Reliability of HD --- HD radio's worst enemy

[rbrucecarter5]

You would think - if stations wanted to promote HD radio, and they cared about making this thing a success, they would do everything in their power to make it work reliably. We have a situation in Houston, where the main channels carry NOTHING of any interest except bland corporate formats, but HD-2 has the interesting stuff. Not one, but two oldies channels. Smooth Jazz. Real Christian rock. Dance. But to me, the best is the real Christian rock. They have something really unique and compelling, at least enough to generate over $50,000 in donations from HD-2 listeners, which amazes me because I was in the camp that believed only a dozen people actually had working HD radios. Here is an HD-2 success story. What is the station's response? HD off for two afternoons! How does that make the contributors feel? Their normal format on analog is AWFUL. A lot of other people listen, but it is bland and lukewarm to the HD-2 fans to whom the normal analog format is of no interest. Worse yet, when HD isn't on, the radio eventually defaults back to the analog. I'd prefer to hear dead air than their normal format - it is that bad. The HD-2 format is available over the air - if you have extreme DX gear from some parts of Houston. The most affluent, fastest growing parts.

So - multiply this by stations all over the country that have avid HD-2 fans. Real potential for stations to make additional revenue. But how many times do I read on this board that HD is off for days or even weeks, and the stations don't bother to fix it. Heck of a way to promote a new service if you ask me. It has enough reliability problems related to reception without being something that the station doesn't care to maintain. HD-2 is the one and probably only "killer app" - the reason to buy HD radios. If you don't have that, HD radio is just a way to make the analog signal sound marginally better on high end systems. Hardly compelling at all.

In my opinion, if stations can't keep the HD-2 on the air reliably, consumers who buy HD radios for those formats will give up on HD radio, and there will be nobody to replace them because word of mouth will spread that HD radio is unrel1able. The fault? Station engineers who don't maintain the HD equipment, and managers who are not committed enough to the system to make sure it is working.

 

[KB1OKL]

This is probably the first time in my 5 years on this board that I have actually ever heard anyone say that they found something on an HD-2 which is compelling.

 

[iyiyi]

This is probably the first time in my 5 years on this board that I have actually ever heard anyone say that they found something on an HD-2 which is compelling.

Then this is probably the first time in 5 years that you have actually listened to opinions - other than yours - on this board.

-

 

[rbrucecarter5]

This is probably the first time in my 5 years on this board that I have actually ever heard anyone say that they found something on an HD-2 which is compelling.

yeah - Houston over the air analog and HD-1 - pretty much crappy corporate formats. HD-2 stuff - well that is where all my presets are. Of course I still lose HD lock occasionally on full class C stations 20 miles away, I can see the towers, with a real whip antenna and very sensitive radio. So --- I wish the HD-2's would trade places with analog over the air.

If I were a conspiracy theorist, I'd swear they are putting all the interesting stuff on HD-2 to force everybody to buy HD radios.

 

[nd2023]

The Christian HD2 most likely streams online and that's where the listeners are hearing it. If the stream was up the whole time, the HD transmitter being off for 2 days is moot. It just takes a little promotion of the HD2 streams to attract listeners.

Dance formatted WWMX-HD2 showed up in the ratings in Baltimore with a 10,000 cume and 0.1 one month in 2010, without an analog translator. There most certainly aren't 10,000 working HD radios even in existence in Maryland, let alone all of them being used in Baltimore to listen to Mix HD2. Meanwhile, their Facebook page said that they had record online listeners.

I have heard quite a few compelling HD2 stations across the country.

 

[TheBigA]

You would think - if stations wanted to promote HD radio, and they cared about making this thing a success, they would do everything in their power to make it work reliably.

Like what? Which one of the radio companies is in the electronics business?

The biggest problem radio has right now is it depends on the consumer electronics industry to create and market the hardware people use to hear their content. And the CEA absolutely hates OTA radio. It's a terrible situation.

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

Station engineers who don't maintain the HD equipment...

Station engineers, often maintaining multiple stations all by themselves, have better things to do than pay attention to something that makes no money, and managers, who must answer to management for the company's bottom line, have the same attitude.

 

[RadioEngnr]

Station engineers who don't maintain the HD equipment...

Station engineers, often maintaining multiple stations all by themselves, have better things to do than pay attention to something that makes no money, and managers, who must answer to management for the company's bottom line, have the same attitude.

I maintain all Sub HD's for the 2 stations I work for, which is HD2, HD3 and HD4 for one station and HD2 and HD3. I installed the HD broadcasting equipment, I built the computers that the audio/automation/processing is installed on, I came up with the formats, I designed the logo's in Photoshop, I set up the streaming audio and URL's, and the music used is 90% of my own music library

So yeah, the Engineer is all HD Radio..... in my world

 

[iyiyi]

I maintain all Sub HD's for the 2 stations I work for, which is HD2, HD3 and HD4 for one station and HD2 and HD3. I installed the HD broadcasting equipment, I built the computers that the audio/automation/processing is installed on, I came up with the formats, I designed the logo's in Photoshop, I set up the streaming audio and URL's, and the music used is 90% of my own music library

So yeah, the Engineer is all HD Radio..... in my world

Great! Perhaps you can shed some light on a few mysteries of HD.

1) What is the ballpark cost of adding -10dBc HD on a Class B (50Kw @ 150M) FM? (Assuming a well maintained , reasonably modern plant?)

2) What % increase in transmitter operating expenses and/or maintenance costs would the above upgrade realize?

3) What is the compelling reason that MW and FM stations shut their HD's down for days, weeks or months at a time?

4) Why do so many people responsible for the audio quality of so many HDs believe that EQ settings are best set while their heads are up their asses? Even ears buried THAT deep should still be able hear the shrill, siblant garbage too many HDs foist on so many listeners!

Thanks!

-

 

[DaveBayArea]

4) Why do so many people responsible for the audio quality of so many HDs believe that EQ settings are best set while their heads are up their asses? Even ears buried THAT deep should still be able hear the shrill, siblant garbage too many HDs foist on so many listeners!

I can sort of answer this one, as I deal with it constantly. It's a compromise between sounding like an AM station on some program material and having the excessive sibilance on the next cut. In my case, the station is in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California and we truly believe there are no HD listeners other than station employees. Even at -14dbc the station has essentially zero HD coverage due to 1st-adjacent analog signals in Sacramento. So there's lots of room for experimentation, and I've come to the conclusion that you can never get an HD signal to sound right all the time.

If anyone has any good experiences with this I'd like to hear how it's done.

Dave B.

 

[davideduardo]

1) What is the ballpark cost of adding -10dBc HD on a Class B (50Kw @ 150M) FM? (Assuming a well maintained , reasonably modern plant?)

A: Too much to justify it.

2) What % increase in transmitter operating expenses and/or maintenance costs would the above upgrade realize?

A: More than it is worth.

3) What is the compelling reason that MW and FM stations shut their HD's down for days, weeks or months at a time?

A: Occasional fits of sanity.

4) Why do so many people responsible for the audio quality of so many HDs believe that EQ settings are best set while their heads are up their asses?

A: To see if anyone notices.


(They don't)

 

[rbrucecarter5]

A: Occasional fits of sanity.

Wow - I'm surprised to see you so cynical about it, David. I am not impressed. My new Pioneer '9400 is their top of the line Supertuner 3, I mainly bought it because my '5900 was failing after 6 years of service, front panel removed every day finally wore out mechanically. It just happens to have HD, hard to buy a Pioneer without it. To my delight, I discovered that Pioneer restored sensitivity on the AM band, which would have been more compelling to me than HD.

Top of the line Pioneer Supertuner 3D, 31 inch whip, analog sensitivity phenomenal on FM. Everything in the antenna and RF circuitry done right. Here is the sad result - KRBE Houston, less than 20 miles away, towers visible. Full class C, 100kW, 2000 foot tower. In previous years, before HD, it could be heard in the Southern parts of the Dallas Ft. Worth area. It even showed up in the DFW ratings on occasion. Yet, with that tremendous transmitter and range - HD drops out in all the places you would expect, behind overpass walls, beside buildings, etc. Full class C, less than 20 miles away. I am extremely skeptical that a mere 6dB increase in sideband power would make a difference at all. In fact, when HD drops, analog reception seems to be blending partially to mono. In other words, decades of power dropped behind those overpasses, etc. But KRBE prior to HD would never drop out like that. HD is a power vampire - just my observations. It really helped when a local had HD, then dropped it, then put it back in. And I observed a 60 mile difference in range between analog and HD.

HD - disappointing. If you think HD-1 dropping to analog is annoying, try dead air on an HD-2, then the stupid radio defaults back to an analog format I don't like. Now THAT is annoying! Enough that I want to install a "defeat" switch on HD if I can't find an option in the manual.

 

[davideduardo]

Wow - I'm surprised to see you so cynical about it, David.

What is not sane about keeping HD off the air for weeks on end?

 

[iyiyi]

What is not sane about keeping HD off the air for weeks on end?

Fulton's folly, Seward's folly, it'll never fly (Wright brothers), get a horse (early public view of the automobile), the myriad broadcasters who took their FMs dark and turned in their licenses because "There is no future for FM", the lemmings who ruined AM stereo's chances by embracing C-QUAM -- which proved itself to be totally impractical in real world MW broadcast conditions...

Think about it... You - O radio person - cannot see any potential whatsoever in digital IBOC broadcasting?

-

 

[TheBigA]

Think about it... You - O radio person - cannot see any potential whatsoever in digital IBOC broadcasting?

Here's a simple fact: People can't hear HD unless they buy an HD radio. That is the one single biggest impediment to it becoming more successful. There's nothing radio people can do, other than buying the radios and handing them out on the street corner. Even then, it would be no guarantee that people would use them. As I've said here many times, the fact that IBOC is proprietary prevents other manufacturers from making improvements in the system, as they might want to do. The fact that it's relatively expensive means it's not something anyone is likely to throw in as a bonus, whereas the FM chip was very cheap after the Armstrong lawsuit was over. The biggest disadvantage to including FM in a portable was the need for an antenna. Antenna is just one of the requirements for HD. But still, at one time, radio companies had the support of the CEA. They don't any more. As far as electronics manufacturers are concerned, HD is for TV. The reason CEA hates radio is because radio is trying to force them to put FM in cell phones. As long as that battle is going on, radio companies will get no support from the electronics industry.

 

[diymedia]

As far as electronics manufacturers are concerned, HD is for TV. The reason CEA hates radio is because radio is trying to force them to put FM in cell phones. As long as that battle is going on, radio companies will get no support from the electronics industry.

True that. This is also a long-standing rift: CEMA (the predecessor to CEA) had officially endorsed Eureka-147 back in the 90s - and was not shy about asserting that - but backed away and effectively washed its hands of the IBOC approval process at the FCC as broadcast-proponents became adamantine about the technology. Electronics manufacturers effectively left the IBOC wagon before it even got rolling.

 

[iyiyi]

There have been several MILLION HD radios sold in the United States to date.

-

 

[diymedia]

There have been several MILLION HD radios sold in the United States to date.

-

Seven million, according to iBiquity, since the technology was rolled out 10 years ago. That's a 1% receiver penetration rate. Over a decade.

 

[TheBigA]

There have been several MILLION HD radios sold in the United States to date.

And how many PEOPLE are there in the US?

My real question is of those "several million sold," how many are still in use?

I'll say it again, in case you missed it: Until the electronics manufacturers get behind HD, it will never go anywhere. Radio companies can put the absolute most brilliant programming on HD, but unless people own the radios, they won't hear it. It's a tree falling in a forest. And it will stay that way until the patent expires. Just like FM.

 

[Savage]

Several things: radio people in this market actually did buy a bunch of HD radios to give away, and while they didn't distribute them on street corners, they gave them away at a large car dealership. Nobody wanted them - even when they were free.

Seward's folly? Clinton's folly? Get-a-horse? Alaska, the Erie Canal and automobiles gave us unimaginable benefits. HD Radio has given us: (a) loud obnoxious hiss, (b) discord within the industry and (c) unimaginable expense.

Oh yes: I almost forgot. The stubbornness with which certain self-anointed "radio leaders" cling to this abject failure makes the entire industry look like a bunch of morons. Mention "HD Radio" to our compatriots in TV, advertising and retailing, and the very few who have even heard of it roll their eyes and laugh.

The "seven million sold" claim for HD penetration is, IMHO, vastly exaggerated. And whatever number were actually sold, be assured that a tiny fraction are actually in regular use to listen to HD broadcasts in digital.