4 ms·

Maybe the HD radio system was the way to go, digital with analog fall back. At least on FM, on AM it doesn't work well for me.

by jdofaz 6y ago

reaperducer 6y ago
HD Radio has some of the same disadvantages as digital TV — if you don't have a strong enough signal, it drops out. The worse part, to me, is that it takes quite a long time for the HD signal to lock in. I had a brand new rental car last month with a brand new HD radio in it. It took upwards of ten seconds for some of the HD signals to lock in. Radio stations (AM and FM) can improve this by going all-digital, instead of the hybrid technology almost all are running right now. But doing so not only excludes hundreds of millions of older radios, it reduces the coverage area. It's simply not worth the revenue hit, since in radio coverage area is everything. On the plus side, I had a great Sony HD tabletop radio that I loved dearly. It had an iPod dock on top and if a song came on the radio that you liked, you'd press a button and the track information would be stored in a special playlist the iPod. Then the next time you plugged the iPod into iTunes, it would match the information from the playlist and you could buy the song you heard on the radio from iTunes. It worked really well. I wish something like that existed for satellite radio.
- jdofaz 6y ago
  A while back a local station was having a problem and their analog signal was off but they were still transmitting digital. When I tuned in it was kind of funny because it was all static and then it faded into whatever music they were playing. I've always wondered what full digital stations do, but for the reasons you've said I doubt there are any.
- interestica 6y ago
  I always wondered why apple never integrated something like this into their iPods and iPhones. AFAIK, the Bluetooth chips in the devices were capable of FM radio reception. It always seems like a perfect chance to get radio users into the iTunes ecosphere. Heck, there may have even been an ad-revenue opportunity? (Radio ads that trigger screen ads on the device?)

Maybe the HD radio system was the way to go, digital with analog fall back. At least on FM, on AM it doesn't work well for me.

by jdofaz 6y ago

Maybe the HD radio system was the way to go, digital with analog fall back. At least on FM, on AM it doesn't work well for me.

reaperducer 6y ago

HD Radio has some of the same disadvantages as digital TV — if you don't have a strong enough signal, it drops out. The worse part, to me, is that it takes quite a long time for the HD signal to lock in. I had a brand new rental car last month with a brand new HD radio in it. It took upwards of ten seconds for some of the HD signals to lock in. Radio stations (AM and FM) can improve this by going all-digital, instead of the hybrid technology almost all are running right now. But doing so not only excludes hundreds of millions of older radios, it reduces the coverage area. It's simply not worth the revenue hit, since in radio coverage area is everything. On the plus side, I had a great Sony HD tabletop radio that I loved dearly. It had an iPod dock on top and if a song came on the radio that you liked, you'd press a button and the track information would be stored in a special playlist the iPod. Then the next time you plugged the iPod into iTunes, it would match the information from the playlist and you could buy the song you heard on the radio from iTunes. It worked really well. I wish something like that existed for satellite radio.

jdofaz 6y ago
A while back a local station was having a problem and their analog signal was off but they were still transmitting digital. When I tuned in it was kind of funny because it was all static and then it faded into whatever music they were playing. I've always wondered what full digital stations do, but for the reasons you've said I doubt there are any.
interestica 6y ago
I always wondered why apple never integrated something like this into their iPods and iPhones. AFAIK, the Bluetooth chips in the devices were capable of FM radio reception. It always seems like a perfect chance to get radio users into the iTunes ecosphere. Heck, there may have even been an ad-revenue opportunity? (Radio ads that trigger screen ads on the device?)