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UH-OH! JAGUAR SHELVES HD RADIO INDEFINITELY

S

Savage

This weekend circumstances brought me into the local Jaguar-Land Rover dealer where I had a few minutes to kill. Perusing the lush sales brochures, I found one of numerous pages detailing the multi-thousand dollar ACM (audio connectivity module) including triple inputs for outboard digital media choices, Bluetooth capability, radio, GPS, Satrad and.....huh? What's this? NO MENTION of HD Digital Radio!

I asked the sales manager about whether Jag's ACM platform included HD and got the highly predictable response, "what's HD Radio?" The manager brought a young, media-savvy assistant manager into the discussion. "Mark" furrowed his brow when his boss asked, do our radios get this HD Radio thing?

Mark responded, "not any more." He showed a factory bulletin advising all dealers that Jaguar has pulled HD from its audio packages "indefinitely," citing owner objections and bring-backs of new vehicles with complaints about radio performance. It seems (from the evident perspective of the lonely few HD fans left on the planet) that new Jaguar owners are taking the oddly petulant stance of insisting that the radios installed in their new $65,000 vehicles actually work properly. The HD-enabled Jags mostly came back to the dealers with complaints about distracting mode-hopping, intermittent muting, weak reception and noise. Jaguar is retrofitting all vehicles with receivers which are analog-only capable for terrestrial AM & FM. The company says, quite diplomatically, that it will revisit HD Radio "when the technical problems with the system are resolved by the broadcasting industry." Set your watch right now for "when hell freezes over."

We now pause to allow Clouseau, BigA, RF Burns, Radioman 100, Kelly and their ilk to howl about how Jaguar's market share is insignificant. And how that means its decision to bag HD Radio thus means nothing. Even though IBOC proponents proudly pointed to luxury marques' inclusion of HD mere months ago as being some harbinger of mass adoption.

There is no word on whether the HD suspension will extend to other related makes such as Land Rover, Volvo or even Ford. But I'll try to find out and report back here.
 
Ford recently sold Jaguar and Land-Rover to Indian automaker Tata Motors. Perhaps they already have enough tech support projects in Mumbai without adding HD to their work-load. ;D
 
$65,000 isn't an ordinary price tag, but the people who drive them have expectations that most people do regarding the simple operation of their radio.
in 1950 radio was still remarkable, people still thought a man broadcasting from a van was like the coolest thing on earth. In 2008 things have changed, expectations are very different because of ipods, iphones and the internet. But even today AM/FM still works and meets the needs of most listeners. We could talk about content but that's a different story. Iboc isn't ready yet. "BS" invited people to his Iboc restaurant, the doors are open for business, but the food and service sucks. Soon they'll be hanging a sign saying under new ownership.
 
Savage said:
He showed a factory bulletin advising all dealers that Jaguar has pulled HD from its audio packages "indefinitely," citing owner objections and bring-backs of new vehicles with complaints about radio performance.
Click to expand...

Must have been fairly recent, because the "build your (model)" function on their web site still shows the HD radio packages as an option.
 
The Jaguar factory bulletin dated from late August 2008. It may have been related to the sale of the marque to Tata (above.)
 
Hey, box-o-hair, not to contradict you - but I went through several models using the "build your --" function on the site and didn't see any mention of HD. (Disclaimer: I didn't go through every model, but I did the convertible and the XF and only saw a $2450 premium sound package.) Where did you see HD?
 
Savage said:
Hey, box-o-hair, not to contradict you - but I went through several models using the "build your --" function on the site and didn't see any mention of HD. (Disclaimer: I didn't go through every model, but I did the convertible and the XF and only saw a $2450 premium sound package.) Where did you see HD?
Click to expand...

I was "building" an XJ8 when I saw the option "HD Radio and Navigation Package" for $2800 (still there as of this posting). That model appeared to be closest in price to the price you mentioned in the original post.
 
Okay, thanks. I didn't get to the XJ8. From the factory bulletin I saw I presume that the website hasn't been updated in all respects. It seems logical that some finer details might get lost in the sale of Jaguar from Ford to Tata and they may not have gotten around to it.

Side note unrelated specifically to Jaguar: can you BELIEVE the most recent RW editorial?? Incredible.

"LEGACY stations DESERVE protection from interference?" (Of course they're referring to HD and the desperately-pushed-for digital power increase.)

What the hell is a LEGACY station??

How about: ALL stations DESERVE protection from interference?

I guess we can all assume that New Bay Media have decreed that Radio World shall henceforth be In The Tank for HD. "How Disappointing." Thought they had more integrity.
 
Savage said:
Side note unrelated specifically to Jaguar: can you BELIEVE the most recent RW editorial?? Incredible.

"LEGACY stations DESERVE protection from interference?" (Of course they're referring to HD and the desperately-pushed-for digital power increase.)

What the hell is a LEGACY station??

How about: ALL stations DESERVE protection from interference?

I guess we can all assume that New Bay Media have decreed that Radio World shall henceforth be In The Tank for HD. "How Disappointing." Thought they had more integrity.
Click to expand...

I agree that the term "legacy station" is ambiguous Newspeak. Most readers associate "legacy" with "legendary" -- and when followed with "station", a big signal AM pioneer like KFI, WLW or WGN comes to mind. But after getting past the headline and reading the commentary itself, it seems to me that "legacy" really means "analog".

So why the doubletalk? Why didn't Radio World just come out and say --- Analog Signals Deserve Protection from Interference?

Problem is, RW is advertiser supported, and New Bay Media wouldn't dare offend the big transmitter manufacturers like Harris, Nautel, Continental, and BE, who naturally support the proposed 10 dB "economic stimulus program". In an effort to straddle the fence, the commentary claims "some level of digital power increase is needed" to make the system perform acceptably, but acknowledges that it can't be "across-the-board" without causing serious interference to analog.

So what's the solution? RW won't come out and say it, but the answer can be found in the EXB article that begins on the front cover of the September 10 issue.

If we're serious about making a orderly transition, let's quit screwing around with the adjacent-channel hash generators, leave the AM and FM bands analog-only, and reassign soon-to-be-vacant TV channels to open-standard digital radio.
 
Savage did thusly:

... pause to allow Clouseau, BigA, RF Burns, Radioman 100, Kelly and their ilk to howl about how Jaguar's market share is insignificant.
Click to expand...

but our friends who love HDRadio have recently been silent for the most part these days. You don't hear much at all from them anymore, except for BigA, who is a relative newcomer here. I wonder why?

Ah, I have such fond memories of days gone by and lively discussions about the relative merits of things like IBOC and what stations will just be plain out of luck in the new HDRadio world order. I can remember when, to counter the arguments that HD Radio wasn't taking off with the public, that nice feller autopaint-1 said:

Let's see where we are at this time next year.
Click to expand...

That was in the summer of 2006. Ayup! How could I ever forget that? :) autopaint-1 and IBOCrocks were my two favorite sparring partners here. Yet sadly, I see they have both quit their memberships in this message board.
 
"Cal Stymes." Man, are you a NAYSAYER! ;)

C'mon, now. In 2006, there were 32 HD Radio listeners. Today, there are 40! That's TWENTY-FIVE PERCENT GROWTH!! :D

iBiquity's PR blabbermouths love to compare the rollout of HD to the growth curves for postwar television, FM and FM stereo. In Jeff Kisseloff's landmark narrative "The Box," which detailed the very early days in the morning of television, an early RCA-NBC exec detailed how everybody who bought a TV receiver got a postcard from NBC with that week's program schedule. They actually had a map of New York City with pushpins at each location where there was a TV. After they broadcast some noteworthy program, they would call up the TV owners to ask how they liked the show.

Of course, by the early 1950s there were millions of TVs in use so those folksy programming practices were soon abandoned. Today, four years after its rollout, HD Radio still has the functional equivalent of pins in a map to identify where there are HD listeners. They're clustered in a four-mile radius around transmitter sites.

Sure, HD defenders have departed. After a while, defending the indefensible just makes you look foolish. If HD had lived up to the promise of "let's see where we are this time next year," all the ludicrous press promotion, dopey slogans, relentless on-air promos and frantic attempts at technical band-aids wouldn't be necessary. HD Radio would simply be.......working, being enjoyed, and growing. ("It ain't cuz it can't.")
 
Savage said:
If HD had lived up to the promise of "let's see where we are this time next year," all the ludicrous press promotion, dopey slogans, relentless on-air promos and frantic attempts at technical band-aids wouldn't be necessary. HD Radio would simply be.......working, being enjoyed, and growing. ("It ain't cuz it can't.")
Click to expand...

And speaking of dopey slogans how about this latest idea of that genius brain trust, the HD Radio Alliance.

According to Inside Radio:

"In a spoof of political commercials hitting the airwaves, the HD Digital Radio Alliance releases new spots featuring creative that invites listeners to "vote" for HD Radio. The spot tells consumers "If you want real change, choose HD Radio!"

I don't know about you but I am totally worn out and sound bite fatigued by this presidential campaign. I can't wait for November just to end the insanity of it all.

The last thing I want to hear is some lame, unamusing shtick telling me to "vote for HD Radio."

C5
 
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