolve into something that is currently unexpected at this time. The additional channels could be used to simulcast existing AM stations in which the reception is poor, ie graveyards, regionals etc. If successful, that might cause the marginal AMs that were allowed to broadcast on formerly clear channels to leave the air, thus cleaning up the band. The HD-2s and 3s could be used for stock reports, movie reviews, ski reports and other information useful to the listener. Adding more channels will be beneficial to the consumers and the radio industry. Your shrinking pie argument could have been made during the 60s when each market had a TV channel for each network and a handful of independets. There are now hundreds of channels available in most homes. This is not a zero sum game. Radio stations will eventually find creative ways to use the additional channels.