How are stations getting around the digital delay for live, local sports? Shutting it down/killing the delay used to match up the analog?
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Live sports on HD
- Thread starter EnoughJohnMayer
- Start date
EnoughJohnMayer said:
Many stations turn off their IBOC. In my opinion what they are doing is lowing the quality for the many listeners who listen to the broadcast outside of the stadium to satisfy the few who carry radios to a game. TV can't even begin to match the true game timing with all of the paths it takes getting the content from stadium into a home. Every digital carrier introduces their own delay. Try watching a gam on SNY or Yes in NY while listening to the radio play by play. I believe stations should keep their IBOC exciters on and if neccessary, turning off the delay for the analog portion.
R.F. Burns said:
What a great way to gather interest, audience, and prove HD radio is "the wave of the future". Can intermittent HD transmissions create an audience, prove the technology, HD's reliability, or gather and hold loyal listeners?
Not likely.
HD radio is too late, too problematic, too fickle, and offers too little to the listener to gather much of an audience or revenue any time in the economically feasible future.
Doesn't that eliminate the few hard won listeners to their HD2, HD3 "stations between the stations"?
What a great way to gather interest, audience, and prove HD radio is "the wave of the future". Can intermittent HD transmissions create an audience, prove the technology, HD's reliability, or gather and hold loyal listeners?
Not likely.
HD radio is too late, too problematic, too fickle, and offers too little to the listener to gather much of an audience or revenue any time in the economically feasible future.
Some stations like WSCR Chicago have sometimes been eliminating the delay on the analog audio during games. It satisfies listeners at the ballpark who listen on portables, and works fine for the HD Radio listeners at home, where an 8-second delay is a non-issue, unless they're listening to a weak enough signal where the receiver flips between analog and digital. Or, a stronger AM-HD signal during a storm.
When the weather is clear I don't have any problems listening to the HD Radio feed for games. But, when there is lightning within ~ 50 miles, which causes my receiver to regularly revert to analog for 4 to 8 seconds at a time, it is totally disconcerting and intolerable. I am appoximately 40 miles from 50,000-watt WSCR, in a semi-rural area with very little man-made RFI on AM. Downtown Chicago is over 20 miles from the transmitter, so I assume that HD Radio listeners there would have similar reception issues.
When the weather is clear I don't have any problems listening to the HD Radio feed for games. But, when there is lightning within ~ 50 miles, which causes my receiver to regularly revert to analog for 4 to 8 seconds at a time, it is totally disconcerting and intolerable. I am appoximately 40 miles from 50,000-watt WSCR, in a semi-rural area with very little man-made RFI on AM. Downtown Chicago is over 20 miles from the transmitter, so I assume that HD Radio listeners there would have similar reception issues.
Listeners in San Diego are having a heck of a time with HD radio and WHY they love XM and Sirius and the reasons HD radio is going nowhere.
Ibiquity seems to be the only money makers on the whole HD venture.
http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,73286.msg534191.html#new
HD Radio = 15 years too late
HD Radio = Nonexistant to consumers
Radiopilot
Ibiquity seems to be the only money makers on the whole HD venture.
http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,73286.msg534191.html#new
HD Radio = 15 years too late
HD Radio = Nonexistant to consumers
Radiopilot
radiopilot said:
What did Aerosmith sing? Oh yea... Dream On...Loser!!
R.F. Burns said:
RFBurns
I never called you a 'loser' and I deserve a little more respect than that SIR!
Read the post or are you too shrill and weak to listen to what others report about HD radio?
Radiopilot
T
Tom_Ray
Guest
EnoughJohnMayer said:
>>>> Many stations back out of the delay for the game. Of course, let's take an example of 250,000 listeners to a game outside the stadium. You have, say, 25,000 listeners inside the stadium, 5,000 of which bring radios. If you back out of the delay, you inconvenience the 250,000 outside the stadium (assuming they are listening in HD), as if they're driving, they may be in an area where the radio blends back and forth between digital and analog and it will be disjointed. Do you upset 250,000 for the convenience of the 5,000 who have radios and are are watching the game live?
>>>> Delay is a fact of life, particularly if you have crowd mics very close to the crowd, as it would be prudent to run a profanity delay. If someone brings a TV to the game, they're lucky to see it 4 seconds later. What's another 4 seconds?
>>>> I don't go to a Giants game to listen to the radio. I go to be in the stadium, to see the game live, to have the experience. If I want to catch up on stats and that bad call, that's what the evening news on TV is for. And besides - my transmitter site is close enough to Giants stadium that I can hear the station on my fillings.
Tom Ray
WOR
radiopilot said:
You are right Radiopilot My comments were over the top. I appologize. With that I'll say'
What did Aerosmith sing? Oh yea... Dream On
radiopilot, you do realize that your post plus URL had nothing at all to do with Live Sports on HD, don't you? That might explain the reaction it evoked from another poster...
Tom Ray said:
I totally understand your logic here, and it would be a viable reason to keep the analog delay in effect, if this were maybe 2009 or 2010. But in 2007, I would be surprised if there would be as many people listening to a game via HD Radio in their cars as within the venue itself. Perhaps that is why WSCR kills the delay.
The few hundred analog portable radio listeners in a ballpark really need to have the delay OFF until there's more HD radio in the hands of actual listeners. Listeners that count in the ratings and aren't professionals in the industry that shouldn't be counted. The bigger problem currently is the 2 second delay on the newer analog TV "digital cable" boxes, and the 5-8 second delay on the HDTV channels. More listeners/viewers call stations re "the crazy delay" while listening to the radio and viewing TV. I would count those people in the thousands in a large market. They have no idea why this is happening and why it is a different delay on different TV channels.
I've also noted football games on FM HD stations switching to the "sports" non-delay mode (which the HD system has!) where the HD radio indicator lights up but the HD buzz channels are off and the HD delay is gone.
I've also noted football games on FM HD stations switching to the "sports" non-delay mode (which the HD system has!) where the HD radio indicator lights up but the HD buzz channels are off and the HD delay is gone.
The real challenge lies with having all the players on the field play with an 8-second delay, so that HD Radio can stay in synch 
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