[BC] HD Radio -- Folks we have to get it right!

[Kevin Tekel]

(warning, rant ahead....)

Robert Orban wrote:
> So the analog receiver choices were four widely available, commonly used

> major-brand AM radios in the three important categories of home, 
> portable/table, and auto. They were chosen to represent the typical 
> experience that a consumer has with analog AM radio today.

If they're only going to represent a typical consumer's experience, then
the entire issue of AM IBOC becomes moot because today's typical consumer
isn't listening to AM radio in the first place!

HD Radio should do more than merely appeal to the typical consumer; it
should be able to appeal to the same kind of people who are spending
thousands of dollars on home theatre systems, because especially right
now, those are basically the only consumers who might be willing to buy
an IBOC receiver for $500 to $1000.

In the 1960s, FM Stereo strived to appeal to audiophiles, and with the FM
programming of that era, it did.  The typical consumer wasn't interested
in FM radio back then, because they couldn't afford it, and even if they
could, most of its programming wouldn't appeal to them anyway.  But now,
we have HD Radio, which _isn't_ attempting to appeal to the people who are
most likely to purchase it, because as test results have already shown, a
good number of its potential purchasers are likely to reject it because of
its poor audio quality, especially on AM.

We've already seen the results with Eureka-147 DAB: just because something
is "new" and "digital" doesn't mean it will be a success, especially if
most of its programming is just a simulcast of what is already available
on analog radio and its audio falls far short of being "CD-quality".
And this is on a system _without_ all of IBOC's messy adjacent-channel
interference and analog compatibility problems!




	
		
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