DAB in Ireland: RTE multiplex closed

You are correct, at least one of those frequencies has been cleared for national roll-out.

I should have said the muxes serving the North East, not the North East muxes.

Just drifting back up this thread, just to completely underline, LMFM is not on DAB.

Radio|Man wrote: »

Seven and a half million DAB (Not DAB+) receivers sold in the UK, with five hundred thousand of them sold at Christmas this year. Hardly obsolete !!

But what about the rest of Europe?, nearly every other European country seems to be on a go slow in relation to DAB - is seems to be that they are waiting for DAB+ ?

Radio|Man wrote: »

Little or no advantage over FM ??? Come now, Here's a few I can think of:

88-108 is full ! Game over, no more room.

in this country the FM band is not, as of yet, fully used.
Many of the 'digital only' stations in the UK are in trouble - are digital only stations going to be viable in this country with a smaller population base?
I notice that some planned additional FM stations in this country have been deferred (not because of the FM band being full).

Radio|Man wrote: »

Noise floor on digital is far superior to that of fm, but that actually doesn't matter a toss as its been proven time and time again that the majority of punters care not for audio quality.

FM can perform far better than most punters allow - but they use poor quality receivers, wrong or broken aerials, etc. Noise floor doesn't of course equate to overall quality.

Radio|Man wrote: »

TMC-Traffic message channel support for your DAB tuner.

RTE and others don't bother utilising the RDS Traffic Announcement (TA) function which is already in practically every car nowadays - so are they going to give much attention to TMC ?

Radio|Man wrote: »

Metadata-streaming of "Now Playing" track and channel information.

possible already (and done by some stations in the UK) with RDS Radiotext. But car radios don't have Radiotext as it is considered distracting to drivers. I assume DAB car radios won't display streaming text either?

Radio|Man wrote: »

:

88-108 is full ! Game over, no more room.


!!

not outside Dublin I get 5 stations if i twidle with the aerial a bit.

is dab going to go nationwide (before 2020)?:rolleyes:

GCap are in the same position EMAP were in last year, but they are selling everything and focusing on FM. Very short term strategy for short term gain.

DMC wrote: »

GCap are in the same position EMAP were in last year, but they are selling everything and focusing on FM. Very short term strategy for short term gain.

True but they need to deliver a return for the shareholders. Gcap are probably looking at the downturn of DAB across Europe... they jumped in at the start and now cold feet has settled in.

Obviously they still have their commitment for the local dab licences but running the national one is probably not cost effective for them.

Talk sport and Virgin aren't going to pull out... their MW coverage is awful. Digital One hasn't got a great line up now... BFBS replacing Core and the bird channel replacing one word... what on earth is going to take the place of theJAZZ and Planet Rock???

marclt wrote: »

True but they need to deliver a return for the shareholders.

Yes, the beancounters need to balance the books. These are the same type of idiots who ran ITV in the early part of this decade. And look what happened there. This is what happens when you let accountants run a media company.

There is a whole lot of whinging going on in commercial radio in the UK. GWR and Capital Radio Group were allowed to merge, yet the whining continues. Get the product right and be inventive, and not run it as a cash cow, milking it dry.

With the state of Digital 1's content, I think Ofcom have grounds to revoke.

DMC wrote: »

With the state of Digital 1's content, I think Ofcom have grounds to revoke.

Hmm, whilst it is probably true, I don't think ofcom would - it would mean paying back money!!!

You're right about the beancounting... unfortunately the ITV situation went tlts up because they had invested heavily in programming (ie the football)... radio doesn't ever part with that much cash.. The average UK (local) station has maybe 3/4 full time presenters, most of which do 6/7 shows a week. Maybe a newsteam of 2 or 2 and a half and then the rest are sales and admin. The product isn't well funded.. and I have this argument about who are more important - the presenters or the sales hounds. (we'll keep that one for another day! )

GCap just wanted rid of these stations, a. to cut costs and b. to make a statement about their current position - its not just about DAB, they are selling FM services also.

This does of course put the future of DAB in the balance. It isn't a failed exercise in the UK... and people are finally picking up on the technology... but then I'm guessing that most people aren't buying a dab radio because its a dab radio, they are just replacing old stuff....

DVB-h makes more sense for Mobile Digital Radio now.
Also without a BBC mux and very portable (DVB-h is with low battery consumption, and DAB is not), without the lower battery consumption and better quality of DVB-h audio only, you are better with Satellite. Better choice and Better quality and all the BBC.

You can get phones with DVB-h and/or FM-VHF. Not with DAB.
DAB is obsolete technology and Digital Radio was implemented too early.

we are NOT any longer part oF Sterling Area or UK. We are more Eurpean than the British. Europe is not irrelevant. Europe if it does Digital Mobile Radio at all will use space on the DVB-h system.

The DVB-h was a closed TV trial. Also O2 was looking at the wrong things. DVB-h is more interesting for Radio, though is not bad even on a 10" kitchen or Bedside TV (I've seen such a thing, not to be confused with the 7" and 10" portable DVB-t LCD TVs).

DVB-h and DRM can use the better than MP3, ACC codec. DAB is using MP2 codec. Fine at 256k Stereo. Rubbish at the typically used 128k. I use 256K MP3 on my phone media player.

DAB is only a set from FM-VHF in terms of choice. DAB sets only selling because they are on shelf. More products are being bought online. Hence Virgin selling their record stores and Dixions closed in UK.

Worldwide the future of Digital Radio is not DAB. Worldspace is starting new services for Europe, UK and Ireland too. Eutelsat and Astra are testing portable/Mobile/car radio services.

DAB was launched too soon. In UK it has too many channels, reducing quality. In Ireland it has too few and no compelling reason to change.

DAB radios are selling for same reason as Vista. Because they are there. Recently in all walks the UK has lost the Plot. I'd rather take notice of what Germany, Scandinavia, Italy are doing.

DVB-h texas chip set is lower power and cheaper than DAB will ever be and can cheaply be put in anything. The receiver is only on for 1/10th of the time as the OFDM transmission uses timeslots. One timeslot can have maybe 10 to 20 radio stations. That's 1/10th of one MUX! The texas chip is used in Italian receivers, mostly Mobile phones made by LG, Nokia and possibly ZTE (They do have 3g/DVB-h handset). I think due to tiny world wide adoption of DAB and very widespread DRM adoption (SW,MW and LW but still a couple of years away consumer wise) and wide adoption of DVB-h outside USA. there will be little chip development going forward on DAB. The system does not lend itself to kind of very low power consumption (weeks on lithium or 4 x AA Alkaline NOW!) that DVB-h is designed for.

Are you talking about something like we have in the UK.

We have BBC Radio 5 with 2 sometimes 3 sub channels depending on how intense the sporting calendar is. Last Saturday we had the Main Radio 5 Live doing the around the grounds, one sub channel doing France v Ireland and the another doing Sunderland v Wigan. Last year when Wimbledon was on there was several channels covering the main courts. These channels are only active when required.

I wonder will RTE follow an example we have here. A station closed down so someone got 2 microphones, stereo of course, and put the in a wooded area. The pick up birds of the feathered variety singing. So now we have 'Birdsong' 24 hours a day! Funny thing is that there was a programe recently saying wood pigeons were moving in to built up areas. Now they have there own radio station :eek:

The following article is from today's Sunday Business Post.



RTE heralds the future of digital radio in Ireland

17 February 2008

Irish enthusiasts - and RTE - are standing by new radio technology. Catherine O’Mahony reports.
Plans to establish an Irish digital radio service using DAB (digital audio broadcasting) technology are on track, despite hiccups with the medium in Britain.
RTE, which is spearheading a trial of DAB radio in the Dublin area, is understood to be ready to expand it to other major urban areas, and is also set to launch its DAB channels on the internet. By the end of this year, executives say RTE will have a full licence to operate a DAB service nationally. DAB is, according to its supporters, the future shape of radio.
Meanwhile, in Britain, the latest on DAB sounds gloomy. After months of speculation, GCap Media, the largest commercial radio broadcaster in Britain, last week finally axed its digital-only radio stations, stating that the medium had not matched expectations.
Fru Hazlitt, GCap Media chief executive, said digital radio was ‘‘economically inviable’’, after the company last year spent stg£8 million on digital radio, while more than 90 per cent of its listeners tuned in to FM stations.
It’s a potential blow for DAB technology, although the BBC, which has invested in DAB for more than ten years, defended its choice.
There are lots of positive statistics for the BBC to cite: more than 22 per cent of British adults now claim to have DAB at home, and it makes up 10 per cent of all radio listening. Two million DAB radios were sold in Britain last year.
DAB is at an embryonic stage here by comparison, although DAB radios have been promoted heavily by electronics shops in the last six months, probably partly since many are British-owned.
RTE has been leading the way on promoting DAB, but its entire annual budget for developing it is a tiny €250,000, out of a total radio budget of €60 million.
JP Coakley, RTE’s head of operations, said RTE hoped to get an accurate picture soon on how DAB sales were going, and would decide partly on that basis how to proceed.
From a consumer’s point of view, digital radio sets are very user-friendly. There’s no crackle between channels and the sets feature a screen that can deliver information about the content, offering multimedia options that traditional radio cannot match.
‘‘In the end, it’s the public who will decide if this stands or falls,” said Coakley. ‘‘If we could see, say, one in 20 people tuning in to us on DAB, that would be game-on.”
He argued that the GCap problems related more to GCap’s corporate strategy than its business model. ‘‘They need to cut costs fast and a quick way to do that is to cut DAB. But they’ve dropped some FM channels as well.”
At present, DAB is still on trial here, since regulators ComReg and the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI) have yet to issue full licences for digital radio transmission.
The BCI said last week it would need to deliberate as to whether DAB was the correct technological model for the Irish market at all. However, since its time is taken up at present with establishing a framework for digital television, the BCI will not begin to address digital radio issues until the end of 2008.
Meanwhile, 15 radio stations, including two newly created commercial digital stations and four new digital-only radio stations from RTE, are broadcasting to DAB receivers in the greater Dublin area.
Since FM remains the principal way most people listen to radio, most operators are paying twice for transmission, as long as their DAB service is operated along with their analogue service.
This doesn’t deter RTE, whose public service broadcasting remit justifies its role as a prime mover on new technologies.
However, some observers think the cost might well prove an issue for commercial players, especially if it remains unclear precisely how long they will have to keep providing two services.
A report on digital radio by the European Broadcasting Union last year estimated that it might be 2020 before many European countries switched off their analogue radio services.
Enthusiasts for DAB radio believe this technology is the only future for radio, and will replace analogue as the transmission mode of choice sooner rather than later.
‘‘If you look properly at Britain, you can see that digital radio is one of the few bright lights in an industry that’s under pressure,” said Coakley.
‘‘There are now twice the number of services on DAB that there are on FM.
‘‘Our conviction is that this has to happen,” he said. ‘‘We need three things for this to work - we need low-cost receivers, we need a regulatory catalyst and we need new and exciting broadcasters to come on board.”
Dusty Rhodes, whose Digital Audio Productions company is behind two new commercial digital channels being tested - an all-80s channel and an R’n’B channel - said he hoped DAB’s woes in Britain would accelerate moves by regulator Ofcom to provide a proper regulatory structure for DAB.
‘‘It’s not a death knell for DAB, far from it,” he said. ‘‘Watch out because that space [vacated by GCap] will be filled.”
Without a timetable for switching off FM radio, he could understand why some commercial stations would see no logic in paying for DAB.
‘‘It’s still a fantastic system,” said Rhodes. ‘‘What I hope it might do is remind people that we need to talk about setting a firm switch-off date for the analogue service.”
Rhodes has been making money from advertising and sponsorship on his digital radio stations, although he conceded that the prices he could charge were very low. Joe Dalton, media buyer at Precision Media, said it was early days for this technology, and it wasn’t yet on the radar for major brands.
‘‘It’s got huge potential and I do think this is the future,” he said.
‘‘It will grow niche stations and that’s great. But, for now, penetration is low and it’s a limited reach.
‘‘Only 1 per cent of new cars are fitted with DAB radios,” said Dalton.

Listened to a bit of this last night, and quite a welcome addition. Those looking for chill type music have had their output slashed in recent times, with Classic FM dispensing of it in the coming weeks on Friday and Saturday nights, and Lorcan Murray taking over Saturday and Sunday mornings on Lyric FM, where that slot always had "new age" music.

RTE 2XM is all over the shop at present... songs are getting skipped to shreds. They played some David Gray song like it was buffered on a webstream, and also, it skips to playing a bit of Air's "Once upon a time" every 5 mins, then into another song.

Also, RTÉ Gold had a presenter at 12 noon today. Dunno who he was, it seemed rerecorded.