[The Cush]

Originally Posted by holidaysong

Good to see some commercial DAB stations in Dublin. How new is this trial?

Announced last March - http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showt...1#post77539631

According to an article in the Sunday Business Post (attached) it started broadcasting in Dublin last Sunday week, as Charles Slane posted above. Not available in Cork, Limerick and Galway yet.

Ten spaces are available on the mux, three further DAB exclusive services may be on air by year end. According to the report below the 3 current services are transmitting in both DAB and DAB+.

Rollout schedule
- Phase 1 Dublin July 1st 2012
- Phase 2 Cork & Limerick Q1 2013 (Subj to site upgrade works)
- Phase 3 Galway TBC

DB Digital Broadcasting’s DAB trial is now on-air in Dublin with Cork and Limerick to follow. It broadcasts on Channel 12A (223.936Mhz). To tune in simply re-scan your radio to hear the stations.

There are three aims to the trial;

Transmission;
Testing signal strength, aerial array systems, indoor/outdoor reception and comparisons between DAB and DAB+. Transmission Maps.

Data;
Testing text and picture data which can be displayed on receiver screens including DLS, DL+, EPG, Slideshow, RadioTAG and other new technologies.

Content;
In addition to simulcasting a number of existing stations we shall be gauging reaction to a number of new DAB exclusive radio formats.

http://www.dbdb.ie/trial-broadcasts/

Q2 2012 Report

Jul 2, 2012 // by dusty // DB Blog // 3 Comments

At the end of each quarter you can get an update with the latest developments and achievements of the dB Digital Broadcasting DAB trial. To automatically receive updates by email or RSS feed see our Join In page.

Q2 has been a very intense period of activity as we geared up to putting our trial on-air.

On the technical front we took delivery of all the required transmission equipment and the installation was carried out during June. Our inventory now includes transmitters from Rhode & Swartz and Harris. These are two of the leading manufacturers of DAB transmission equipment and we shall be testing the various transmitters as part of our trial.

We have a special thanks to say to our engineering team who took every problem in their stride, delivered a solution and had on us on-air on-schedule for July 1st.

This has also been a very active quarter working with the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland on licencing new services for DAB. The first two of these are All 80s and Raidió Rí-Rá. The latter has been an internet only service up to now and their participation will provide some interesting insight regarding online v’s DAB radio. In the meantime we continue to work with the BAI on three further DAB exclusive services which we hope will be licenced by Q4.

The first three services launched on July 1st were;
All 80s
Raidió Rí-Rá
UCB

Each service broadcasts on traditional DAB and the new world standard DAB+.

Each stations DAB+ service includes Slideshow displaying images as well as the station audio. In particular All 80s are working with All-In-Media’s Rapid software. This delivers rich dynamically updated information from now playing to weather/traffic info plus listener requests all displayed on-screen.

Now the trial is on-air our first task is to slowly bring up the transmitter power and directly compare it with the local RTÉ service. Other tests include variations on actual transmitter, error correction, encoding rates and others.

Each month we intend to post a list of the specific items we are working on and your feedback would be greatly appreciated in the comments section below. Keep up-to-date automatically with these updates by email or RSS feed on our Join In page.

http://www.dbdb.ie/q2-2012-report/

Q1 2012 Report

May 1, 2012 // by dusty // DB Blog // No Comments

At the end of each quarter you can get an update with the latest developments and achievements of the dB Digital Broadcasting DAB trial. To automatically receive updates by email or RSS feed see our Join In page.

January 2012 started with confirmation from ComReg of our trial licence for DAB transmissions. The licence covers transmitters located at Irelands four main cities; Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Galway. The three key areas on which we shall be reporting back to Comreg and the BAI are; transmission, data and content. Find more details about our trial goals here.

With the licence confirmed we officially invited approximately forty broadcasters to provide radio stations to the trial. Despite the recession we had a higher than expected response, and surprisingly, some responses from outside of Ireland also.

For Irish broadcasters we have avoided general simulcasting of FM services. We believe that DAB needs to offer listeners something new or different. To make this a reality a number of new stations are going though a content licencing process with the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland which should be complete by June.

Running in conjunction with this was sourcing suppliers for the actual multiplex and transmission equipment.

For the mux we sought a supplier who was equally keen to expand the data functionality of DAB and use our trial to experiment with brand new world leading features. Our supplier of choice is the Swedish based Factum Electronics. Their mux is capable of encoding sixteen different stations in DAB or DAB+ as well as supplying DLS, DL+, EPG, Slideshow, TPEG and more right out of the box. We are excited to be working with Factum and others over the coming months on other data features yet to be announced.

On the transmission side we have engaged German company Plish, who also supply RTÉ, for our transmitters. The supplier chain is rounded off with Delta Mechanics cavity filters and Aldena for custom antenna manufacture.

Now the base elements are decided we are working through Q2 on putting everything in place.

We shall be rolling out the trial in three phases;
Phase 1 Dublin July 1st 2012
Phase 2 Cork & Limerick Q1 2013 (Subj to site upgrade works)
Phase 3 Galway TBC

http://www.dbdb.ie/q1-report/

[waiguoren]

So UCB, All 80s and Ri-Ra are being broadcast in both 128Kbps MP2 and 64Kbps AAC? Has anyone noticed any improvement on the AAC versions? I'm not finding the quality of either particularly good as they keep cutting out. Anyone else have this trouble?

[dowtchaboy]

They would inspire more confidence if they could get Minister Rabbitte's name spelled correctly!

.Minister of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources Mr Pat Rabbitt launched a new DAB+ trial in Dublin this week being operated by dB Digital Broadcasting.

The trial is broadcasting three new radio stations; All 80s, Raidió Rí-Rá and UCB with another three scheduled to come on-air early October. This will bring to over ten the number of commercial and RTÉ stations available exclusively to anyone with a DAB radio.

http://www.dbdb.ie/minister-launches...roadcasting%29

[zorro2566]

I wonder when there will be a full roll out of DAB across the whole country.I would love to be able to avail of it here in Sligo.

[dabfan]

Originally Posted by waiguoren

So UCB, All 80s and Ri-Ra are being broadcast in both 128Kbps MP2 and 64Kbps AAC? Has anyone noticed any improvement on the AAC versions? I'm not finding the quality of either particularly good as they keep cutting out. Anyone else have this trouble?

What part of Dublin do you find this happening most?

[waiguoren]

I tried it again on another much more sensitive radio (Roberts MP16) and found the signal of the MP2 broadcasts of the test multiplex to be stable. However, on my portable DAB radio (Technika DAB211PT) I find stations on the 12A (test) multiplex break up more frequently than those on the 12C (RTE) multiplex in Central Dublin (near the Quays). I found no improvement of the DAB+ versions over the DAB versions. I thought DAB+ was supposed to provide a more robust signal due to the addition of Reed-Solomon error correction coding?

Dabfan - what are your experiences in listening to the stations on the test multiplex?

[lasno]

I have had excellent DAB reception since the service launched a couple of years ago. However for the last 2-3 days all I get is "no service". I have done a rescan but no luck. I live in Limerick.

[dabfan]

Originally Posted by waiguoren

I tried it again on another much more sensitive radio (Roberts MP16) and found the signal of the MP2 broadcasts of the test multiplex to be stable. However, on my portable DAB radio (Technika DAB211PT) I find stations on the 12A (test) multiplex break up more frequently than those on the 12C (RTE) multiplex in Central Dublin (near the Quays). I found no improvement of the DAB+ versions over the DAB versions. I thought DAB+ was supposed to provide a more robust signal due to the addition of Reed-Solomon error correction coding?

Dabfan - what are your experiences in listening to the stations on the test multiplex?

DAB+ is meant to be slightly more robust than DAB, but only slightly. The coverage maps for the DBDB trial show that the antennas are pointing to the west, this is to prevent overspill on 12A to the UK, this means that the West of Dublin will have much better coverage than the East, and possibly parts of the city centre and the far North.
The RTE DAB antennas are pointing directly towards the city, the licensed power for RTE is greater than the DBDB trial - and RTE have a SFN, so in parts of Dublin you could actually be receiving Claremont Cairn.

[Trick of the Tail]

All80s has now appeared on the South-East DAB mux.

The country's first independent DAB transmissions, by the way!

The mux run by Total Broadcast is also an SFN (Single Frequency Network) with two transmitters.

A.

[Elmo]

Originally Posted by alinton

The country's first independent DAB transmissions, by the way!

Should that not be

Ireland's first DAB only radio service? And wouldn't that go to Raidio RíRá?

[Trick of the Tail]

No, the DAB transmissions from Total Broadcast are now into their third year. Ri Ra is only a service carried on it, and first debuted on DAB last year.

A.

[marclt]

Yes, the different between multiplex operator and content provider.

Where are the two transmitters ALinton? Any news on a site for Wexford town?

[Trick of the Tail]

One is on White Mountain, the other Waterford.

White Mountain covers Wexford quite well.

A.

[real rocker]

I retuned my basic Sony DAB reciver a few times but the test transmissions are not being picked up. I am based around Leopardstown in Dublin. Last week I was finding a lot of break up on signal rendering it almost unlistenable.
The RTE service is fine.

[marclt]

Originally Posted by alinton

One is on White Mountain, the other Waterford.

White Mountain covers Wexford quite well.

A.

There a just one or two blackspots in around the town - fall in the shadow of Forth Mt.