[EAS] 2019 EAS National Periodic Test -- The Good. The Bad. The Ugly.

[Sean Donelan]

On Thu, 8 Aug 2019, Sean Donelan wrote:
> Switching and cut-off audio.  Some stations don't program sufficient delays 
> when switching EAS audio, and sometimes cut-off part of the EAS data bursts 
> or audio.
>
> WASH-FM: EAS AFSK header decode error (part of header cut-off)
> WJFK-FM: EAS AFSK header decode errro (part of header cut-off)

Good news.  WASH (FM) and WJFK (FM) fixed their digital switch timing 
issues during this month's RMT (Wednesday morning in the DC area). Both 
had a clean decode of the AFSK data burst and this month's test audio.

Bad news.  SIRIUS XM broke the timing on their digital switching and 
cut-off the triple EOM data bursts early at the end of the RMT audio this 
month. I still have no idea what the appropriate audio levels for the 
SIRIUS XM barker channel is. It varies widely.

A question for EAS box vendors -- Can the EAS Attention Tone removal 
process be improved? Or better guidance for configuring the audio chain 
and transmitter's processor for the attention tone allowing clean 
detection of the attention tone? Obviously, every station will configure 
their audio processor for regular programming and paying advertisors, 
not EAS.