HD Radio?
October 11, 2006 10:15 AM Subscribe
HD radio? What is it? Is it better? Why would a person bother?
The local NPR pledge drive is in full-swing and they are pushing an HD radio receiver as one of their premiums. I am a radio junkie - listening online to a bunch of radio streams on itunes and downloading various podcasts -- I've even considered getting a radio with better reception so that I can listen to the public radio station in the next state over --
So my questions are:
What is HD radio? What's added?
(When the receivers get cheaper) Would their be any point in having one beyond what I can already get online?
The local NPR pledge drive is in full-swing and they are pushing an HD radio receiver as one of their premiums. I am a radio junkie - listening online to a bunch of radio streams on itunes and downloading various podcasts -- I've even considered getting a radio with better reception so that I can listen to the public radio station in the next state over --
So my questions are:
What is HD radio? What's added?
(When the receivers get cheaper) Would their be any point in having one beyond what I can already get online?
Best answer: From npr.
Hybrid Digital radio has good sound quality (ibiquity advertises it as CD-quality) and doesn't have the "staticky" sound of regular FM. The biggest difference is that stations can play more than one stream on their regular FM frequency by compressing the digital streams onto the sidebands, but the more subfrequencies they cram on there, the lower the quality of each. I think most public radio stations will lean toward a two-channel format, one music, one talk. One other difference (which applies more in a car than for a tabletop model like the one your station is giving away) is that when you go out of range of an HD station, it just drops out all at once rather than gradually losing reception.
Adoption of the technology has been slow because until very recently, the receivers were prohibitively expensive---why would a station broadcast in HD if no listeners are willing to pay $300 for a receiver? Not many radio stations are currently broadcasting in HD, but more are getting on board all the time. I don't think it will really take off until carmakers start offering them in new vehicles.
If you are going to pledge anyway (which I assume you are if you're a big pubradio fan), might as well go ahead and get the radio, right?
posted by slenderloris at 2:08 PM on October 11, 2006
Hybrid Digital radio has good sound quality (ibiquity advertises it as CD-quality) and doesn't have the "staticky" sound of regular FM. The biggest difference is that stations can play more than one stream on their regular FM frequency by compressing the digital streams onto the sidebands, but the more subfrequencies they cram on there, the lower the quality of each. I think most public radio stations will lean toward a two-channel format, one music, one talk. One other difference (which applies more in a car than for a tabletop model like the one your station is giving away) is that when you go out of range of an HD station, it just drops out all at once rather than gradually losing reception.
Adoption of the technology has been slow because until very recently, the receivers were prohibitively expensive---why would a station broadcast in HD if no listeners are willing to pay $300 for a receiver? Not many radio stations are currently broadcasting in HD, but more are getting on board all the time. I don't think it will really take off until carmakers start offering them in new vehicles.
If you are going to pledge anyway (which I assume you are if you're a big pubradio fan), might as well go ahead and get the radio, right?
posted by slenderloris at 2:08 PM on October 11, 2006
Response by poster: Thanks slenderloris - I should've known to look at NPR!
I never would have thought the 'H' would be for 'Hybrid' but I guess that makes sense considering the definition.
I can understand why it's not catching on. None of the selling points compel me to consider buying one. Somebody else will have to take one of those radios as a premium (on top of the fact that the pledge amount is a little too rich for me)
Still, I am curious if anybody out there has an HD radio and if they can notice a difference in sound quality. And how about that additional programming? Is there much out there?
posted by nnk at 3:06 PM on October 11, 2006
I never would have thought the 'H' would be for 'Hybrid' but I guess that makes sense considering the definition.
I can understand why it's not catching on. None of the selling points compel me to consider buying one. Somebody else will have to take one of those radios as a premium (on top of the fact that the pledge amount is a little too rich for me)
Still, I am curious if anybody out there has an HD radio and if they can notice a difference in sound quality. And how about that additional programming? Is there much out there?
posted by nnk at 3:06 PM on October 11, 2006
I know almost nothing about HD Radio, and I haven't listened, but I know that FM radio is advertising HD radio receivers and the concept of HD radio VERY heavily, at least in the DC area. I hear one of their commercials every 30 minutes or so in the morning and afternoon commutes on DC101/98Rock...
I actually doubt many HD stations are up and running because if they were, existing FM stations would be pimping their HD affiliates rather than just the HD receivers. Thus, I'm inclined to believe that the recent advertising blitz is an attempt to solve the chicken-and-egg problem of lack of receivers and transmitters, more than anything.
I am not a radio junkie, standard disclaimer of my ignorance and this being a wild-arse guess goes here.
posted by Alterscape at 3:37 PM on October 11, 2006
I actually doubt many HD stations are up and running because if they were, existing FM stations would be pimping their HD affiliates rather than just the HD receivers. Thus, I'm inclined to believe that the recent advertising blitz is an attempt to solve the chicken-and-egg problem of lack of receivers and transmitters, more than anything.
I am not a radio junkie, standard disclaimer of my ignorance and this being a wild-arse guess goes here.
posted by Alterscape at 3:37 PM on October 11, 2006
Best answer: It's confusingly named intentionally! They really want to evoke "High Definiton" from the HD, but the materials I've seen from Ibiquity state that the name is just "HD Radio", and the HD does not stand for anything.
I have a JVC car HD receiver, one of the first that supports 'multicasting' (additional side-channels of programming). It does 'work' great for eliminating static on the primary feed of a station. My local NPR station broadcasts two side-channels: one of alternate NPR programming (time-shifted and otherwise), and the third is all BBC news all the time. The sound quality of the primary feed is pretty good, the alternate programming feed is a little worse (and goes out when reception conditions are poor, as opposed to fading in the analog signal for the primary feed), and the BBC news feed sounds like RealAudio from around 1998 on a 28.8 modem (also cutting out in poor reception areas).
On stations where they are not borrowing (much) bandwidth to broadcast additional 'multicasted' programming, the audio quality is quite good, imho, and it's kind of a trip when you first tune to an HD station where it initially plays the crackly analog signal, then a few seconds later the receiver locks on to the digital signal and fades over to the clear feed. It's impressive.
In the Seattle area there are about a bunch of HD stations, most with alternate programming on a secondary feed. No HD AM stations here though. Found one on a roadtrip this summer though, and it was even more dramatic of an improvement in fidelity: staticky lo-fi mono to clear med-fi stereo.
posted by xiojason at 3:56 PM on October 11, 2006
I have a JVC car HD receiver, one of the first that supports 'multicasting' (additional side-channels of programming). It does 'work' great for eliminating static on the primary feed of a station. My local NPR station broadcasts two side-channels: one of alternate NPR programming (time-shifted and otherwise), and the third is all BBC news all the time. The sound quality of the primary feed is pretty good, the alternate programming feed is a little worse (and goes out when reception conditions are poor, as opposed to fading in the analog signal for the primary feed), and the BBC news feed sounds like RealAudio from around 1998 on a 28.8 modem (also cutting out in poor reception areas).
On stations where they are not borrowing (much) bandwidth to broadcast additional 'multicasted' programming, the audio quality is quite good, imho, and it's kind of a trip when you first tune to an HD station where it initially plays the crackly analog signal, then a few seconds later the receiver locks on to the digital signal and fades over to the clear feed. It's impressive.
In the Seattle area there are about a bunch of HD stations, most with alternate programming on a secondary feed. No HD AM stations here though. Found one on a roadtrip this summer though, and it was even more dramatic of an improvement in fidelity: staticky lo-fi mono to clear med-fi stereo.
posted by xiojason at 3:56 PM on October 11, 2006
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http://www.ibiquity.com/hd_radio/hdradio_find_a_station
posted by trevyn at 10:33 AM on October 11, 2006