Wi-Fi Radio

[SDRadio]

Bought me a name brand wi-fi radio and am amazed on the sound quality of AM and FM. I can listen to KOGO, KFMB, and XTRA Sports a lot easier. Plus, using the Receivia database, I can listen to stations around the world.

Anyone else out there in San Diego land have one, and your thoughts? I'm very pleased with my radio -- especially since living close to KFMB/KSDO/KCBQ towers that tends to null AM reception.

 

[paulcano]

Did you go with the Poway, CA company Grace for your radio purchase? They're supposed to have have some of the best internet radios you can buy (I always hear bad things about the C Craine WiFi Radio). Love my Grace radio. Even picked it up at their Poway office.

 

[SDRadio]

OH MY no, Paul. I did buy the C Crane WiFi radio and it has been a great radio. It was on sale for $120.00. It has been wonderful; and I use it every day. From local, to BBC, and Radio Ireland, I enjoy it. As I stated, I primarily got it for AM radio reception. Two many high powered sticks in my hood of 760, 1130, and 1170.

 

[pianoplayer88key]

Is 910 not a pest? 1170 diplexes with them.

 

[paulcano]

OH MY no, Paul. I did buy the C Crane WiFi radio and it has been a great radio. It was on sale for $120.00. It has been wonderful; and I use it every day. From local, to BBC, and Radio Ireland, I enjoy it. As I stated, I primarily got it for AM radio reception. Two many high powered sticks in my hood of 760, 1130, and 1170.

WOW! $120 is hard to pass up! I mostly listen to KFI for local stations and some great internet stations (1Club.FM and 181.FM)

 

[pianoplayer88key]

How well does it pick up distant and/or weak stations 10kHz off your local pests in the daytime? For example, do you hear anything on 750, 770, 900, 920 (Ensenada or KPSI Palm Springs), 1120 (Mexicali), 1140 (KNWQ Palm Springs), 1160 (XEQIN San Quintin) or 1180 (KERN Wasco-Greenacres)? With my PL-380 and Select-A-Tenna from a couple miles south of El Cajon, if they are positioned and tuned properly I can sometimes just barely detect 920 Ensenada, 1140 KNWQ and 1180 KERN.
Also how close are you to the 760, 910/1170 and 1130 sites?

 

[SDRadio]

Also how close are you to the 760, 910/1170 and 1130 sites?

Right about in the middle of 'em all, near the Lakes of Santee. AM reception is null from 540 to the upper part. I can get all those stations above really good ... but KOGO and others are just not there. I have several radios (GE SuperTuner, C Crane DX, and a descent AM radio in the car -- the Pioneer SuperTuner) ...

 

[pianoplayer88key]

so you mean you get NOTHING... except 760, 910, 1130 and 1170?  Not even anything as weak as... WNSB415 clip 1 or clip 2 (somewhat stronger), KIXW, KZSB, or KFRN?  (Those were recorded at home in east Mt. Helix area (in the area bounded by Avocado Av, Chase Av, Jamacha Rd & Fury Ln.)  I'm quite shocked!
I recorded reception of several different stations, XEMO, KURS, KNX, XEPRS & XERCN, on two different radios on Morena Ave about 700-800 feet south of KCBQ/KECR's transmitter site.  One radio (my Panasonic RQ-SW20 - a walkman-style early/mid 1990s radio + cassette player) picked them up fine, but the other (my Tecsun PL-380 - a recent DSP "ultralight") could hardly even hear a trace.   I also used the same two radios to record reception of several stations ...  are you prepared? ... within 75 FEET(!) of 1450 KFSD's tower!  As with the other recordings, the RQ-SW20 did a better job at pulling them in than the PL-380.
I would expect that the radios you're using should run circles around that Panasonic I just mentioned.  I'm just completely puzzled as to how you could get no reception of anything else from Santee Lakes, when I pulled in several stations (and I could have heard more, too) from within 1/8 mile of a 50kW site!  ??? ??? ???  YEOWZERZ!  And here I thought the radios I'm using had their share of struggles, ranging from stations bleeding halfway across the band (or desensing so badly that only locals could be heard) to it just not being sensitive enough to hear some of the ones I want to hear (for which I'm quite far outside Radio-Locator's predicted 0.15mV/m contour for many of them).
I guess now I know which radios to NOT try to use for the oft occasions I want to hear a 0.6µV/m signal (or whatever level a signal would be that's right at atmospheric noise level, assuming no thunderstorms within a couple thousand mile radius) 10kHz away (or less, for digging TPs and TAs out, for example) from a 614.4V/m signal (max recommended public exposure for most of the AM band, per FCC 1.1310).

 

[eganders]

Anyone else out there in San Diego land have one, and your thoughts? I'm very pleased with my radio

Hey Chris, I'm in SD and purchased my first Logitech Squeezebox products about 20 months ago when Circuit City was closing their doors. I saw two SqueezeBox Booms sitting on a table near the front door, and had no idea what they were (nor did the sales people!). I went home, did a bit of quick research, and ran back down to the store to purchase them at 50% off. Since then I've acquired several more, and introduced the simple pleasure of quality digital streams to many friends who've also purchased.

 

[bob_international]

I lived in California nearly 30 years, moved to Arizona in 2007. Bought a Sangean WFR-20 in 2008. It's great!! use it to listen to KLAC, KFI, KSPN, KBRT, KABC, KRLA, KNX, KCBQ (Larson) and KWVE. I receive them better over the internet better then I did in Ca. I just wish the stations would do a better job of synchronizing the OTA and Stream commercial breaks. Frequently one will hear the start of the OTA spot then switch to the internet spot.. then the stream will rejoin the program late.   

 

[SDRadio]

I'm just completely puzzled as to how you could get no reception of anything else from Santee Lakes, when I pulled in several stations (and I could have heard more, too) from within 1/8 mile of a 50kW site!

I'm not doubting you; but I don't try scanning the AM dial until the summit of the 53, or Slaughterhouse Canyon Road on the 67.

 

[jefflaurence]

You guys want to hear REALLY awesome Internet radio..try using an iPod Touch with the Bose Ipod base unit..It is unbelievable..and Ipod has a Reciva app.

Furthermore it is all battery powered (you can charge the iPod when plugged in and use it all as a portable as long as you have a wifi signal or use an iPhone)

 

[steve91x]

A few years ago, I predicted that internet radio will become available in the car before too long, the WiFi thing has been available for over a year...iPhone, Blackberry and Andoroid all have free apps for streaming internet radio and with the wide coverage of 3G and the soon to be available 4G it is possible to drive and listen to your favorite internet station, uninterrupted. Many of my listeners are emailing me from all over the country to inform me that they are doing precisely that. Additionally the audio quality is far superior to FM.
The larger question is, what kind of impact will this have on terrestrial radio moving forward?

 

[RadeoEngineer]

Hey Steve. Nice to see you on here. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

John Buffaloe

 

[radio-darn]

A few years ago, I predicted that internet radio will become available in the car before too long...

I started listening to internet radio in the car six years ago using a Palm Treo (connected to the car radio through one of those cassette adapters) and Sprint data service. Now we have XM in one of our cars so we can choose old fashioned AM-FM radio, satellite radio or internet radio. At home the lines get blurred as I listen to XM on my computer: a terrestrial feed of satellite radio received through my computer's Wi-Fi connection.

Remember the old days when phones were wired and TV and Radio were wireless? I pity the radio managers who still think only in terms of what comes out of their antennas.