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Old 10th Dec 2018, 1:53 pm   #21
dave walsh
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

I used to listen to Jazz FM from 2006 onward's but it did go "soft" in the end. I didn't know it was lurking under the + sign now! I also enjoyed the New Orleans Jazz Station WWOZ [pronounced as in Wizard or "ohzee" as the Americans say!]. During Katrina they had to shift up the Hill with a temporary aerial but kept going on the air and online. There was only them and the American Radio League Emergency Team on SW. Quite a lot of people were more concerned about a lack of cell phone signal than anything else-amazingly! Now they would be wanting to ask Alexa for help.

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Old 10th Dec 2018, 2:05 pm   #22
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

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Originally Posted by k_yller View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by cheerfulcharlie View Post
Hope not..bought one of those Asda-On £20 DAB/FM sets to replace my ageing Grundig..
Have to say the DAB has been absolutely brilliant.picking up with clarity non local stations I was interested in.....no drop outs or popcorn- stereo coming out the ear jack as well.
stereo? from what i know as a user of DAB only BBC provide stereo broadcasting with higher bitrate (only BBC can switch stereo pilot lamp on my DENON)
Plenty of stereo stations on there roughly about 40/60 mono I would guess.
If some have lower bit rates then it's not of that much concern on my 'work' radio but hisses, disturbances from modern electronic paraphernalia and crackles are..and this little DAB does away with all that.

However saying that, the FM side is pretty good too with anything from the 'local' transmitters.

Anyway an enjoyable way to spend 20 quid (sometimes discounted to £15)
At our ages we probably visit hospitals frequently for either ourselves or someone else, so bought a friend one in hospital, and have to say it out performed anything I have known used in say a hospital..and just to say I have absolutely nothing to do with Asda or any associated company.

As a lad (like many others) I recorded (direct no microphone)the top twenty pop shows on Radio 1 and what is interesting today is listening to all the disturbances- I have decoded a couple of numbers from Mum's pulse dial phone - the boiler striking up - and various vehicles passing by.
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Old 10th Dec 2018, 2:09 pm   #23
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

I would expect all DAB radios made in the last decade or so to support DAB+ as they all use the same chipsets. It doesn't make sense for the chipmakers to produce non DAB+ chips as few countries use bog standard DAB (the UK and Norway are probably the biggest markets, and even these are slowly migrating to DAB+).
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Old 10th Dec 2018, 4:06 pm   #24
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

Maybe it is a matter of price points? You sell a DAB radio for £20 and a DAB+ for £30. They are identical internally, apart from a wire link. Just an idea.
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Old 10th Dec 2018, 4:40 pm   #25
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

During a tropospheric 'lift' on Band II some weeks ago, I resurrected an early Woolworth's DAB/FM set. It had been in the top of a bedroom cupboard for over four years. Relocating it to the workshop for testing, to my surprise (and joy) I found that the FM section was equipped with an RDS decoder ... very handy for identifying the likes of 'France Bleu Armorique' from Rennes

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Old 10th Dec 2018, 5:44 pm   #26
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

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I would expect all DAB radios made in the last decade or so to support DAB+ as they all use the same chipsets. It doesn't make sense for the chipmakers to produce non DAB+ chips as few countries use bog standard DAB (the UK and Norway are probably the biggest markets, and even these are slowly migrating to DAB+).

I think it is disingenuous to offer for sale non + DAB radios without making it crystal clear that it won't receive all available stations.

You might say I am nonplussed about it.

The situation exactly mirrors the situation with DVB-T vs. DVB-D2 TV sets, and many people bought the former without realising they only received a subset of the available channels, including missing out on some standard definition channels.

Expecting the public to recognise the right kind of "tick" on the packaging is not enough.
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Old 10th Dec 2018, 6:09 pm   #27
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Well that is market forces, general ignorance, and/or not wanting to learn or understand and political lobbying for you. To quote a popular song from The Jam "The public gets what the public wants (I'm going underground)"

A shame, DAB+ and it's after-goers implemented nationally would be a great improvement. With the demise of 405 there where some complaints by then nearly everyone had a 625 set, I think the same applies to DAB radios where most in use have DAB+ too.
 
Old 10th Dec 2018, 6:20 pm   #28
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

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I think it is disingenuous to offer for sale non + DAB radios without making it crystal clear that it won't receive all available stations.
I agree, the difference between the flavours of DAB is not anything like as obvious to the layperson as AM/FM/LW.

There has been such a song and dance promotion of DAB - even to the extent that the BBC have been in on the act* - yet this distinction hardly gets an airing.

"Look for the tick so that you can receive all the stations." ?

*5 Live seems to have quietly dropped reference to transmissions on AM when they announce their platforms.
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Old 10th Dec 2018, 10:25 pm   #29
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

I have an internet radio permanently connected to a pantry AM transmitter. My AM sets in various rooms in the house can now receive stations from all over the world. The remote control works over the wifi so it doesn't need to be in the same room as the internet radio. If I want Hi-Fi quality I use a decent FM tuner. Who needs DAB+ whatever that is.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 12:28 am   #30
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

I just type the name of the radio station into a search engine and click the listen now button. Other peoples night time output has less adverts than our own daytime offerings.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 12:55 am   #31
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

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Who needs DAB+ whatever that is.
DAB+ uses a much later codec than bog standard DAB and this handles low bitrates much better. It has the potential to make DAB sound nicer, but unsurprisingly the broadcasters have simply seized the opportunity to crush the bitrates down even further so there is no audible benefit for the listener.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 1:12 am   #32
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

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Originally Posted by paulsherwin View Post
I would expect all DAB radios made in the last decade or so to support DAB+ as they all use the same chipsets. It doesn't make sense for the chipmakers to produce non DAB+ chips as few countries use bog standard DAB (the UK and Norway are probably the biggest markets, and even these are slowly migrating to DAB+).
Unfortunately, although the chipsets that support DAB+ are used in both sorts of radios, many manufacturers disable the DAB+ in software. This is because the patents for original DAB have expired, and no royalties are payable. Original DAB dates back to around 1995, it's almost vintage now. But DAB+ requires royalties to be paid by radio manufacturers. To cut costs and avoid paying royalties, many DAB radios sold in the UK have DAB+ disabled, yet in other countries where DAB+ is used exclusively, the same radios are DAB+ enabled. Pure and Roberts Radio have both been guilty of disabling DAB+ on their UK models.

Pure allowed UK customers to upgrade the software in some of their DAB+ capable radios on payment of a fee. For a while, the DAB+ upgrade was free of charge. I successfully upgraded a Pure Siesta clock radio to DAB+ for free by updating its software and then entering a special code obtained from Pure to enable the "+".

Unfortunately, no such luck with a Roberts Sound100. Models sold outside the UK have DAB+, but not mine. Although it has a USB port for software upgrades, there are none on their website. A phone call to Roberts Technical Support was answered by a helpful sounding person who said the radio would have to be returned to their workshop to have a new DAB+ module fitted, at a cost of £60. No way! It's cheaper to buy a no-name DAB+ radio and feed it into the Roberts' AUX IN socket.

Luckily there are only a couple of stations I listen to that require DAB+ and one of them (UnionJack) can't be received at home due to no signal - I only listen on a DAB+ car radio. So it's no big deal as yet. But if there is a total switchover to DAB+, I'll be left with a lot of obsolete sets. In particular, I'd miss the Pure stereo DAB radio which I use every weekend to record Pick Of The Pops onto SD card for later listening. There is no DAB+ equivalent of this type of recording radio, as far as I know.

Ultimately, I predict online listening (streaming) will kill off DAB(+) in the next 10-20 years.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 11:48 am   #33
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

Well this little Asda ( I'll shut up about it now LOL) radio is picking up Union Jack radio right now in stereo on the headphones (obviously I might be in a hotspot?) but I really can't be bothered with 'bit rates' and what is happening in 20 years time (as I may not be here anyway and my recordings will land up in landfill) and appreciate the every day surprise and delights such as what came from a 20 quid radio.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 12:21 pm   #34
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Unfortunately, although the chipsets that support DAB+ are used in both sorts of radios, many manufacturers disable the DAB+ in software. This is because the patents for original DAB have expired, and no royalties are payable.
I wasn't aware of that, thanks for the info. It seems ridiculous for manufacturers of expensive branded radios to be shipping models with DAB+ disabled to save the tiny licensing charge, if only because of the resulting reputational damage.

I agree that internet streaming is likely to kill off DAB sooner rather than later. Devices now cost little more than typical DAB sets and most people have uncapped home broadband. They are easier to use, more versatile and have better sound quality.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 1:38 pm   #35
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

With power consumption taken into account DAB will end up as a car radio platform only.
Batteries hardly last more than a day so the things are tied to mains or a car.
Mains commonly comes with uncapped broad band so streaming ends up being easiest.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 2:23 pm   #36
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Batteries hardly last more than a day so the things are tied to mains or a car.
Eight or ten hours' use from a set of D cells was typical of early DAB sets, but fairly soon that improved to, as I recall, something more like 120-150 hours. Must admit I've never run a DAB set from batteries, then most of mine don't have the facility and batteries haven't powered much of my radio listening in the last 30 years or so.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 2:40 pm   #37
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

Battery life has certainly improved since the early days, but they still pull a lot of power. It doesn't help that they usually handle FM in software running on the DSP chip, so battery consumption is just as high when using FM.

I see the future as being:

Battery portables: FM
Cars: DAB
Mains radios: internet

Whether it's practical to continue with multiple delivery systems like this is unclear. A lot may depend on how the 5G rollout goes, as this may enable permanent uncapped high speed internet connectivity in vehicles. Most buses around these parts already have permanent 3/4G connectivity, which they use for contactless fare payments amongst other things.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 3:22 pm   #38
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

Some bus companies offer free WiFi and phone charging points.
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Old 11th Dec 2018, 3:35 pm   #39
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Who needs DAB+ whatever that is.
I need DAB (+) on my motorcycle for the radio (4 extra and world service) no internet on the bike!
Quote:
Batteries hardly last more than a day so
I have a portable dab radio that uses ONE AA cell, lasts for a day at least, advertised as 14 hours. https://www.techdigest.tv/2007/01/alba_unveils_ne.html
 
Old 11th Dec 2018, 3:57 pm   #40
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Default Re: Redundant DAB sets?

Some people seem to think that just because they don't need something, or like something, no one else should either.

I don't like BBC R2 much, but clearly a lot of people do and good luck to them.
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