And they call it "Progress"

[simmitc]

Those old enough to remember valve radios or analogue tuning dials will recall that one switched on a radio, waited for it to warm up, and then had to twiddle to tune in.

Than came transistors, chips, VHF, phase locked loops, and preset buttons. Excellent. Switch on radio, instant reception. Instant access to required stations. Clear reception. low power consumption. Real progress, perfect.

Now some idiot has come up with digital. I bought a brand new supposedly portable DAB radio. It uses EIGHT D-Cell batteries that last about six hours at the most. I switch it on and it takes ages to boot up. Reception is appalling. Tunig now requires that I press a single "presets" button and then have to turn a knob to run through a list of my favourite stations. Once selected, the set displays "tuning" for a period of time. Where's the progress in this? Some people say "oh, it displays what tune is playing" So what, I usually recognise the music. If I don't, then the announcer / DJ tells me what it is.

And don't even start me on digital TV.

Grrrrr

[beero]

The trouble is they were making FM radios so reliable we stopped having to buy replacements, so they invented a new way of making us part with our cash!

[mike.perry]

That should discourage you from fiddling with the radio whilst you are driving

[bmcecosse]

Dear oh dear - it's even worse than I suspected then! The whole 'digital radio' business is just an excuse to make sales of new radios - the reception is by no means guaranteed to be better and I understand the music reproduction is much poorer than a decent FM wireless. At least the crazed plan to stop FM transmission seems to have been abandoned as one of David Cameron's plans to stop wasting money on pointless exercises.

[phurn]

As it goes, digital tv makes a lot of sense as you just cannot transmit enough data through an analogue system to support hi def. Its also cheaper to transmit as you can carry multiple stations on one carrier frequency.

For radios the idea was simply to free up the radio waves for other uses, and yes the sound quality should be better, but its only ever as good as the transmitted data or the radio your using. A lot of people baught cheap radios that sound bad no matter what, and for those that didn't, well its just cheaper to transmit less data, therefore less sound quality.

[bmcecosse]

But - for what 'other use' were these frequencies going to be used ? And surely - all the cars on the road today have FM radios built in, were these to become redundant overnight ? I understand that sound reproduction is NOT better with digital transmission - quite the opposite. And my efforts to receive digital TV, even though I can SEE the masts about 15 miles away from the window where my aerial is set - are constantly plagued by some pixilation at best/complete loss of sensible picture and sound quite often. One day it can be fine - the next hopeless, and that without the slightest movement of the aerial or anything surrounding it.

[chickenjohn]

Yes, it is a total con because with a good FM signal you could get near HiFi quality, i.e. the vinyl or CD you hear on the radio has little lost in quality when it gets to your FM radio aerial. But this digital radio uses a nasty data compression, much like poor quality MP3.

Doubtless, the reason is that in 10 years time they will try and sell you a "high definition" DAB radio!!! and so the consumer rip-off goes on!.

Much like CD is actually inferior in sound quality to decent vinyl played on a decent turntable- they were going to being out SACD but nobody bought it!

Really, there is no need to replace old, perfectly good technology with new just cause you can! EG, pencils and paper still have their uses, as do horses, and thatched cottages, and Morris Minors!

[bmcecosse]

And steam engines........

[phurn]

Your being a touch unfair on technology there, dab should sound better, and allow for more stations. Itys not the fault of the technology if someone saves money by broadcasting at a higher compression.

Same with cd's, higher compression = cheaper to make. Using a lossless format a cd can sound amazing, far superior to any vinyl, problem is lossless recordings take up huge amounts of space.

But for tv, well as I said its a nessesary improvement, but it does have its drawbacks and the long term future definatly lies in fibre optics, the only problem we have there is there's no universal standard for data transmition, and as with any plesiosnychronous system it can loose its timing if anything gets damaged.

[alanworland]

When buying a 'Digital' portable radio for Christmas about 3 years ago I visited several shops to actually 'listen' to them, I was told on more than one occasion that 'they dont work very well in hear'
Too right they dont - alarm bells should have rung, they dont work very well ANYWHERE
Sound quality poor so it is always on FM!

[bmcecosse]

QED!

[ferret76]

Australia is currently in the progress of switching all tv broadcasting to digital. I have it currently and it is rubbish. Darwin is considered 'Remote/Regional" and as such is generally behind the eight ball whenever it comes to Government funded technology roll-outs, we either don't get it or get it in a watered down, half-ar**d manner. Digital TV appears to be in the second category. No consideration of the local climatic conditions seems to have been made, and as a result in the monsoon when it rains you find yourself staring at a frozen, pixelated screen for 20 minutes. It would appear that the local TV is broadcast using an old wire coat hanger and a 9volt battery. Pay TV is no better, it used to be copper cable and it was brilliant. Then the cable got turned off and the providers went to sattelite which meant that firstly you had to get a dish and upgrade your box and secondly when it rains the whole things goes to pot as well. It wouldn't be so bad if the monsoon and the cricket season didn't coincide. Don't get me started on the ham-fisted dish installers, we had ours intalled only to discover that the bloke that did it damaged the roof. We didn't realise the roof was leaking until part of the ceiling fell in.
I haven't even considered digital radio, it would be pointless here. I think that once everyone realises it doesn't work it will hopefully die a quiet death and we can be rid of it. In my garage I have a Sharp transistor radio circa 1980 and it works just fine, thankyou.