[HN Gopher] Swiss Broadcasting Corporation to pull plug on FM radio
___________________________________________________________________
Swiss Broadcasting Corporation to pull plug on FM radio
Author : austinallegro
Score : 140 points
Date : 2024-06-29 23:27 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.swissinfo.ch)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.swissinfo.ch)
| bad_username wrote:
| Does DAB really offer better quality? From what I know, stations
| opt for puny 64kbps streams which sound nowhere near as good as
| FM can.
| zinekeller wrote:
| In theory, yes, it really can, but as you stated, in practice,
| no. This is basically the equivalent thing on digital TV
| between the US and Canada: most US broadcasters tried to pack
| as much channels as possible (that sometimes digital broadcasts
| are objectively worse than analog ones because of bitrate
| starvation) while Canada usually only have a 1:1 correspondence
| between virtual and physical channels (sometimes 2:1 but there
| isn't really much more than that).
|
| This is not Switzerland, but the BBC apparently uses 192 kbps
| only at Radio 3 (their classical music station), while other
| BBC stations are either 128 kbps or 64 kbps only.
| kuriho wrote:
| Switzerland uses mostly 64-96kbps as per this outdated(?)
| list https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_DAB-
| Sender_in_der_Sc...
| corint wrote:
| Switzerland uses mostly 64kbit DAB+, by the look of the
| latest observations on
| https://www.wohnort.org/dab/switzerland.html?PageSpeed=off
| vel0city wrote:
| I saw a video a while back (it was since taken down) from a
| guy with a low power TV station who experimented with
| broadcasting much more modern video codecs. He experienced
| some good results with modern "smart TVs" largely because
| they have good hardware support for various modern video
| codecs and seemed to handle the streams just fine. He managed
| to get multiple 4K video streams over standard ATSC 2.0
| signaling working on a range of different TV models. It
| seemed like a neat experiment.
| coretx wrote:
| That's done on purpose so that they can roll out conditional
| access / DRM. In order to make people pay for that, they need
| to be invested in hardware first ( DAB radios ) and suffer from
| poor quality channels.... DAB is optimized to make money, not
| to serve the general public.
| gpvos wrote:
| Source?
| coretx wrote:
| https://www.etsi.org/deliver/etsi_ts/102300_102399/102367/0
| 1...
| avidiax wrote:
| Same thing with ATSC 3.0.
|
| You can read the industry's claims as to why DRM is needed in
| broadcast (to ensure authenticity mainly), but you'll have to
| read between the lines that it's to make broadcast TV
| impossible to record, ads impossible to skip, and (probably
| eventually) sweet talk regulators into allowing pay-per-view
| or paid access "premium" channels, probably leeching off the
| bandwidth (and quality) of the "free-to-air" channels they
| are legally a required to broadcast to maintain their
| licenses.
|
| https://cordcuttersnews.com/the-team-behind-nextgen-
| atsc-3-0...
| xysg wrote:
| The reverse scenario happened here in Singapore. It was the first
| in Asia to introduce DAB in 1999. The national broadcaster
| MediaCorp then decided to cease DAB transmission in 2011, forcing
| those who've invested in new DAB equipment to throw them out the
| window (while many are dual-FM/DAB sets, some more affordable
| ones are exclusively DAB-only). Interesting that the decision was
| made to go backwards in technology, likely motivated by
| economics.
| hulitu wrote:
| > the decision was made to go backwards in technology
|
| What is so forward about DAB ?
|
| In theory it sounds excelent. In practice it sounds like crap
| due to using the lowest bitrate possible.
| coretx wrote:
| DAB is optimized for "rights holders". Not for radio
| stations, not for end users, not for the state. It's designed
| against everyone but the rights holder / copyrights industry
| interests.
| gpvos wrote:
| How so? It's not encrypted or anything similar.
| coretx wrote:
| https://www.etsi.org/deliver/etsi_ts/102300_102399/102367
| /01...
| teractiveodular wrote:
| Is this actually used anywhere? To me it feels like DAB
| and any putative DRM mechanisms have already been
| basically obsoleted by streaming systems like Spotify.
| pjc50 wrote:
| That's not the real rightsholder thing, as hardly anyone
| bothers with scrambled broadcasts; no, the real
| rightsholder handicap was limiting the bitrate of
| original DAB so it sounds worse than CDs.
| rsynnott wrote:
| While DAB is very rough (mp2 at usually under 128kbits) DAB+
| is HE-ACC and will sound better than FM even at quite low
| data rates.
| userabchn wrote:
| DAB has also effectively been abandoned in Ireland (https://en.
| wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Radio_in_the_Republic_...)
| jeffrallen wrote:
| DAB has worse behavior with marginal signal quality. When a FM
| signal may be slightly degraded with static, DAB just gives up
| entirely.
|
| I really hate that engineers, regulators, and businesspeople
| managed to work together to make something simple and reliable
| less reliable but more "modern".
| coretx wrote:
| It's worse on purpose. They did not even try to be "modern".
| Here you can read what it's about:
| https://www.etsi.org/deliver/etsi_ts/102300_102399/102367/01...
| gadders wrote:
| Agreed. DAB reception is very poor in comparison.
| femto wrote:
| Probably because DAB has been designed to be spectrally
| efficient, allowing one to cram as many radio channel as
| possible into a slice of spectrum. It's a property of error
| control codes, as used in DAB: that the closer one gets to
| optimal performance, the sharper the cutoff between working and
| not working. As range increases: works, works, works, BAM,
| gone...
|
| If it's optimal, the quality of a digital link will be pretty
| well perfect up until that cutoff (but no link is truly
| optimal). DAB's design placed emphasis on more channels rather
| than longer range, so the point at which DAB cuts out will
| likely be before the point that FM has degraded to
| unintelligibly. In theory there can be a region where FM has
| degraded but DAB is still holding up, but in the name of more
| channels this region is probably small.
| throw0101b wrote:
| > _When a FM signal may be slightly degraded with static, DAB
| just gives up entirely._
|
| You'd think that this would be a good scenario for
| 'hierarchical modulation':
|
| > _Hierarchical modulation is particularly used to mitigate the
| cliff effect in digital television broadcast, particularly
| mobile TV, by providing a (lower quality) fallback signal in
| case of weak signals, allowing graceful degradation instead of
| complete signal loss. It has been widely proven and included in
| various standards, such as DVB-T, MediaFLO, UMB (Ultra Mobile
| Broadband, a new 3.5th generation mobile network standard
| developed by 3GPP2), and is under study for DVB-H._
|
| * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchical_modulation
|
| Combine that with scalable audio quality:
|
| * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_SLS
|
| * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitrate_peeling
| sschueller wrote:
| Nobody wants this especially since there are still quite a lot of
| cars that have old radios.
|
| I thought there was an agreement that we would wait a little
| longer but for what ever reason the SRG thinks they know better.
| xnyan wrote:
| Something similar happened with TV broadcasts in the US ~15
| years ago. The solution was just to provide an adaptor for free
| for anyone who wanted one.
| pintxo wrote:
| Adapters are not much use on a car, are they?
| FreezingKeeper wrote:
| They are available https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/product-
| group-tests/88304/best...
| ClassyJacket wrote:
| Just a matter of time before my state makes it illegal to
| touch one of those while driving, if they haven't
| already.
| whoopdedo wrote:
| They weren't free. They were subsidized and consequently what
| used to be a $20 converter jumped to $35 overnight because
| that was how much retailers knew they could milk out of the
| rebate.
| ur-whale wrote:
| Does it mean the 88Mhz -> 108Mhz frequency band will go to back
| the auction block ?
| digitalsankhara wrote:
| Maybe, when most regions follow suit. Hate the idea of FM
| broadcasting turning off. Still, would love some ham radio
| wideband spectrum. Then people driving to work can listen to
| the likes of me droning on about <insert favourite ham radio
| topic here>.
|
| Personally I think they should expand community radio wholesale
| if national broadcasters cannot be arsed.
| lenerdenator wrote:
| What's the demand like for that part of the spectrum in
| Switzerland?
|
| In the US it'd just be gobbled up by another corporate
| interest; no way that'd go to the amateur service.
| digitalsankhara wrote:
| In the US more than likely. In the UK I'm not so sure
| (can't speak to Switzerland) as there is a healthy
| community radio scene who may have some democratic
| influence. There are mutterings of trying to close UK FM
| broadcasting as well in order to force DAB. I'd like to
| think there would still be some spectrum allocated for
| that. If not, the pirates would take over - and good luck
| to them.
|
| This wholesale move away from simple, analogue radio
| infrastructure (AM/FM/SW radio) is a disaster waiting to
| happen in the event of a major regional/global catastrophe.
|
| Most amateur organisations would not even think about
| trying to experiment with WBFM anyway - too obsessed with
| ultra-narrow digital modes.
| sitkack wrote:
| FM is so simple and robust. It should never be turned off.
| mikemitchelldev wrote:
| Digital audio is also relatively expensive for some people.
| There are people who in my community who ride around on their
| bikes listening to fm radio. A monthly data fee could be hard
| for some.
| dark-star wrote:
| I have never heard of DAB or DAB+ requiring monthly
| subscription fees? At least I don't pay any, and I have a
| DAB+ receiver in my car
| mikemitchelldev wrote:
| Listening to DAB on a cellphone requires a monthly data
| plan.
| arghwhat wrote:
| You listen to DAB using a DAB radio like you listen to FM
| broadcasts with an FM radio.
|
| If you're listening to something on your phone through a
| data plan, it's not DAB, but an unrelated streaming
| service.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Not having a radio receiver in a phone has always been
| one of those WTF things for me. There have been articles
| on why iOS doesn't have a radio tuner even those the
| receiver is there claiming because it would divert users
| from apple music or whatever. It's always felt like a
| missed opportunity to me though
| devbent wrote:
| Phones used to have fm receivers! It was common in the
| early 2010s. They used the headphone cord as an antenna.
| arghwhat wrote:
| The main reason to not have it is that unless you're out
| of cellular range or has no data quota left, it's just
| worse than just streaming the same stations over the
| internet, which also offer more content as running FM
| stations is expensive.
|
| Even though older iPhone baseband chips had FM receivers,
| you'd still need break it out and deal with the antenna
| setup, with the approach taken by others requiring wired
| headset and shenanigans in the headphone port. That's
| more BOM, and user resistance to wireless headphones or
| newer models whose baseband chips cut the feature.
|
| It used to be a somewhat common feature in phones
| (including smartphones from other brands), but it usually
| had quite "eh" reception. And with transitions to DAB,
| the feature becomes unusable without DAB decoders which
| I'm sure someone is claiming royalties for.
| throw0101b wrote:
| > _Listening to DAB on a cellphone requires a monthly
| data plan._
|
| Cellphones used to include AM/FM radios.
|
| Personally I think it might be useful to have them for
| public service uses: perhaps cell network are more robust
| than a few years ago, but there are still instances when
| they could be (are) overwhelmed, and a broadcast-only
| system could be useful in major emergency events.
| conradfr wrote:
| Hard to have an antenna with wireless headphones.
| arghwhat wrote:
| _hard to have an efficient VHF antenna using traditional
| designs
|
| Smartphones a _lot* of antennas, but most target 1/10th
| the wavelength of FM radio.
| vel0city wrote:
| Cell systems still have the ability to push out a message
| regardless of how "overwhelmed" the towers are. They'll
| just drop service to some customers while the higher
| priority emergency message is broadcasted out.
|
| A cell network doing a one-way broadcast text message to
| all clients is a solved problem. And honestly, I greatly
| prefer this way to push out an emergency message than
| assume I'm tuned to a radio station or broadcast TV, two
| things I'm rarely doing. I'm way more likely to be
| listening or watching local or streaming media instead of
| watching broadcast TV. Or even just not be doing any of
| that at all. Lots of people I know wouldn't even be able
| to tune into a broadcast TV or FM radio station outside
| of their cars.
| mozman wrote:
| I wouldn't mind if those people blasting FM radio used
| headphones. I don't believe it's because they can't afford
| them.
| Y_Y wrote:
| Not a good idea on a bike
| recursive wrote:
| I've heard this assertion many times. But after having
| ridden hundreds (thousands?) of hours wearing headphones,
| I must conclude that it's a perfectly fine idea. People
| believe headphones will obstruct your hearing. Some do.
| Some don't. Wear the ones that don't. It's also possible
| to set the volume to the same level that it would be from
| a set of handle-bar mounted speakers.
| gpvos wrote:
| AM is even simpler and even more robust. I think we never
| should have switched it off.
| HeatrayEnjoyer wrote:
| But AM isn't switched off.
| ale42 wrote:
| Depends where. In Switzerland it is.
| ClassyJacket wrote:
| I looked for a source for this but can't find any mention
| of it.
| zuminator wrote:
| "Most European countries are now running a reduced AM
| radio service with fewer transmitters, fewer services and
| lower power. Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belarus, Belgium,
| Croatia, Estonia, Finland, Norway (except Svalbard),
| Slovakia, Sweden and Switzerland have completely closed
| their AM radio services. Denmark retains a part-time long
| wave service for mariners. Lithuania has closed domestic
| AM radio, but retains a medium wave transmitter for
| international broadcasting. Only Cyprus, Hungary, Iceland
| and Romania (together with England, Scotland, Wales,
| Northern Ireland and Spain) are continuing with a
| comprehensive AM radio service."
|
| http://frequencyfinder.org.uk/AM_Other_Countries.pdf
| tempcommenttt wrote:
| This is outdated. Denmark closed its long wave
| transmitter last year. The biggest hold out is bbc radio
| 4 and they stopped special long wave programming and the
| service is only still on the air because it doubles as a
| digital signal for some power meters.
| georgeburdell wrote:
| My new car doesn't even have an AM tuner
| hulitu wrote:
| Because it raises the costs (antenna + cable) so the
| profit is lower.
| a_paddy wrote:
| LW is simpler still and incredibly robust. It's a pity it has
| been turned off.
| coin wrote:
| LW isn't a modulation
| voldacar wrote:
| AM sounds painfully awful
| kalleboo wrote:
| For a while there was an AM Stereo which sounded much
| better
| jamesbfb wrote:
| And there are some stations in the US still broadcasting
| in AM Stereo AKA C-QUAM, if you have an AM stereo capable
| receiver that is.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-QUAM
| hulitu wrote:
| You should listen to some DAB+ for comparison. I heard that
| 56kbps can make wonders. /s
| ugjka wrote:
| That's he-aac so 56kpbs is not that bad, it gets dicey
| below 32kbps when you need tricks like parametric stereo.
| But he-aac's spectral band replication does add metallic
| taste to everything, i would agree
| jen729w wrote:
| Agree for music. Hard disagree for voice.
|
| Especially in the car! I can't make out voices on FM at
| all. But AM, easy.
| lebuffon wrote:
| That "sound" is partially due to the design of the current
| AM system. It was built to pack more transmitters into the
| allocated frequency range.
|
| There are no technical impediments to high fidelity audio
| because of amplitude modulation. In the past the big
| limitation was the bandwidth of intermediate frequency (IF)
| amplifiers in the receivers which were typically tuned for
| maximum gain and not flat audio band response. The
| transmitters have flat response out to the legal limits.
| Radio stations have a monitor receiver that has proper IF
| audio response and the sound of those are very good.
| tomjen3 wrote:
| So does DAB. It's way the hell compressed.
|
| Not that I care too much, as I basically only do on demand
| media these days.
| userbinator wrote:
| In the US, AM is still very common and there are efforts to
| keep it that way:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40234871
| ekianjo wrote:
| AM was switched off?
| bamboozled wrote:
| It sucks though, sounds horrible.
| lenerdenator wrote:
| I wouldn't say it's more robust. One pass under a bridge
| proves that AM has problems.
|
| It also has lower fidelity.
| genter wrote:
| AM only has lower fidelity because of the low broadcast
| power and shitty receivers. 80 years it was much higher
| quality with the huge transmitters and high quality tube
| radio.
| gwbas1c wrote:
| In the US, our "HD" radio (we don't have DAB) sounds so bad, I
| end up turning it off and listening to the analog version.
|
| It sounds like they reduced bitrate by pitch-shifting down
| prior to transmission, and then pitch-shifting back up at
| playback. Everything just has this metallic ring to it: When I
| tried the classical station, at first I thought there was bells
| in the piece they were playing until I realized it was a
| compression artifact. When I listen to talk, I keep hearing a
| bell/ringing over everyone's voice.
|
| I know a lot of the newer codecs also sound great (for the car)
| at low bitrates, so I don't want to go and blame "quantity over
| quality."
| FireBeyond wrote:
| The whole "HD" thing of HD Radio was a deception to begin
| with. It blatantly played on the understanding of HD as "high
| definition", when all it actually meant was Hybrid Digital,
| i.e. you get a digital audio stream that falls back to a
| simulcast FM with insufficient signal strength or exceeding
| error correction thresholds.
| jcfrei wrote:
| Swiss here: Pretty certain this is part of a pressure campaign by
| the SRF ("Swiss Radio and Television"). They are facing budget
| cuts nationally through an initiative that will be voted on
| probably later this year (https://srg-initiative.ch/). By
| preemptively cutting services on their own (that they are not
| forced to under the text of the initiative) they probably hope to
| sway voter's opinion.
| chinathrow wrote:
| Cutting service costs on their own while burdening the cost to
| their listeners is so backwards. My car radio can't do DAB and
| it would cost me quite a bit of money to install a replacement
| radio if I want a proper setup (i.e. as before in terms of
| usability/integration).
| michaelt wrote:
| Some politicians in my country have worked out that when
| someone tries to force them to spend less, they can cut
| funding to something popular like libraries, immediately get
| a bunch of complaints and protests, then declare "Well we
| tried, it seems voters don't want us to spend less after all"
| anamax wrote:
| You fire them by pointing out what they kept vs. what they
| dropped.
| Seattle3503 wrote:
| In the US it is called Washington Monument syndrome.
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| Being a non-USAn, can you provide the background story
| for that? Sounds interesting.
| opo wrote:
| >...The Washington Monument syndrome,[1] also known as
| the Mount Rushmore syndrome[2] or the firemen first
| principle,[3][4] is a term used to describe the
| phenomenon of government agencies in the United States
| cutting the most visible or appreciated service provided
| by the government when faced with budget cuts. It has
| been used in reference to cuts in popular services such
| as national parks and libraries[2] or to valued public
| employees such as teachers and firefighters,[3] with the
| Washington Monument and Mount Rushmore being two of the
| most visible landmarks maintained by the National Park
| Service.[1]
|
| >...The term was first used after George Hartzog, the
| seventh director of the National Park Service, closed
| popular national parks such as the Washington Monument
| and Grand Canyon National Park for two days a week in
| 1969.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Monument_syndrom
| e#:....
| cranky908canuck wrote:
| In Canada, it's the "Musical Ride" process.
| Youden wrote:
| Technically, if you don't have a device capable of receiving
| their broadcasts, you can get an exemption from the fee.
| Unfortunately a single computer or TV is enough to incur the
| obligation.
| avidiax wrote:
| I think you're thinking of the BBC.
|
| Serafe will only let you waive the fee if everyone in your
| household is both deaf and blind, or you are on certain
| social benefits (can't afford it), or you are a diplomat.
|
| Everyone else has to pay CHF335/year, and good luck getting
| a partial refund if you leave the country (we didn't).
|
| https://www.serafe.ch/en/exemption-from-the-fee/basic-
| princi...
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| _> Everyone else has to pay CHF335/year, and good luck
| getting a partial refund if you leave the country (we
| didn't)._
|
| Not Swiss here(it's the same kind of tax in Austria), and
| I hate useless taxes that incompetent governments shove
| down our throats, but I support the idea of citizens
| having an independent, impartial and transparent publicly
| funded media, and unfortunately that costs money to fund
| and maintain either through direct or indirect taxes, but
| either way you'll still be paying for it one way or
| another from the state budget.
|
| We can't have a functioning democracy expecting citizens
| to make informed decisions on important things like
| Brexit, when their only sources of information are
| controlled by big-ad-tech like Meta or Google and Warren
| Buffet.
|
| The only question remaining is the traditional "who
| watches the watchmen", as in what assurance do we have
| that the publicly funded media is truly unbiased and
| independent and not paddling its own biases and political
| agendas.
| ekianjo wrote:
| > the idea of citizens having an independent, impartial
| and transparent publicly funded media,
|
| if its controlled by the state by definition it cant be
| neutral.
| garte wrote:
| It's not controlled by the state, but funded by it.
| There's a kind of a people's council everyone can join
| and vote about stuff which in part control the direction
| of it, it's called SRG.
|
| People in Switzerland still trust their state and
| institutions: https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/democracy/why-
| people-in-switzer...
| BSDobelix wrote:
| It's not funded by thew state but by it's citizens,
| enforced through serafe and the whole construct blessed
| by the state.
| ekianjo wrote:
| you typically dont behave the same way when you receive a
| check from someone. just like people dont openly
| criticize their boss at work.
|
| Maybe Switzerland has a better system but in most
| countries state funded media ends up being the voice of
| the state
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| If it's like in Austria, then the state media doesn't
| receive cheques from the state government, but directly
| from the taxpayers via a separate tax collected by an
| independent agency granted power by the state, and not
| from the state itself.
|
| On paper this makes it so that the state media is
| reporting directly to the paying citizens similar to a
| national Patreon, in practice IMO, it's still state
| control but with extra steps and middlemen designed to
| give the illusion of independence.
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| On paper it's not controlled by the state, but awarded
| independence by law. On paper. In practice, it's still
| subject to the laws and influence of the state it's
| funded by, so take that as you will.
|
| At least here in Austria I can't put too much faith in
| the state media since they don't cover any major
| corruption scandals of the parties in power, but mostly
| report on neutral stuff like whatever new laws passed and
| that the sloth family at the local zoo had a baby.
| o11c wrote:
| Maybe not, but it's far more neutral than any other
| source of control.
| hulitu wrote:
| > independent, impartial and transparent publicly funded
| media,
|
| Choose one. /s
| tentacleuno wrote:
| > I think you're thinking of the BBC.
|
| That's not quite right. You don't need a TV License if
| you're in possession of a TV.
|
| You do, however, require one _if you watch TV as it is
| being broadcast_ , utilise BBC iPlayer (their online
| catch-up service), or consume TV via satellite /
| terrestrial receiver equipment[0].
|
| Consuming catch-up TV (e.g. My5, Channel 4, etc.) does
| not require the purchase of a TV License, nor does
| Netflix or YouTube.
|
| The "Enforcement Officers" (who pay you a visit if you
| cancel, and try to intimidate you) tend to play into
| misconceptions regarding how the law works, so it's best
| to be equipped with knowledge before cancelling to avoid
| being tricked.
|
| [0]: https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| I wonder how often such attempts backfire ("well, they're going
| to cut what is useful for me anyways, so why should I vote to
| give them any money?").
| conradfr wrote:
| Can there be an initiative to force them to keep FM?
| nar001 wrote:
| Funny how it's always the SVP trying to cut the SRG funds,
| after their first initiative to completely abolish the tax
| failed.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| Attacking public broadcasters is a pretty standard playbook
| of the far-right and even Conservatives - the latter in
| Germany for example killed off fibre buildout under Kohl in
| favor of cable TV/radio because they wanted private
| broadcasters as competition against a "too left" public TV
| [1]. The consequences of that decision haunt us to this day,
| with many households still getting internet access via
| decades-old twisted pair phone lines.
|
| [1] https://netzpolitik.org/2018/danke-helmut-kohl-
| kabelfernsehe...
| red_admiral wrote:
| Switzerland has a national siren network, tested annually, and
| regularly reminds its citizens "if the sirens sound, turn on the
| radio to DRS/SRF 1". They've added the swissalert mobile app more
| recently, but I guess everyone is going to have to buy new radio
| sets who doesn't have a DAB+ one already.
| CodeBeater wrote:
| I have a genuine question, what's to gain from this? I could
| half-understand it if they were going to re-allocate the 88-108
| MHz block, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
|
| I could also understand why such an action would be taken if that
| meant that they could pack more stations in the same spectrum,
| but considering that Switzerland is a relatively small country,
| so is there really a market? Even if considering multiple
| languages per niche.
|
| I guess a case could be made for power savings by virtue of
| (assuming local topography allows) lower power transmitters or by
| multiplexing various stations on the same transmitter.
|
| On a personal level, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about all
| forms of analog broadcasting being slowly phased out. The
| tinkerer in me likes the idea of being capable of constructing an
| information receiving device in an almost "survivalist" manner,
| but if this trend continues and analog FM really goes the way of
| the dodo, then I surmise that DAB (or whichever local flavor is
| chosen) will become easily and cheaply available, which makes my
| gut feeling a moot point anyway.
|
| I don't know, I just don't like the idea of needing a processor
| to receive broadcast audio, and I can't quite put my finger on
| why.
| dark-star wrote:
| It probably lets them scrap large amounts of FM transmitters,
| relays, broadcasting hardware and maintenance. I assume in a
| mountainous country such as Switzerland this adds up to quite a
| lot
| brnt wrote:
| Considering DAB has less range, the amount of antennas would
| need to go up.
| ale42 wrote:
| But DAB is already deployed, removing the FM part will
| probably allow them to spare money. I think the
| transmitters are managed by someone else than SRF (maybe
| Swisscom broadcast), as any service it can be pretty
| expensive. This said, I'm not happy about the removal of
| FM. Now I want to find out what's the cheapest way to
| broadcast the whole FM band at once using an SDR (inside my
| house).
| jhoechtl wrote:
| So following your argument, DAB shouldn't have deployed
| from the begining? I agree with you!
| kasabali wrote:
| DAB works worse in that kind of terrain, so good luck with
| that.
| JohnKemeny wrote:
| Norway phased out FM in 2017, and went from 5 national channels
| to over 30.
|
| There's an article from back then here:
| https://radio.no/2017/01/norway-makes-radio-history/
| fifilura wrote:
| Interesting.
|
| Switzerland an Norway both have a very moutaineous terrain.
|
| Does that make it more difficult to fit many channels?
| notatoad wrote:
| > if they were going to re-allocate the 88-108 MHz block, but
| that doesn't seem to be the case.
|
| they definitely will do that though. spectrum is valuable,
| they're not just going to let unallocated spectrum sit there
| unused.
| globalise83 wrote:
| Interesting. I live near Switzerland and the only time I listen
| to radio is using FM in my car. I hope this same idea doesn't
| make it to the country where I live.
| generic92034 wrote:
| I guess this will start to happen everywhere in the EU, now. In
| Germany it has also already started:
|
| https://www.heise.de/news/UKW-Radio-Schleswig-Holstein-schal...
| switch007 wrote:
| My fav ... part of di radio ... is tha you only he ... ha of the
| broadc ... whe sign i poor...
|
| It's useless in the car, in my experience on-and-off the last 10
| years or so. Too many blackspots (in the UK)
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| The UK is a bad example, as it adopted DAB (without the "+")
| far too early. DAB uses the MPEG-1 Audio Layer II "MP2" codec
| which is a _very_ old codec, and while MP2 actually sounds
| pretty great at appropriate bitrates (256kb /s or higher), it
| was decided that quantity was better than quality and so the UK
| has a large number of poor quality, low bitrate, stations.
| Sometimes in MONO!
|
| DAB+ uses HE-AACv2 which is much better suited to the bitrates
| that the UK has chosen to use, and in addition has much better
| error correction, reducing the "bubbling mud" effect that UK
| DAB listeners are all to familiar with.
|
| The sad truth is that FM actually works very well, and can have
| extremely good audio quality, but capitalism must ruin all good
| things. The death of the BBC, as now seems inevitable, will be
| the final shame.
| switch007 wrote:
| Are you implying DAB+ existed when the UK launched DAB in
| 1995...? Or we should have not launched DAB at all and
| waited?
|
| DAB+ came out in other countries in the mid 00s and was
| adopted in the UK in 2016 and now we have over 180 DAB+
| stations. But notably missing the BBC.
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| I'm saying that the UK should have done one of the
| following:
|
| * Recognized that DAB was not capable enough given the
| number of stations required, and waited.
|
| or:
|
| * Cut back on the number of stations so that the remaining
| ones could be broadcast at an acceptable quality.
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| Analog radio and and video signals like VGA, fail way more
| gracefully and linearly, which is why they're still used in
| many applications today where rough environments are involved
| and high availability is desired as a degraded signal is better
| than no signal at all due to some CRC or handshake failure.
|
| Digital connections have a terrible failure model, it either
| works perfectly or not at all, with little in between.
|
| In modern datacenters or in radio broadcasting equipment, you
| can still find VGA connectors or LCD displays using that
| signal.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Might be an anti-anti-fragile move...
| pverghese wrote:
| I understand why the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation (SRF) wants
| to pull the plug on FM radio. But I think there are still some
| good reasons to keep it around. FM radio is simple and strong,
| and it can be heard by a lot of people even in areas with bad
| internet access. FM radio also comes in handy in emergencies,
| like when natural disasters knock out other ways to communicate.
| BSDobelix wrote:
| >even in areas with bad internet access.
|
| They stop the analog signal, not the whole "air transmission":
|
| >>Those who listen to the radio now largely do so via digital
| audio broadcasting (DAB+) or the internet
|
| It's literately the first sentence.
| clbrmbr wrote:
| It made me sad when I got into amateur radio to learn that SRI
| had shut down their famous HF (shortwave) transmissions just a
| few years prior.
|
| But I still listen to podcasts and streaming from RTS/SRF. They
| do great world news coverage from a kind of detached perspective.
| Gotta know French or German, for next 6mo until it becomes
| commonplace to have live transvocalized podcasts.
| caseysoftware wrote:
| An FM receiver is pretty basic, cheap, and easily
| understood/home-built technology. Does DAB+ require an encryption
| key, license, or otherwise limited-access component that would
| prevent people from rolling their own receiver?
| rsynnott wrote:
| No encryption. Manufacturers do have to license HE-ACC, I think
| (at least in theory; wouldn't really be any issue for amateurs)
| rsynnott wrote:
| Oddly, in Ireland we did the opposite; the last DAB transmitter
| was switched off a year or so ago (digital radio, oddly, is still
| available bugs DVB-T2, bundled with the terrestrial digital tv
| signals, though I'm not sure anyone really listens to it that
| way).
| piltdownman wrote:
| DAB made little sense in Ireland. The FM figures used to argue
| for DAB adoption were skewed by a huge captive drivetime
| audience who were already pivoting to podcasts and live-streams
| instead of to DAB/Digital stations.
|
| Combine this with cheap and ubiquitous 4G Internet, the
| introduction of mass audio and podcast streaming services, and
| the prevalence of smart-home devices at loss-leader prices like
| the Google Home or Amazon Alexa, and the writing was on the
| wall from the get-go.
|
| In short, the National Broadcaster (RTE) were latecomers to DAB
| to the point where it was no longer deemed necessary by the
| time it was implemented. Case in point was when RTE shut down
| the DAB infrastructure, but didnt shutter the digital services
| populating it: RTE Gold/2XM/Pulse continue as online streaming
| services.
|
| The majority of people - even my parents - are now far more
| tuned in to the likes of Audible and Spotify. When they want
| e.g. Death Notices or GAA they use a streaming app or the
| native webcast from the FM station Website.
|
| Synchronous single-infrastructure dependent Audio Streaming is
| now a use-case in search of a problem for the average consumer,
| outside of certain niches like Naval/Aviation traffic.
| Ekaros wrote:
| TV signals have lot more spare bandwidth. So packing a few
| audio only channels is not really that much extra work or cost.
| lqet wrote:
| 20 years ago, Germany decided to stop FM broadcasting in 2015.
| Digital radio (DAB+) was heavily advertised. Despite a fear
| campaign ("your radio will stop working soon!"), almost nobody
| cared or replaced their working cheap kitchen or car radio. The
| plan to stop FM broadcasting was finally abandoned in 2011,
| because radio stations would've lost 80% of their listeners. My
| parents bought a DAB+ kitchen radio in 2009, but never liked it
| and it stopped working after a few years. They replaced it with a
| new FM radio.
| empath75 wrote:
| Yeah to me, it seems like FM radio + internet audio over
| cellular is a great mix of choices, and "digital radio" is
| pointless. If you want to do digital radio, make a
| carplay/android app.
| TylerE wrote:
| Digital radio allows for far more efficient use of spectrum
| than FM
| randomdata wrote:
| Imagine: Instead of three radio stations all playing the
| same song, you could have 100 stations all playing the same
| song!
| crote wrote:
| Or perhaps they could play _different_ songs!
|
| In my country DAB has station dedicated to playing
| classical music, jazz, youth-oriented pop music, current
| affairs, religion, rock music - not to mention dozens of
| local radio stations!
|
| FM allows for only a very limited number of stations,
| which means it ends up in a bidding war between the large
| commercial stations - who in turn have to play fairly
| generic music to attract a large number of listeners.
| With DAB there's plenty of space left over for niche
| stations, as they can transmit essentially for free.
| randomdata wrote:
| Once you get beyond the cities, there is still plenty of
| open FM spectrum. Getting a frequency isn't the real
| hurdle. Human effort and licensing are the much greater
| challenges.
|
| Especially licensing. Even on commercial radio you can
| regularly catch them playing "10 second" clips of
| different songs, to stay within fair use, that they wish
| to play but cannot legally do so. The college stations
| are more brazen about it and will flat out tell you that
| they can't play different jobs for legal reasons.
|
| Indeed, commercial radio does have to appeal to an
| audience, but that audience would unquestionably enjoy
| other music - at least within the same genre. But playing
| it for them opens up a huge legal minefield. It is a lot
| easier to pick a small catalog that you can properly
| audit and disallow anything beyond that.
| bayindirh wrote:
| Using the spectrum more efficiently doesn't make a system
| automatically better.
|
| I don't think Switzerland is crowded enough to have 10x
| more radio stations sustainably.
| TylerE wrote:
| It's not to have more radio stations, it's to have more
| bandwidth to allocate to things that AREN'T commercial
| radio.
| martinald wrote:
| Genuinely interested - what is using the FM frequency
| instead?
| TylerE wrote:
| Well, nothing right now because it's still allocated for
| FM.
| georgeplusplus wrote:
| I believe he was saying what else could that portion of
| the spectrum be used for, if not for FM radio?
| martinald wrote:
| Correct. I don't see a huge amount of use for ~20MHz
| (probably less) of very long range spectrum. Potentially
| for smart meters and other IOT stuff, but current
| cellular networks deal with that pretty well (and there
| are other alternatives available). Plus I don't know much
| equipment that could use it at least out of the box so it
| is going to be fairly custom and very expensive.
| TylerE wrote:
| It's valuable precisely because it's relatively low
| frequency, which means it works for things that need to
| punch through buildings.
| asdefghyk wrote:
| apparently, digital radio has less range than FM
| TylerE wrote:
| You get a lot of that back because you can have all the
| repeaters for a given station on The same frequency.
| JohnFen wrote:
| Same with digital TV, but digital TV also brought a
| significantly worse viewing experience, at least in my
| area.
| ale42 wrote:
| > If you want to do digital radio, make a carplay/android
| app.
|
| Rather a streaming service with an open protocol, and then
| users use whatever they want to listen. Fine if there's also
| an app for those who want, but I don't want to install an app
| to listen to a specific audio stream. I have VLC and it's
| enough.
|
| The other problem is people without cellular data and/or
| cellular phone, and those with limited data plans. But if
| most radio stations stay also on FM, that's basically a non-
| issue.
| pdntspa wrote:
| > Fine if there's also an app for those who want, but I
| don't want to install an app to listen to a specific audio
| stream. I have VLC and it's enough.
|
| "But muh branding!!!" - Every marketer and UX designer
| everywhere
| crote wrote:
| 2015 was WAY too early for that switch.
|
| However, since December 2020 the EU mandates that all new cars
| equipped with a radio must be able to receive DAB+. In H2 2019
| only 22% of cars sold in Germany were equipped with a
| DAB+-capable radio, in H2 202 this already rose to 80%.[0]
|
| So yeah, in 2015 they'd indeed lose around 80% of listeners.
| But it's a completely different story in 2024, as anyone with a
| car bought in the last 5 years would support it. Give it
| another 5, and the switchover might be possible without anyone
| really noticing.
|
| As for Switzerland? 99% of cars sold in 2019 were already
| equipped with DAB+, so they probably mandated it even earlier.
|
| [0]:
| https://www.worlddab.org/system/news/documents/000/012/060/o...
| Cheer2171 wrote:
| Those figures are for new cars sold. People drive cars for
| decades.
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| The average (mean) age of vehicles on the road in the USA is,
| I believe, 12 years. I don't know about Switzerland, but I
| presume it isn't under five.
| openrisk wrote:
| This is the analog (pun) in radio technology of abandoning
| physical cash and switching exclusively to digital money.
|
| Optimisation, efficiency and monoculture versus redundancy,
| resilience and diversity.
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