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Time to reconsider AM stereo?

It's great to reminisce and all, but the fact remains unless you have receiver manufacturers on board with producing quality synthesized radios (I know that is an oxymoron), then you can be broadcasting the best Amplititude Modulation (okay another oxymoron) AM stereo Hi-FI whatever signal on the planet, and no average consumer could tell.

Granted, C-Quam sounded better than mono AM in theory, but the fact remains that 3-5kHz high end is pretty poor listening response. The only people that would enjoy the sound are oldsters like us who grew up on AM, and frankly we don't even register on the consumer electronic folks nor advertising executives radar. And no, young people aren't going to comb fleamarkets to find the few Sony AM stereo radios only to hear Glen Beck in mono with spots in glorious stereo (10dB separation). They're plugged into their IPods with 50Hz -20kHz reponse and 60+ dB separation. If you don't think the average person can hear that differrence, then you're completely in denial.

Look I hate to piss in your punchbowl, but the fact is we're living in the fading days of AM folks. As more of us get older and die off, so goes AM listening.
 
i think you are wrong with this one. With more and more people becoming aware of the bias of mainstream media....the importance of AM, the talk shows, the alternative music programming.... I think you should see a swell in their numbers. Look what Beck did with the Van Johnson thing! Also, the freedom of programming. In our area...we have been listening to 920 and 990...talk and Midday madness variety. Reports from porn valley, good music interviews. When you are driving up and down the highway day after day, AM is a bright alternative to the sterile predictable programming on FM.
 
Yes, earwig - and as a general rule, AM offers something largely lacking on FM these days: live, relatable human on-air talent interacting with listeners and offering nonrepetitive, engaging content. (This comment is meant to be politically neutral. I know that AM offers the neurotic on either end of the political spectrum plenty of reason to have palpitations, but this isn't about that.)

It's blatantly obvious: FM music formats, largely voicetracked or altogether jockless - and devoid of content on the rare occasions when there actually IS live talent - are boring, repetitive and unappealing.

Radio tied itself to the satrad and iPod railroad tracks when the industry's genius programmers concluded that "a radio station" consists of 14 in a row, a giant gob of cluttery spots, disclaimers and corporate policy blabs, plus an angry-voiced liner guy.

News/talk is one of the only bright spots in terms of audience growth. Yeah, yeah, I know some of the formats are migrating to FM, but it isn't necessary, nothwithstanding what the defeatists say. It's still true: listeners will go where the appealing programming is. Most of what's on AM today represents minimal interest and effort by cluster managers, and the result is predictable.
 
Commercial FM has become so boring I very rarely even listen to it anymore, mainly AM or Satrad. AM stations can broadcast much higher than 3-5kHz on the top end, Good AM is virtually indistinguishable from FM with a good wideband stereo receiver like The Meduci.
 
AM stations can broadcast much higher than 3-5kHz on the top end, Good AM is virtually indistinguishable from FM with a good wideband stereo receiver like The Meduci.
Click to expand...

Good point. Unless an AM station is purposely cutting it's high end down do keep from interfering with IBOC, almost all AM stations are delivering audio up to just less than 10 kHz. The 10k limit is only due to the NRSC mask put in place during the stereo days. Listening with a nice wideband radio can be a challenge though, since modern processors shelve the high frequency energy way up to compensate for the poor bandwidth in receivers.

I've said this before here...the perceived inadequacies with AM are due to receiver deficiencies. Just a few more pennies per unit on the receiver end and AM would sparkle (like it does on the mod monitor).
 
Savage said:
Most of what's on AM today represents minimal interest and effort by cluster managers, and the result is predictable.
Click to expand...

Most of what's on AM today was put there before cluster managers. There's another thread on this board listing the year when numerous local AM Top 40 stations died, and all of them were before 1985. That's when the public gave up on AM as a source for music. You can pour a lot of time, effort, and money in a format to bring music listeners back. But your one station would just be an oasis in the middle of downtown Wheeling.
 
stacker said:
AM stations can broadcast much higher than 3-5kHz on the top end, Good AM is virtually indistinguishable from FM with a good wideband stereo receiver like The Meduci.
Click to expand...

Good point. Unless an AM station is purposely cutting it's high end down do keep from interfering with IBOC, almost all AM stations are delivering audio up to just less than 10 kHz. The 10k limit is only due to the NRSC mask put in place during the stereo days. Listening with a nice wideband radio can be a challenge though, since modern processors shelve the high frequency energy way up to compensate for the poor bandwidth in receivers.

I've said this before here...the perceived inadequacies with AM are due to receiver deficiencies. Just a few more pennies per unit on the receiver end and AM would sparkle (like it does on the mod monitor).
Click to expand...

Yup, that's a good place to start, we need are better receivers and there is no logical reason why IBOC is still in existence, especially on AM, AM IBOC is especially stupid and useless, it sounds terrible if you can actually receive it.
 
The Sangean HD-1X decodes C-Quam, and Motorola designed a really decent set of chips called "Symphony" that had DSP and C-Quam, but they sold off their semiconductor chip line to "ON" and it floundered after that. I would love to see someone pickup the ball with the Motorola Symphony chipset.

In additio to the Sangean decoding C-Quam, Fanfare makes a really sharp tuner (FTA-100P) that is C-Quam, plus every T-Bird made the past couple of years has C-Quam. I believe that many of the Ford Visteon receivers that are IBOC are also C-Quam. Then of course you have all the Chrysler minivans out there that still have C-Quam from 92 to 2001, and the GM Delcos with the "AMST" pushbutton.

A few of us engineers petitioned the FCC for an "AM Receiver Standards" edict a while back, but we never got even a docket number assigned from the FCC for comments.
The FCC was/is no help to have quality over quantity on the AM broadcast band.

I still listen to CFCO AM Steeo in my Chrysler.
 
So then let's take a little survey of the AM listening choir here. Please respond back with the letter that corresponds with your age.

Are you:

(A) 18-25 years old (B) 26-35 years old (C) 36-45 years old (D) 46-55 years old (E) 56-65 years old (F) 66-75 years old
 
hearing the WOWO clip from 1992 that Strangelove posted , it breaks one heart to hear . what might be possible with AM Stereo
 
c and not liking it! I think AM also has the potential, as someone else mentioned in another blog, to offer reasonable $ adds to the mom and pop businesses which are also dying off....
 
So it appears that several of the choir here don't want to admit that they're over 40, but that seems to be the concensus anyway.

Now I'll admit its tough to admit you're getting old, just as it's difficult to admit that the best days of AM are behind us. Even back in the day when new, the vast majority of consumers could care less about AM stereo when MW stations were still playing music. (rather like HD isn't it) So exactly why do you think consumers would care about it now? Does it have equal-to or superior audio quality to FM or IPods? No. Can listeners find unique music or high quality entertainment programming on it? Nope

Besides the age gap, people under 40 generally don't listen to right or left-wing political talk shows. For the most part, older demographics do and that's about it. PPM measurement has eliminated the option for listeners to 'vote' for their favorite stations, and the AM N/T shows have paid the price.

My point is that since digital modulation of AM signals has been effectively shot down and lost the battle, all we can do is sit back and listen to AM as it fades into the sunset. Young people don't want to hear old and grumpy political talk and stereo commercials, when they can hear superior audio quality of whatever music they want, when they want it.

By the way, I fall into the D category.
 
Well, I don't think it's accurate to say "digital modulation of AM has been shot down." AM-HD shot itself down. It's a lousy system that just plain doesn't work.

The AM flavor of HD was hastily cobbled together when the NAB demanded that hybrid-digital couldn't be left out of the plan. When most opinion from experienced AM engineers predicted that there was insufficient bandwidth and that the propogation characteristics would create disastrous adjacent-channel interference, particularly at night, the response was to finesse the problem by farming it out to an aerospace electronics consortium with no medium-wave training or experience. In other words: a conscious decision was taken to ignore physics and live in a fantasy world.

AM-HD failed because it had to. You can polish poop all day long, and you still wind up with poop.
 
I'm in catagory E and damn proud of it. If I'd have known I was going to live this long I would have taken better care of myself (Mickey Mantle.)
 
What were the categories again?? I forgot. (Isn't it time for Judge Wapner or Wheel of Fortune??)

Oh. Yeah. I'm 59, so that puts me in.....hmm. Let's see. Yep, got it right here. I'm in "E".

Excuse me. Gotta head out to Walgreens with my left turn signal on all the way.
 
HowardMBurgers said:
Besides the age gap, people under 40 generally don't listen to right or left-wing political talk shows. For the most part, older demographics do and that's about it. PPM measurement has eliminated the option for listeners to 'vote' for their favorite stations, and the AM N/T shows have paid the price.

My point is that since digital modulation of AM signals has been effectively shot down and lost the battle, all we can do is sit back and listen to AM as it fades into the sunset. Young people don't want to hear old and grumpy political talk and stereo commercials, when they can hear superior audio quality of whatever music they want, when they want it.

By the way, I fall into the D category.
Click to expand...

While it's true that most (but not all by any means) talk radio listeners are over 40, your theory is based on a mistaken assumption that the same listeners are the only ones who will ever listen to political talk radio. That has already been proven wrong. What happens is when people get into their mid 30s and up, they start to take more interest in politics - particularly conservatives. At that point, they tune into the likes of Rush. So, you do get an influx of 35-40 year olds (mainly men) who left other formats to listen. The older listeners fade out, but you do get newer ones to take their place. That's how it's been since 1990 or so. The format is not dying by any means, nor is it only the Geratol crowd listening. In fact, the ratings have been quite good for talk in many places.

As for the AM band, perhaps its prognosis isn't quite as good as that of talk radio. The big 50 kw flamethrowers still do well. They have a clear signal in their markets and are easy to find. The smaller stations are the ones in big trouble. And, rather than shoehorning MORE stations into the MW band, the FCC should be paring it down. Culling the herd to protect the strong.
 
That WOWO clip posted earlier is not the best representation of what AM Stereo sounded like. The Radio Shack TM-152 was pretty narrow bandwidth. Any of the Sony Radios, Delco, Ford or the Denon TU680NAB sounded way better.

Personally, I think wide bandwidth is more important than stereo - but having both is certainly nice.

In time, it may be that internet streaming is the overall winner. I listen to WBZ-AM at home that way and it sounds spectacular. I've also heard some of the Clear Channel AM's on the Blackberry iHeartRadio app. and is is also very good. At some point, radio may just get out of the transmission business and focus on content. Let the phone companies deal with the delivery.

Until I see HD really become a big success, or it just happens to come with a radio or car I buy, I'm not spending money on it. I have a pile of C-Quam receivers which are a testament to the risk of being on the cutting edge (but at least I got several years of enjoyment from them - where I am I doubt the HD would lock in a reliable way).
 
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