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NY Radio Muddy Audio!

L

LenoxAve

Is it just me, or has NYC radio become increasingly muddy over the past few days? Almost as if every station sounds like it's playing music underwater? It sound very distorted and full of digital artifacts or something that didn't exist before.

Lite-FM sounds awful, CBS-FM sounds even worse, and Fresh and 94.7 sound terrible compared to usual. No high ends.
 
LenoxAve said:
Is it just me, or has NYC radio become increasingly muddy over the past few days? Almost as if every station sounds like it's playing music underwater? It sound very distorted and full of digital artifacts or something that didn't exist before.
Click to expand...

Generally, when you notice a simultaneous change in many radio stations with different owners, transmitter brands, studio equipment and audio processing, the change is at your end. It could be your radio, or it could be something causing interference in the portion of the spectrum you are located in. Have you noted this on different radios, or in considerably different locations?
 
This sounds like a case of a few digital STL's acting up. Did the ESB have a major power surge recently? I notice this happening after monsoon thunderstorms on FM's in the Phoenix area, but NYC sure doesn't get those.
 
DavidEduardo said:
Have you noted this on different radios, or in considerably different locations?
Click to expand...

In many locations on various radios. I checked everything, including EQ settings. Both stations in NYC and Long Island. They all have an increased amount of what sound like digital artifacts or something that is obliterating the audio quality on the extreme high and low end. I waited a few days before posting in case it was an anomaly. But this is something I have noticed consistently since late last week.
 
I haven't noticed any change. Though my Sangean DT-110 personal stereo broke and I got a DT-180 which sounds horrible in comparison so its going back. Could it be your ears are clogged up, it is allergy season after all and I notice it happens to me sometimes before I realize it's my ears. It's impossible that every single radio station would change their audio at once. If anything CBS-FM has been sounding a little bit better.
 
Could it be atmospheric, e.g. temperature inversion? Sunspots? Just trying to imagine what could affect multiple stations at once...
 
AudioFile said:
[NOTE-content removed per Terms of Service.]
Click to expand...

The PPM system does not change station "fidelity" or frequency response. What the system does is insert a tag on one of several frequencies when there is audio present to mask the tag.

The tags are not audible as they are masked, and the PPM encoder does not change the audio, equalize it or do anything else except insert the identification data.
 
If every station started to sound different at the same time, it's your ears. I find my audio perception definitely changes along with my overall health.
 
If it was all (or a group of uncommonly-owned) stations, as DanM surmised there could have been some atmospheric conditions (meteor showers, sunspots, solar flares, etc.) that could have caused some interference. There wasn't any particularly warm weather during the period, although tropo/temperature inversion can happen at various temperature levels.

It could have been some technical problem/transmitter maintenance at Empire that might have knocked things off a bit.

Or...none of the above...possibly your ears deceived you or your receiver or a setting was a bit off - although it sounds like you'd know when something was mis-set.

Keep in mind that CBS-FM has been consistently muddy for a while now. At times I'll tune in and hear a song that maybe sounds "better", but then I'll tune over to 100.7 WHUD (for example) and I'll realize that CBS-FM is still up the creek audio-wise.

Fresh sounds a bit more brash/harsh lately.
Lite-FM has never been a stalwart of audio fidelity.
 
I do not live within the area, but non-comms often have the purest, cleanest, least distorted processed sound.
 
In my point of view, WBLS has the best audio processing in NYC. It has everything in it what make it sounds great. The Omnia 6 (?) tweaked well done!
 
WOR has sounded like crap all afternoon... like they're on a backup audio processor or something.

As for WBLS, two words: Paul Sanchez.
 
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