Dumbed down consumer electronics: Adding DTV channels
in [Design]
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From: Greegor on 3 Aug 2010 12:15 G > WHO designed this new USA TV standard G > and why did the FCC not catch the considerable G > problems BEFORE committing us to it? JT > A system designed by bureaucrats ?:-) You're right, I was silly to forget that even for a moment.
From: Martin Brown on 3 Aug 2010 12:28 On 03/08/2010 16:35, Joerg wrote: > Martin Brown wrote: >> Panasonic kit sold in Europe will allow any amount of manual DTV tuning >> to add individual channels if you have the patience to do it. Autoscan >> tends to be more convenient when new channels pop (briefly) into >> existence. The most annoying thing is that several designs reset the >> favourites lists whenever you make a change using autoscan. >> > > Out here it's only he dumbed-down variety, only auto-scan. So the drill > is to wait for a weather pattern that will show most DTV signals, peek > outside and listen to the scannner to make sure no Fedex freight > aircraft is on the approach, hit auto-scan and hope that as many DTV > channels as possible stick. Then delete the flakey ones. I can see that being really annoying. We have trouble whenever there is heavy rain - a bunch of marginally OK stations at the top end of the band deteriorate to the annoying pixelate and freeze mode with the odd blast of ultrasonic clicks and chirps out of the speakers (unwatchable). I wonder if there is a market for a combined rain detector and variable gain low noise block for terrestrial DTV aerials? Digital (DAB) radio is worse still - every unit I have tried will intermittently crash to silence once a week and there is a random variable time delay in the decoders about 1s behind realtime. HD TV is about 1s behind ordinary definition TV showing the same channel presumably because the encode decode step takes more CPU. > >> If your terrestrial DTV reception is so dire why don't you use Freesat >> or whatever it is called over there to get the free to air channels? > > I don't think there is any free satelluite this side of the pond. Wiki seems to think that you do have free to air on satellite though you might need to mess around a bit to find them. It could still be a lot cheaper if you count your time spent fighting this kit and completely immune to terrestrial multipath distortion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_television#United_States I find it useful for getting stuff like NHK. It isn't hard to set up. Regards, Martin Brown
From: Joel Koltner on 3 Aug 2010 12:43 Hi Joerg, Joerg wrote: > Yes, having landed a de-facto monopoly provides a plum position in the > marketplace no matter how small that monopoly is. True... the problem with iBiquity is that the FCC let them have the entire market. At least with, e.g., Apple, while they get a cut of every (non-free) app that ends up on a (non-jailbroken) iPhone, there are plenty of other GSM phones out there. > I vaguely remember one of the domestic car manufacturers offering it > (Polk i-something) but I also remember seeing a $500 price tag there. The car manufacturers have incredibly inflated ideas about how much radios ought to cost -- even a simple AM/FM/CD player radio is often >$200... that fact probably really helps the JVCs, Kenwoods, Sonys, Pioneers, etc. of the world who sell an awful lot of aftermarket car stereos. Many people purposely orders their car with either no radio or the cheapest one available, as they intend to immediately replace it anyway. ---Joel
From: Joel Koltner on 3 Aug 2010 12:52 Jim Thompson wrote: > Content is what it's all about. I know next to nothing about HD. Does > it work in tunnels and underpasses? It's an all-digital standard, so as long as there's still "enough" SNR it'll keep pumping out audio just fine. Hence I'd expect that at least for any reasonably local stations that don't noticeably fade on traditional FM in tunnels and underpasses, it'd be fine, but I can't personally vouch for how well that works in practice: I have an HD radio at home, but not in a car. ....and in southern Oregon here the only HD radio stations available are a couple of public radio stations that mostly play classical music, although occasionally they'll head for the blues and touch upon jazz a bit, which isn't bad -- but I'm not going to drop Sirius any time soon either! Phoenix is rather better, however: http://www.hdradioalliance.com/station_guides/widget.php?id=15&utm_source=Station+Guide+Proper&utm_term=Phoenix%2C+AZ&utm_medium=Widget&utm_campaign=Station+Guides+on+hdradio.com ---Joel
From: Jim Thompson on 3 Aug 2010 14:16
On Tue, 3 Aug 2010 09:52:48 -0700, "Joel Koltner" <zapwireDASHgroups(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >Jim Thompson wrote: >> Content is what it's all about. I know next to nothing about HD. Does >> it work in tunnels and underpasses? > >It's an all-digital standard, so as long as there's still "enough" SNR it'll >keep pumping out audio just fine. Hence I'd expect that at least for any >reasonably local stations that don't noticeably fade on traditional FM in >tunnels and underpasses, it'd be fine, but I can't personally vouch for how >well that works in practice: I have an HD radio at home, but not in a car. >...and in southern Oregon here the only HD radio stations available are a >couple of public radio stations that mostly play classical music, although >occasionally they'll head for the blues and touch upon jazz a bit, which isn't >bad -- but I'm not going to drop Sirius any time soon either! Phoenix is >rather better, however: >http://www.hdradioalliance.com/station_guides/widget.php?id=15&utm_source=Station+Guide+Proper&utm_term=Phoenix%2C+AZ&utm_medium=Widget&utm_campaign=Station+Guides+on+hdradio.com > >---Joel That's pretty poor... Firefox claims _92_ "Radio Broadcast Companies" in Mesa alone... which I doubt... maybe 30 active AM and FM that I can think of. I have Sirius in the Q45, but I do web radio in my office...Roku Soundbridge. ...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. |