Dumbed down consumer electronics: Adding DTV channels
in [Design]
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From: Joerg on 8 Aug 2010 16:54 Paul Keinanen wrote: > On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 09:28:58 -0700, Jim Thompson > <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon(a)On-My-Web-Site.com> wrote: > >> On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 17:48:42 +0300, Paul Keinanen <keinanen(a)sci.fi> >> wrote: > >>> Are you really saying that some radio broadcasting companies in the US >>> are still using medium wave AM as their main distribution channel ?? >> Some? There are probably 10's of thousands of AM stations in the USA. >> Your country is smaller than many/most of our states, so you don't >> appreciate the need for "medium wave" to cover large areas. > > Alaska, Texas and California have a larger land area than Finland, as > expected. However, I did not expect Montana to be also slightly > larger. > > FM started here in the early 1950's and only a few people relied on AM > in the 1960's. In the 1990's medium wave AM was used to send news to > Finnish speaking emigrants in Sweden and to the Finnish speaking > minority in NE Russia. > > Since those days, only hobby based low power (0.1 kW) AM transmitters > have been used during some selected weekends, mainly to support > DX-listeners. > > To me, it is a surprise that medium wave AM is still actually used for > commercial broadcasting. > On long drives I listen to AM a lot. The reason is quite simple. The US is such a large country and there are long stretches of land with very sparse population. IOW not enough market for FM stations with their low range. You can always find this or that local station but if their programming is boring, well, then you must switch to the AM band. Also, the smaller FM station tend to drift into the noise after only a few country songs while AM stations usually stay around for hundreds of miles. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
From: Jim Thompson on 8 Aug 2010 17:46 On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 13:54:51 -0700, Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >Paul Keinanen wrote: >> On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 09:28:58 -0700, Jim Thompson >> <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon(a)On-My-Web-Site.com> wrote: >> >>> On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 17:48:42 +0300, Paul Keinanen <keinanen(a)sci.fi> >>> wrote: >> >>>> Are you really saying that some radio broadcasting companies in the US >>>> are still using medium wave AM as their main distribution channel ?? >>> Some? There are probably 10's of thousands of AM stations in the USA. >>> Your country is smaller than many/most of our states, so you don't >>> appreciate the need for "medium wave" to cover large areas. >> >> Alaska, Texas and California have a larger land area than Finland, as >> expected. However, I did not expect Montana to be also slightly >> larger. >> >> FM started here in the early 1950's and only a few people relied on AM >> in the 1960's. In the 1990's medium wave AM was used to send news to >> Finnish speaking emigrants in Sweden and to the Finnish speaking >> minority in NE Russia. >> >> Since those days, only hobby based low power (0.1 kW) AM transmitters >> have been used during some selected weekends, mainly to support >> DX-listeners. >> >> To me, it is a surprise that medium wave AM is still actually used for >> commercial broadcasting. >> > >On long drives I listen to AM a lot. The reason is quite simple. The US >is such a large country and there are long stretches of land with very >sparse population. IOW not enough market for FM stations with their low >range. You can always find this or that local station but if their >programming is boring, well, then you must switch to the AM band. Also, >the smaller FM station tend to drift into the noise after only a few >country songs while AM stations usually stay around for hundreds of miles. That's why I like satellite radio. The stretch of I8 from Gila Bend to Yuma is devoid of FM and has only Mexican AM... although some of their oom-pah-pah bands can be pretty entertaining... and their ads are hilarious... all that shrieking, hooting and hollering ;-) ...Jim Thompson -- | James E.Thompson, CTO | mens | | Analog Innovations, Inc. | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | | | Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat | | E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 | Spice is like a sports car... Performance only as good as the person behind the wheel.
From: krw on 8 Aug 2010 20:31 On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 07:12:06 -0700, Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >Michael A. Terrell wrote: >> Joerg wrote: >>> Jan Panteltje wrote: >>>> On a sunny day (Mon, 02 Aug 2010 15:08:20 -0700) it happened Joerg >>>> <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote in <8botupFq9aU1(a)mid.individual.net>: >>>> >>>> >>>>> Jan Panteltje wrote: >>>>>> On a sunny day (Mon, 02 Aug 2010 13:36:19 -0700) it happened >>>>>> Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote in >>>>>> <8booi7FqgtU1(a)mid.individual.net>: >>>>>> >>> [...] >>> >>>>>>> [...] >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Right, do not pay for the advertising! >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> No, we fast forward through it. One box even has an advertising >>>>>>> FFW button that hops it 30sec at a time. >>>>>> Good,. There exists soft with scene change detection too, IIRC. >>>>>> >>>>> Yeah, but it works well enough by hand. I am also rather good in >>>>> tuning it out in my head, reading up on stuff during the news when >>>>> the ads play. >>>> Once I made the mistake to actually edit it out. Those are the >>>> commercials I still remember, as I had to see them many times to get >>>> start, and end, and audio, right in the editior :-) >>>> >>> Very few ads remained in my gray cells. The only one I remember from the >>> six years I lived in NL is from Douwe Egberts "En dan is er koffie". >>> >>>>>>>> And also the source material counts, garbage in garbage out. >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> Dancing with the Stars from BBC is super material, you really >>>>>>> see a difference. >>>>>> Now I am confused. If it was from BBC, then it must have been >>>>>> original 25 fps . that reminds me of dropped frames and fast >>>>>> pulldown, big problem with motion in a 30 fps country. Here the >>>>>> movies just play 25 fps, no dropped frames, but they are slightly >>>>>> shorter (original film was 24). The pitch of the audio is higher >>>>>> too. http://www.24p.com/conversion.htm >>>>>> >>>>> Oh, Jan, we live in the 21st century. The times when such major >>>>> events were recorded in an analog format are long gone. >>>> Cannot follow you here, BBC was recorded at 25 fps (tape) or 24 fps >>>> (film). You play at 30 fps (or 60), so you have to interpolate frames >>>> and add those at irregular intervals. I have some Linux soft for >>>> that, it works, but the motion is not as smooth as at the original >>>> speed I think. Do you think digital does not know about frame rate? >>>> The problem we had here with LCD TVs (seems to go away with better >>>> sets) was that many sets were HD compatible but displayed the 25 fps >>>> material at 30 fps, causing horrible horizontal irregular jumping of >>>> the picture. >>>> >>> This is what's cooking these days: >>> >>> http://www.ikegami.com/br/products/hdtv/pdf/HDK77EX0401s.pdf >>> >>> Most modern cameras can be switched so you can record in several native >>> frame rate standards: >>> >>> http://www.ikegami.com/br/products/hdtv/hdtv_camera_frame1.html >>> >>> I don't know how they do it but there is no interpolation at all. I >>> believe they record in US format because the participants are mostly >>> American, so it's for our market. The judges are one American, one >>> British and one (rather hot-blooded ...) Italian. >>> >>>>> It's the level of the nerd factor. A big honking PC in the living >>>>> room requires one almost not to be married. A small one is ok, but >>>>> only if freshly married or close to the 50th anniversary :-) >>>> I think you still do not get the concept. I am not a fan of VDR, but >>>> have a look at Klaus his website: http://www.tvdr.de/ It does not >>>> have to be a 'big honking PC'. ... >>> It is pretty big. Anyhow, ours has the described features as well or >>> pretty close: >>> >>> http://www.tvdr.de/software.htm >>> >>> Except we have to swap out the disk after x hours. Ok, no big deal. >>> >>>> ... My media centre PC is not in the >>>> living room. There is no need for that, most modern TVs can access >>>> files on the media server, via a menu (and ethernet). There are cheap >>>> interface boxes available these days with HD output and ethernet >>>> connection for any room you want. In fact, with all those standards >>>> constantly changing, the best bet is to split everything up, monitor, >>>> receiver, disks, DVD burner. At least something will be of use a bit >>>> longer then the 2 to 5 years we now have between a system change, 3D >>>> is here hoopla, we just had HD . Do you have your 3D set yet? >>>> >>> No, and no need to. Same with BlueRay. Since we are into older movies >>> and don't like games or scifi there would be no use for that here. We >>> rather spend that money at the Japanese restaurant, like today :-) >> >> >> Do you watch any TV on http://www.hulu.com > > >Not yet. Since the switch to DTV our TV consumption has gone down >significantly. And maybe that's a good thing :-) Since we switched to DISH Network, our TV consumption hasn't gone down (the end of the world wouldn't do that), but our frustration level has skyrocketed. The city is proposing a venture into the cable TV and Internet market (the network would be useful to the power company) and as much as I don't like such things, I'm leaning towards it.
From: krw on 8 Aug 2010 20:36 On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 09:23:45 -0700, Jim Thompson <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon(a)On-My-Web-Site.com> wrote: >On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 07:10:12 -0700, Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> >wrote: > >>Michael A. Terrell wrote: >>> Joerg wrote: >>>> Out here the news is actualy not all that negative. But sometimes >>>> boring. For example, I really don't need to know where Chelsey Clinton >>>> got married. >>> >>> How about this news? A well known AM radio station lost all three >>> towers a few days ago. It was a well know country music station, with >>> its Wheeling Jamboree. >>> >>> <http://www.wtrf.com/story.cfm?func=viewstory&storyid=83934> >>> >>> <http://www.bing.com/search?q=%2bWWVA+tower+collapse&FORM=RCRE> >> >> >>Very sad to look at those pictures. This could be the financial end of >>WWVA :-( > >Only because the Obama administration and local tree huggers will >oppose the reconstruction. Too bad it didn't happen last year. They could have named them the "Byrd Towers" and had the taxpayers fork over for them. Maybe they could slide it in the appropriations bill for NIST, between WWV and WWVB. >Amusing... when I lived in WV I didn't listen to WWVA, I listened to >the rock-n-roll stations in Huntington. > >As a married student at MIT, early every morning I drove my wife to >work at Honeywell Datamatic and played WWVA in the car... very loud to >keep awake :-) Didn't think country would be your style.
From: Joerg on 9 Aug 2010 20:29
Jim Thompson wrote: > On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 13:54:51 -0700, Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> > wrote: > >> Paul Keinanen wrote: >>> On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 09:28:58 -0700, Jim Thompson >>> <To-Email-Use-The-Envelope-Icon(a)On-My-Web-Site.com> wrote: >>> >>>> On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 17:48:42 +0300, Paul Keinanen <keinanen(a)sci.fi> >>>> wrote: >>>>> Are you really saying that some radio broadcasting companies in the US >>>>> are still using medium wave AM as their main distribution channel ?? >>>> Some? There are probably 10's of thousands of AM stations in the USA. >>>> Your country is smaller than many/most of our states, so you don't >>>> appreciate the need for "medium wave" to cover large areas. >>> Alaska, Texas and California have a larger land area than Finland, as >>> expected. However, I did not expect Montana to be also slightly >>> larger. >>> >>> FM started here in the early 1950's and only a few people relied on AM >>> in the 1960's. In the 1990's medium wave AM was used to send news to >>> Finnish speaking emigrants in Sweden and to the Finnish speaking >>> minority in NE Russia. >>> >>> Since those days, only hobby based low power (0.1 kW) AM transmitters >>> have been used during some selected weekends, mainly to support >>> DX-listeners. >>> >>> To me, it is a surprise that medium wave AM is still actually used for >>> commercial broadcasting. >>> >> On long drives I listen to AM a lot. The reason is quite simple. The US >> is such a large country and there are long stretches of land with very >> sparse population. IOW not enough market for FM stations with their low >> range. You can always find this or that local station but if their >> programming is boring, well, then you must switch to the AM band. Also, >> the smaller FM station tend to drift into the noise after only a few >> country songs while AM stations usually stay around for hundreds of miles. > > That's why I like satellite radio. The stretch of I8 from Gila Bend > to Yuma is devoid of FM and has only Mexican AM... although some of > their oom-pah-pah bands can be pretty entertaining... and their ads > are hilarious... all that shrieking, hooting and hollering ;-) > Ahora escuchen YUMAAAAAH! Ven al partido de futiboooooool EL DOMINGOOOOO! -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM. |