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Thread: Norway Switches off FM Radio Broadcasting

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    Default Norway Switches off FM Radio Broadcasting

    Quite a bold move, but nonetheless logical in a small country:
    I cannot see such a move in Australia for some time to come. DAB+ reception is confined to capital cities only and is questionable quality even at its best.
    I don't listen to FM radio at all (except JJJ sometimes) as I find the commercial broadcasts appalling. In the car I listen to podcasts and at home use a Redback DAB+ model A2698 in the workshop to listen to the ABC stations.
    I have three Sangean PR-D3L long range AM receivers located in various rooms in the house. Only recently returned from a holiday in Coffs Harbour and was picking up Sydney stations over 500 kilometres away at night.
    The other concerning aspect of DAB+ receivers is their hunger for batteries; all that DSP hardware consumes a great deal of current in a portable device.
    At least Norway can now probably deal with the issue of propagation delay and time stamping?
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    In their way its no different to when Australia went from Analog TV to Digital a few years ago.
    However their changing over 'County by County' rather than the whole country at once makes me curious to know why.
    I can understand those other countries who have have considered going 'DAB' but decided against changing possibly when they did because everyone with a car has an FM radio and getting them to change over would be a major possibly very unwelcome proposal to say the least.
    Another problem I see is that many cars today dont have a 'stand alone' radio which is easy to remove and replace but they now have a built in Media system that is damned costly to to do anything too.
    To just remove and reinstall the dash in a 2005 BA Ford Falcon to get access to a fault, my Son was quoted AU$800 by the dealer.
    I first thought it was a misquote or a joke but not so apparently so who will to pay that out to install a DAB radio at what ever it costs on top when they have a perfectly good FM radio already there?
    I dont care if it has 500 channels, you can bet 495 will be garbage and you can only listen to one at time anyway.

    What would help to spread DAB usage would be if the Car manufactures begin to incorporate the system into their vehicles on assembly.
    For many years Long Wave (200 khz to 450khz) was a feature on radios sold in Europe along with AM and FM so these no reason not to add DAB to them now, is there?
    If their installed as a 'standard' like the AM/FM radios are today, this would barely add more than a few $$$'s or Euro's to the price of a new vehicle rather than what they cost if installed individually.
    Last edited by gordon_s1942; 19-01-17 at 12:54 PM.
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    Default

    Give it a while and 'DAB adaptors' for FM radios should appear if there's a sufficient market for them if they're not already available that is.

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    To make market the go we need three things to happen, increase the number of stations AND coverage of DAB radio, cheap and easy ways to either replace or adaptors to allow those FM/AM radios currently installed to receive the signal and the most important one of all, get the buying public interested and stampeding to buy !!
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    Quote Originally Posted by gordon_s1942 View Post
    ...increase the number of stations AND coverage of DAB radio...
    Very unlikely to happen Gordon. Coverage has not increased since the introduction of DAB+.
    Completely confined to capital cities, with both the ACT and Darwin still in "Trial" mode.
    Inertia from broadcasters to invest in infrastructure, combined with decreased revenue from advertising will render DAB+ an experiment in futility unless the regulatory authority mandates a transition.
    Fortunately, where I live, the signal strength is great (even from a horizontally polarised Matchmaster MK 7). Check out the for an insight as to how little coverage there is!
    "The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom." - Issac Asimov

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