WILL BRITAIN ADAPT HD RADIO?

[blackgold]

Here's a question I'd like to pose to you all-with DAB(Digital audio broadcasting) failing to attract listeners in the UK, will the IBOC HD Radio platform be adapted there any time soon?

 

[NXEA]

Here's a question I'd like to pose to you all-with DAB(Digital audio broadcasting) failing to attract listeners in the UK, will the IBOC HD Radio platform be adapted there any time soon?

Considering more than 17 million people (in a country with a total population of 60 million) listen to DAB each week, and more than 16 million housholds own a DAB radio, you can hardly say that DAB is failing to attract listeners.

http://www.nma.co.uk/digital-radio-listening-up-14-backed-by-increase-in-dab-sets/3006071.article

I got a DAB radio a few months back and love it. No dial positions, just look up the name of the station you want. Contary to the highly slanted HD radio entry in Wikipedia, some DAB stations broadcast above 128kbps (Classic at 160kbps, Radio 3 at 192kbps).

In 2015 or 2016 all full power UK FM stations (alot simulcast on DAB already) are scheduled to migrate to DAB only, and the FM band will be used for ultra-local lower-power community stations. This date though will probably slip as the roll-out of in-car DAB in the UK has been much slower. But here's another thing: if you want to listen to any of the national FM or AM stations: they are mostly already on DAB, and many are also on the audio portion of Freeview digital television (free multi-channel over the air digital TV) which is quickly replacing analog television (all analog TV will be switched off by 2012), plus we have an ever-increasing 3G mobile phone network where you can listen any radio station that is on the net. With all these choices I can't see HD radio being considered, and as the UK is part of the EU it means they probably will eventaully want inter-operability between all 27 nations at some point using DAB of some sort.

 

[adamgre]

is there anyway to listen to UK radio on a Blackberry?

 

[CHRles]

Try this website
http://www.radiofeeds.co.uk/pda/

 

[BMR]

BBC are still committed to the DAB platform and launching new transmitters.

Personally I can't see analogue radio being switched off in any great hurry though. There are just too many analogue sets out there, and no easy or cheap uprgade route as there is for TV.

 

[Charlie]

The turn-out for the Digital Reform Bill makes for interesting viewing/reading... This chap has blogged about it: http://po-ru.com/diary/democracy-live/

 

[smorris]

IBOC wouldn't work in the UK: stations in neighbouring areas are very often too close together in frequency, and the UK has a much less crowded band than most of Europe. Experiments with IBOC in Europe have been done, but have never lasted long.

In the UK DAB is fairly well established, but has drawbacks - it's very expensive to run (in most places commercial stations won't do it without incentives / subsidies) and the signal often struggles to get indoors much more than FM.

Other systems are on test around Europe but none fully established yet. e.g. FMXtra is on test in Holland and Italy, DRM+ in Germany.

 

[BMR]

I actually think FM is pretty good. Unlike AM, which has clearly had its day. I think the future for the UK will be FM and DAB both having a role to play.

Germany is switching off AM to spend the money on DAB, but keeping FM.


It's a shame, though, that we will be losing the universal global standard of radio. Unlike TVs, radios currently work (almost) anywhere in the world...

 

[e-dawg]

Is the UK actually going to shut down the FM band instead of Combining FM and DAB?

 

[smorris]

The previous government wanted to drop FM and AM for everything except 'community radio' in 2015. The new government is making vague noises about backing away from that idea, probably wisely given we are in a recession and the last 'Digital Britain' report called for commercial radio to be given long term subsidies (!) in order for them to afford DAB.

However I would predict the electronics manufacturing industry (very keen on switchover - lots of profit in everyone having to buy new radios), and maybe one or two of the radio groups, will be issuing howls of pain via their lobbyists about that.

We'll see what happens. I'm personally hoping for a reorganisation of FM, and a scaling back of the DAB network. Thanks to 1950s/1970s planning, London has fewer FM stations than any capital city in Europe, and probably 90% of those in the world. Other smaller cities are in a similar situation. While it wouldn't offer the same capacity as DAB, a lot more of the new stations would actually be able to break even...

 

[e-dawg]

United Kingdom need to re-organized their band scan. In London I counted 25 FM stations, 20 for citywide coverage. That is less than Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Rome, Athens, Berlin, Brussels, Amsterdam. It should be about 40-50 not 20. I don't think DAB will solve the issue.

88.8, 89.1, 90.2 90.5, 91.0, 91.3, 93.2, 93.5, 94.9, 95.8, 96.9, 97.3, 98.5, 98.8, 100.0, 100.6, 100.9, 102.2, 103.3, 104.4, 104.9, 105.4, 105.8, 106.2 107.1.

 

[BMR]

United Kingdom need to re-organized their band scan. In London I counted 25 FM stations, 20 for citywide coverage. That is less than Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Rome, Athens, Berlin, Brussels, Amsterdam. It should be about 40-50 not 20.

Article on why the UK has fewer stations here http://frequencyfinder.org.uk/other_fm.html

 

[smorris]

United Kingdom need to re-organized their band scan. In London I counted 25 FM stations

With two on your list being pirates... the total citywide stations count if you exclude duplicate frequencies and pirates is 14.

 

[KB1OKL]

Here's a question I'd like to pose to you all-with DAB(Digital audio broadcasting) failing to attract listeners in the UK, will the IBOC HD Radio platform be adapted there any time soon?

Bob from MA, USA here,

IBOC is a huge failure here, well not huge because almost no one besides radio people have ever heard of it or know what it really is, it ONLY gets press in radio mags and radio forums, I own one and am the only person I know personally who does own one and mine is gathering dust on top of my real receiver, a thirty year old Marantz. The range is terrible, it doesn't sound much if at all better than analog radio, drops out constantly and interferes with it's neighboring stations with white noise. It is a proprietary system with a lot of the huge radio conglomerates invested in it and even they are starting to bail out on it. Do not, I stress, do not believe anything positive you may read about iBlock in the press, it is almost always an ibiquity press release or some other hack who stands to attempt to profit on it. The only people who have profited on it so far are the ibiquity people themselves who own the licensing rights and it is highly debatable whether they have profited at all, most think big radio is propping them up. It takes up 2-3 channels depending on whether it's AM or FM we're talking here and whooshes up the bands, especially the AM band. As in your country with DAB it is nothing but an attempted money making scam led by big business. We do have one thing going for us however at least our government isn't trying to force it down our throats like yours, ours is letting it slowly sink and drown all by itself. Ours however lets legitimate interference claims die without being addressed by our harmful interference rules. Good luck and may DAB die along with iblock.

 

[MarioMania]

How many pirates are going to Pop up when FM stations turn off analog in 2015