Well, I just Tweeted this:
"In 2015 all UK FM radio switches to Digital. That means 31 MILLION cars (+vans +trucks) will need new radios. New cars NOW don't have them."
Background:
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The challenges facing the motor industry in meeting the 2013 deadline for all new vehicles to have digital radios were explored when the House of Lords Communications Committee questioned SMMT chief executive Paul Everitt. By 2015, when the FM content will move to digital radio, all vehicles on the road should be equipped to receive the digital signal.
“A pan-European approach to the introduction of digital radio in vehicles is vital to a successful switchover," said Everitt (not my favourite person).
"Every one of the 31 million vehicles currently on UK roads will be affected by the switchover, so coverage and content concerns must be satisfied, in addition to a means of converting existing FM radios to receive the digital signal."
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Surely, for this "target date" to be achieved, all cars should be having digital radios fitted now? I mean, who wants an aftermarket radio slapped in their new-ish car? Goodmans in your BMW, anyone?
But new cars (in 99% of cases) aren't getting them at the moment. This will force consumers into a (costly) upgrade. Also, the 2015 date is a "target". We all know what happens to these Government targets.
My customers who have had DAB radios fitted as (costly) options have consistently said their reception seems patchy, weak and prone to losing signals. DAB is a poor technology.
Ofcom have said that only when 50% of listening is done on digital radios will the countdown to switchover start. Hard to see that being the case for home radios, never if they include car radios.
Can you imagine radio stations and advertisers being happy with accepting just 50% of the current audience as an acceptable amount?
I think 2025 is more likely for this switchover, having seen the evidence - and by then it is far more likely that internet streamed entertainment will be available (and prevalent) in cars - via a PC embedded instead of a radio.
Discuss?
Ling
Last edited by: VxFan on Tue 2 Mar 10 at 19:11
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...In 2015 all UK FM radio switches to Digital...
First I've heard of that.
No switchover date set yet, as far as I'm aware.
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>> ...In 2015 all UK FM radio switches to Digital...
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>> First I've heard of that.
www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/jun/16/digital-britain-analogue-radio-switchoff
www.autocar.co.uk/News/NewsArticle/AllCars/247428
To name but a few websites mentioning it.
I imagine that some kind of freeview type box will come along to plug into existing stereos so they don't have to be replaced, just like there are for people who don't have digital televisions.
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...To name but a few websites mentioning it...
In the reports, 2015 is described as a 'target' based on a two year countdown from when more than 50 per cent of radio listening is digital, which would have to be by 2013.
Could happen, but 50 per cent by 2013 is a big 'if'.
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My only experience with DAB in a car was in a brand new Lexus RX450h last week driving from Manchester to the West Midlands and back with a client. I can only say I was underwhelmed by the quality or reception which seemed to offer no improvement over FM - and that was in a car with it fitted as an integral part of the sound system with a special aerial fitted to the windscreen as well!
At the same time, I found it difficult to get a decent signal on my Blackberry which I was assured was because of the double glazing?
So if the need to get us all over to DAB within the next five years they are really going to have to bribe us to do it. There is a big difference between buying a £20 set top box for digital TV (for those of us who prefer not to sponsor the Sun newspaper) and ripping the guts out of a car which has an integrated radio (as many do these days). I wonder how many radio stations will see a significant reduction in listening figures?
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I hope it is better than digital TV, which seems to object to bad weather or strong winds.
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For a car it's necessary to be integrated. And if there are steering controls they need to worn. As well as the original display on the in built radio. It's not like plugging in a box via SCART at home.
It will all happen late. Digital radio reception can be poor at home sometimes so I am notconvincd at 155mph.
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What about Satellite Radio ? Drove a hire car in the US with one loads of choice (Blue Collar Radio was brilliant) perfect reception and even BBC Radio 1....first time I've ever listened to that junk but the only way to get Cricket scores on the move.
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I think the UK uses a particularly old codec - plus limited bandwidth has resulted in many stations reducing the bit rate well beyond that considered acceptable.
I do remember seeing a chart recently which ranked broadcast quality by user perception - FM was at number one, DAB was at six just ahead of AM!
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>> I hope it is better than digital TV which seems to object to bad weather
>> or strong winds.
>>
It will (from what Ive been told) just as bad as TV.
where I live is subject to poor TV reception, so Im stuck with Sky (no cable in my road) and when the weather is poor, I give up trying to watch TV as the picture just pixulates/ goes VERY blocky, or just stalls, making the programme unwatchable.
at least with analogue the worst you got was ghosting, allowing you to get the gist of the action.
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I'm pleasantly surprised - moved to deepest Wales in the middle of the hills and Digi signal for telly is er----superb, knackered old aerial, miles of internal co-ax and it just works......not a fan of DAB - horrible sounds like wet mud.
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>>......not a fan of DAB - horrible sounds like wet mud.
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DAB reception is really sensitive to signal level though, SWMBO's Intempo PG-01 had really good reception upstairs in our house on BBC7 ( her) and Planet Rock ( me). Virtually no bubbling mud ever. Moved it downstairs into the kitchen, BBC7 still fine, but PR breaks up into bubbling mud every time I go within 6 foot of the darned thing. I've tried various Heath Robinson lengths of wire clipped onto the antenna in various directions, no better though.
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If heavy rain is affecting your Sky signal frequently the maybe your LNB is starting to leak and water is getting into it & the feeder cable, or the dish is lightly misaligned, so any reduction in signal level ( as caused by heavy rain) can push the picture over the edge. If the picture quality returns to normal as soon as it stops raining I'd suspect the latter problem, if it takes a while I suspect the former.
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No need to rip out your existing radio - although I won't be coughing up eighty quid in the near future. I'm sure the price will drop in the next five years:
pure.com/products/product.asp?Product=VL-60905
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I've still got a radio cassette in my car.
I've also got an FM transmitter lighter socket thingy, I can play mp3s from my phone through it. My phone also has an FM tuner, so by 2015 will phones not all have DAB tuners instead? Problem solved :-)
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>> If heavy rain is affecting your Sky signal frequently the maybe your LNB is starting
>> to leak and water is getting into it & the feeder cable or the dish
>> is lightly misaligned so any reduction in signal level ( as caused by heavy rain)
>> can push the picture over the edge.
>>
My signal on Sky is fine. However, the TVs in the kitchen and upstairs have Freeview boxes and they are the ones playing up. The ariel is a modern type too.
We are waiting for London to lose their analogue signal in the hope of an improvement because of all the outraged complaints they will get which will be hyped up by the media. Nobody takes any notice of the crap services we hillbillies have to suffer.
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You shouldn't be listening to the damned radio anyway...you should be concentrating on your driving....:-)
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>> by the media. Nobody takes any notice of the crap services we hillbillies have to
>> suffer.
Quite right, get back to mangling your wurzles or whatever it is you smock wearers do.
Last edited by: Zero on Tue 2 Mar 10 at 22:11
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There is no place for radios in moving vehicles when the driver is listening to them - especially when he's travelling alone.
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yes there is. The car makers make a place for them in the dash
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If car makers hadn't meant you to listen to the radio they wouldn't have given you a steering wheel to play the bongos on.
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Well, up to now car manufacturers have been reluctant to install DAB radios due to conflicting standards across Europe. However, now the WorldDAB standard has been established, a single €10 chipset can handle all these different types of signal. Apparently.
I think the manufacturers are deliberately withholding the fitment of digital radios (or hybrid radios that can handle digital and analogue). The reason will probably be to create another overwhelming reason to change cars when it is suddenly realised that people will lose radio reception.
I can't see most new car owners happy to fit an £80 aftermarket device to their windscreen with suckers, which (at least for early adopters) will create a theft-target and need to be removed when parked etc.
Frankly these radios should be fitted as standard now - but as usual the industry is dragging its heels - no one is prepared to jump first when 10 Euros for a chipset are at stake. Yet, Vauxhall's digital radio upgrade costs £150 on lower-spec cars.
Milk the early adopters, create a massive radio headache for the rest of us... I can see "DR" as a new Autotrader selling point and cars without it will get reduced residuals, and give people a "reason" to upgrade their whole car by making manufacturer replacement radio models prohibitively expensive.
Cars with radio operated by touch-screen displays will be a particular problem (often integrated with sat nav and hands free phone), and who wants to buy a car without a working radio?
Luckily for me, this is not such bad news, as my customers commit for just 2 or 3 years - but would you buy a new car with super-flashy integrated radio, knowing that in 2015 it will be a MAJOR problem for resale, without a massively expensive dealer upgrade? People just won't want cars that can't get 100% radio.
Last edited by: LINGsCARS on Wed 3 Mar 10 at 07:21
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Its a non problem
1/ Analogue radio wont be phased out by 2015. Take up in the home to date has been very slow and its widely seen that this target will be dropped.
2/ There is plenty of aftermarket units that could be fitted by your local ICE store.
ok its a potential 200 quid problem at worse. No need for a new car.
Last edited by: Zero on Wed 3 Mar 10 at 08:14
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...as my customers commit for just 2 or 3 years...
Ah, and there was I thinking Ling was posting out of altruistic concern for us all.
The message is clear - get a Ling car and you'll never be without sounds.
Why pay to advertise on this site, when you can advertise in the threads themselves?
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Last edited by: Pugugly on Wed 3 Mar 10 at 10:58
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Last Christmas I asked for (and received) an Pure Highway DAB radio for the car. So that I could listen to BBC 6 Music. Also the reason I'd bought a nice DAB radio for the kitchen.
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. I am not happy. Best part of 200 quid in total, now they're closing down the best radio station in the history of radio stations. I'm just hoping it's a Heinz Salad Cream job now.
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You might want to read this article, which suggests that switch off of FM might not happen for many, many years:
www.theregister.co.uk/2009/06/19/carter_radio_dumb_media/
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One of the reasons that analogue TV needs to be switched off is that the digital transmissions share the same bandwidth. Consequently, digital power can be increased when there are no analogue stations to interfere with - giving a better signal, and more of the spectrum is made available for multiplexes - so more channels.
IIRC, DAB is broadcast well outside of the current 88-108 FM spectrum - so that same argument doesn't hold true. There may be commercial / licencing / political issues behind a move to switch off analogue, but I don't believe there are any engineering ones.
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>> IIRC DAB is broadcast well outside of the current 88-108 FM spectrum
218-229MHz according to this: www.uk-dab.info/stationlist.php
(right hand side)
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I think I'll be ok, I rarely listen to the drivel on UK radio and always have a CD full of Mp3s on the go in my car.
If there was a decent rock/metal radio station I would be concerned ;-)
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>> I can't see most new car owners happy to fit an £80 aftermarket device to their windscreen with suckers, which (at least for early adopters) will create a theft-target and need to be removed when parked etc.
Phew, just as well every new car, van and lorry comes with built-in satnav as standard then! ;-)
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>> Ofcom have said that only when 50% of listening is done on digital radios will
>> the countdown to switchover start. Hard to see that being the case for home radios
>> never if they include car radios.
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Does this include digital TV as radio is broadcast here too.
50% will be easily attainable if this is counted in the figures/stats.
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2015 analogue shutdown is frankly ya ya land.
Firstly, as already mentioned above, UK DAB is the day before yesterday's technology. Adopting a new system that's fit for purpose will turn the count back to nil.
Secondly, and I suspect I'm fairly typical, I do have digital radio; one set in the kitchen. Across the cars and other rooms in the house are a further eight AM/FM analogue sets including two Sony ICF7600G worldband receivers and a Denon unit in the HiFi. That figure excludes any mobiles with radio. Once people realise thay need to junk hundreds of quids worth of kit for no gain the whole idea will sink.
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>> Once people realise thay need to junk
>> hundreds of quids worth of kit for no gain the whole idea will sink.
But they're not the ones making the decision - if the powers that be decide to switch FM off, the FM users might kick up a fuss, but do you think they could get the decision reversed?
I'm more interested in what music is being played rather than the fine detail of how it is reproduced, so I like the convenience of our DAB radios in the kitchen and bedroom. No experience of it in cars.
Last edited by: Focus on Wed 3 Mar 10 at 23:11
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Some vehicle manufacturers offered the option of DAB but withdrew it due to lack of demand.I'm happy at the moment with FM RDS.We have an RDS portable in our kitchen.In the car,I can travel all round the country and the radio switches transmitters(seamlessly)to stay on the same station.Can't do it on DAB-not enough transmitters.
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>> Some vehicle manufacturers offered the option of DAB
IIRC, the Vectra-C (Design trim spec) had DAB as standard for a little while.
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I'm convinced it is a deliberate strategy (not to offer it as standard at the mo). After all, the BBC promote it like mad in every frequency plug. Manufacturers could have been incorporating it for years for peanuts, but choose not to:
1) To save a few quid
2) To force the early adopters to pay big bucks to have it
3) To create a massive demand when they all decide (coincidentally) to offer it as standard in 2013 when the Government are going to FORCE manufacturers "by agreement" to fit it.
The demand will be in retro-fit and aftermarket parts and labour in very expensive upgrades when people realise their residuals are gonna be knocked for six without it. That will include all the cars sold in the next 3 years.
For instance if you can choose between 2 identical Lexus IS200, one with Digi Radio, the other without, and the FM bands are going to stop broadcasting (or threat of, or simply that all new cars suddenly have digi)... and the integrated set is a £1500 non-digital satnav, phone, reversing camera enabled, iDrive type thing that would need replacing... that digital enabled car is going to be worth £1000 more.
Creating a market through fear.
Desire, need and fear of loss... powerful marketing! Like a car without aircon... who would buy it when the next one has it?
Not about "YOU", about residuals and £££s
Last edited by: LINGsCARS on Thu 4 Mar 10 at 19:22
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LINGsCARS if you do a bit of research you will find most people dont use aircon so its not a must have its something marketing has said they need (im a convert so please dont try and tell me i need it) as for dib dab dib do a bit of research and you will see the bbc coffers are now overspent and they probably wont be pushing dab as much in future,remember it needs more shillings in the meter to send it out so we might all end up going back to 247 medium wave
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>> we might all end
>> up going back to 247 medium wave
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Super duper pop picker!
I bought a DAB for the house and can't be bothered with the carp reception, dropped channels, and general unreliabilty. It has a mountain to climb before it can supercede FM. 2015? No way!
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...IIRC, the Vectra-C (Design trim spec) had DAB as standard for a little while...
Yes, I got the impression Vauxhall DABbled (ouch) with DAB for a while.
They were the only volume manufacturer to offer DAB sets as standard in any model, as far as I know.
Last edited by: ifithelps on Thu 4 Mar 10 at 19:21
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When the Police converted to the digital Airwave system the existing frequencies were sold off for rather a large amount of money.
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And ruined my scanner fun,
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...ruined my scanner fun...
The coppers I spoke to couldn't hear each other, either, when Airwave was introduced.
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>> And ruined my scanner fun
Never mind RF, there's still aviation and shipping transmitting in clear!!
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>> Yes I got the impression Vauxhall DABbled (ouch) with DAB for a while.
2005 Vectra-C. They fitted the CDC40 Opera to the Design model.
I see that Vauxhall are still DABbling though. The Insignia and Astra-J with the following head units fitted - CD400, CD500 NaviD, & DVD800 have DAB.
Last edited by: VxFan on Fri 5 Mar 10 at 00:31
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I had a rented Insignia a few months back which had DAB, and it wasn't a hugely high spec model, bog standrad rental fleet stuff. Loved the DAB. Liked the car too as it goes. Nice drive.
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Quality of DAB is rubbish for hi-fi but ideal for portable units and cars in particular. There is a bit of extra confusion in that the world standard for DAB is DAB+ and most UK receivers sold over the last few years will not receive DAB+.
The UK isn't sure if DAB or DAB+ will be the eventual standard so that adds a layer of confusion to any car maker thinking of adding digital to their tuners.
Mind you I see little excuse for, as an example, my new C5 not having DAB/DAB+ in its integrated nav/music/radio/phone unit. Given that in models where it's an option the NAV unit cost is £1000+ you'd think they could let you have a £10 chip to do the digital stuff.
My year old Sony small portable DAB radio has no reception/dropout issues but will sadly need replacing if DAB+ does arrive.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Fri 5 Mar 10 at 10:28
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Just had a look and at least current Pure Highway models are DAB+ compatible.
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DIGITAL RADIO IN CARS - Ling - Iffy
