My FIRST personal purchase of “HD technology”—Sony’s demure XDR-F1HD was waiting yesterday evening. Amazon delivered it in five days despite the Thanksgiving holiday. This is the first “HD Radio” product I have had to opportunity to interface with my living room surround-sound audio system [a Sony ES 5.1 pre-amp/control center, Carver power amps, Polk speakers/250-watt powered sub] and directly compare performance with my three “heritage” component tuners: McIntosh’s MR-78 (1982); Carver’s TX-11B (1987); and Denon’s TU-680NAB (1990). The former offered “legendary” FM reception and audio quality for its era; the latter two feature dual I.F. on both AM and FM; notable innovations such as Carver’s exclusive FM noise and multipath mitigation plus “hi-fi” wide-bandwidth C-Quam AM Stereo; and Denon’s NRSC-compliant 7.5k “mid-fi” C-Quam capability.
This encounter is far from a “lab test” – no instruments involved... Only my perceptions and expectations as a consumer, but is the target customer for this product any different? So far, listening spanned one evening, early-morning, and some channel surfing at the office. “HD” reception occurred “in market” – generally within the 70dbu contours of Class C1 stations running 100kw [two stations are 25kw Class C3 facilities, but are not considered “rimshot” in nature]. I tossed the Sony-supplied antennas to the corner – opting to use a C Crane “FM Reflect” dipole for FM... Two external AM antennas with a “workaround” to accommodate the “balanced” nature of the XDR-F1HD’s AM RF inputs were tried—Terk’s “AM Advantage” loop [in wired mode] and a Dymek DL-4/DA-9 12-inch ferrite bar/active and tunable RF pre-amp with adjustable gain and a bypass option.
When I first sampled the prolific number of five-star reviews of this tuner on Amazon, I wondered if I was viewing an online convention of “HD Radio” apologists engaged in “seminar” posting to bolster a “finally, we have a winner” radio. It appears that their glee is rooted in more
fact than fiction – on the FM band. All I had to do was drape the C Crane dipole across the top and down one side of my entertainment center, and EVERY local “HD” and HD-2 service [even on the Class C3s] appeared – and remained despite the path I took walking around the room.
FM “HD” reception was SOLID and DEPENDABLE. The XDR-F1HD tuned and acquired “HD” signals much faster than the prior two “HD” radios I have handled [the BA and Sangean table models]. Audio quality is VERY GOOD on the primary services,
but I did not notice a compelling advance beyond the audio offered by my much-older thoroughbred FM tuners in an A-B comparison [especially the 26-year-old MR-78 whose sonic capability was generally indistinguishable from that of the current-day contender]. The Sony was a bit quieter on a few stations whose format engaged a less aggressive modulation scheme, and the high-end on the usual over-processed culprits was more transparent in HD mode; but as earlier stated in this thread:
Most casual listeners wouldn’t notice - much-less care about the difference.
I enjoyed two HD-2 services [interestingly on the 25kw C3 stations]: “Jammin Oldies” [classic soul] on WSCC and Jazz on WALC. The “JO” HD-2 service sounded uncharacteristically good! The WSCC primary “HD” service is News/Talk, so I’m wondering if they
can or have allocated a higher bitrate to the HD-2 channel at an expense to the primary “HD” service due to the lesser demands of the voice-intensive format there. Jazz on WALC HD-2 sounded nice also, but all the other HD-2s were sub-128k mp3 in quality [not that 128k mp3 is the apex of audio excellence by any means].
The Sony XDR-F1HD is worth owning at its reasonable price to provide HD-2 and HD-3 services alone, but there appears to be an even bigger caveat packed into this little tuner...
Much has been made about the astonishing FM reception capabilities of the XDR-F1HD. My urban location and initial setup only allows me to scratch the surface of this tuner’s awesome performance to price ratio, but I get an initial sense that it lives up to its kudos. I found several distant stations [one adjacent to a nearby 50kw Class C2] that were sub-listenable on the TX-11B and TU-680NAB, borderline on the MR-78, but fully-usable on the XDR-F1HD. I wouldn’t have believed that an under-$100 tuner marketed by a company that long-ago surrendered its pursuit of FM excellence [remember Sony circa 1974] could have pulled off a difficult station snare that a McIntosh MR-78 could not.
It is patently obvious that this tuner’s greatest finesse is not in its “HD” logo, but rather in its FM RF agility! I’ll be better-able to experience this in a few weeks when I return to the FM “sandbox” between Cincinnati, Dayton, and Indianapolis... Can’t wait!
There are no AM stations in ChasTown that have squandered their precious resources on “HD” [in]capability, so I’ll sweep this aside quickly. Regardless of the premium antenna that fed it, the Sony XDR-F1HD’s AM RF ability is “pedestrian” at best, and the analog audio is “typical modern Sony”—very little below 150Hz and nearly-nothing of substance above 2kHz. In fact, it was nearly identical to the pathetic no-attention-given sound offered by the “convenience” AM section in the ES surround-sound unit it was plugged into. I’ve heard shortwave that sounds better! As for “HD”... Despite a strong post-sunset signal from WBT Charlotte, there was never a “lock” and only very-brief and infrequent illumination of the “HD” indicator. Since the AM “HD” Emperor still appears to “have no clothes”,
this AM tuner in analog offers little more than low-quality local listening... FORGET IT! Shame on you, Sony... What you scored thru DSP technology on FM – you sidetracked on AM :'(
Finally, “THE BAD”...
[1] You could slow-fry an egg on the top of this tuner – IT RUNS HOT!!!
[2] The control buttons are
top-mounted dirt catchers. Both “bads” make for a no-good – plus an installation dilemma and potential service and longevity concern... 'Remember when your Engineer told you about the two worst enemies of electronic gear—HEAT and DUST?
[3] There is no way to direct-enter a desired frequency
...The first Sony radio remote I’ve held without those ten little numeral buttons.
[4] In analog, the FM high-frequency de-emphasis is inaccurate and results in a
noticeable dulling of the high-end when compared with my other tuners. This has been documented elsewhere, and allegedly there is a “fix” in the pipeline.
[5] WHY in the Master’s name, given the well-established inconsistent reception of “HD” signals on both bands, would a manufacturer design an “HD” radio without an “analog only” option? The XDR-F1HD forgot to include one also! There is an easy technician’s fix, so I’ll keep mine, but I’m wondering if Joe the Plumber will when his Sony keeps doing an analog-“HD” see-saw :
