DAB in Ireland: RTE multiplex closed

RTÉ Pulse: Dave

What does it say?

DMC

If you are listening on DSAT or DTT, it will break into the 24/7 rolling loop of trails, with "Coming up in the next few minutes, live <insert event here> ". If you are listening on DAB, it will only come in when the signal is activated, the only thing you'll hear is the announcer saying "Coming up in the next few minutes, live <insert event here> " and some shorter trails.

BowWow

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.

byrnefm

Hi,

has anyone noticed an odd channel name from RTÉ: RTE xxxxx
It's listed as of type 'Other music'.

I didn't see it there last week!

I also noticed that RTÉ Gold's bitrate has been reduced to 112kbps 'stereo'...

The current list I see now is:
RTE xxxxx - 128kbps stereo 'Other music'
RTE RnaG DAB - 112kbps stereo
RTE News Heads - 64kbps Mono
RTE Junior DAB - 80kbps Mono
RTE Choice DAB - 80kbps Mono
RTE 2xm DAB - 128kbps stereo
RTE 2fm DAB - 128kbps stereo
RTE Sport DAB - 64kbps Mono
RTE Radio 1 DAB - 128kbps stereo
RTE Lyric DAB - 160kbps stereo
RTE Gold DAB - 112kbps Stereo

DAP ALL 80's - 112kbps stereo
DUBLIN'S 98FM - 128kbps stereo
Today FM - 128kbps stereo
SPIN 1038 - 128kbps stereo
DUBLIN'S Q102 - 128kbps Sterero
PHANTOM 105.2 - 128kbps Stereo
NEWSTALK 106-108 - 64kbps Mono
DAP Mocha - 112kbps Stereo
Radio Kerry - 96kbps Mono
FM104 - 128kbps Stereo

LarWright

byrnefm wrote: »

Hi,

has anyone noticed an odd channel name from RTÉ: RTE xxxxx
It's listed as of type 'Other music'.

YEP.... Saw that, sounds good. Brings back memories of my teenage years!

Tagged as "Something for the Millenium Generation". Sweet Just seems to be a loop at the moment.... not alot on it, I hear alot of repeats. Hopefully they'll get more stuff on!

RTÉ Pulse: Dave

The station RTE Junior changes its name to RTE Chill at 9pm at night to reflect the change in musical style. My receiver changes the name automatically. what does everyone elses do?

DMC

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.

scath

I read what ye were saying regarding dvb-h and DAB and spectrum usage differences. I wonder though will DVB-H2 which will likely be validated this year along with DVB-T2 with 30% greater capacity narrow the gap?Or will DAB+ still have an advantage spectrumwise over H2?

DMC

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.

Antenna

RTE BAB switched on today from Spur Hill Cork, Ch 12C

Charles Slane

DMC wrote: »

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.

Twice I've listened to RTE Choice on a Saturday morning and they were playing two programmes at the same time - one being an RTE show and the other being an NPR show. Hilarious!

L1011

Antenna wrote: »

RTE BAB switched on today from Spur Hill Cork, Ch 12C

Nice. Might be time to put the DAB block on my car radio, although it'd be Truskmore and Cairn Hill that'd make it cover most of my journeys...

L1011

RTE Chill is having the skippy tracks problem tonight, too. Not every track, just a few. Sound like damaged CDs imported.

DMC

Antenna wrote: »

RTE BAB switched on today from Spur Hill Cork, Ch 12C

It is indeed splendid news.

DMC

MYOB wrote: »

Truskmore and Cairn Hill that'd make it cover most of my journeys...

It has always seemed odd to me that there is only one low powered FM service on the biggest (in terms of wattage) tx in the country. Read somewhere that i102104 is coming from there too, also low powered. Does this not make it doubtful that Cairn Hill will have DAB?

galtee boy

DMC wrote: »

It is indeed splendid news.

Anyone know if there is some kind of "carrier" signal being broadcast from Woodcock Hill on Dab ? I have a Dab tuner connected to a band 3 vhf loft aerial facing towards Limerick city and I'm getting " Dab Ireland " appearing on the display with a signal reading of 10 out of 16, but no stations seem to be active. Any ideas as to what I'm picking up ?

Thanks,

galtee boy

Foggy43

Are we now having the 'official' roll out of DAB in Ireland? If so I take it you will have the same system used in the UK.

Galtee Boy! If you are north of the Galtee's, you are in the overlap of 3 main transmitters. I am interested in your position as I left a DAB radio in South East Limerick last summer. I will be over in 3 weeks and I may have something to play with.

galtee boy

Foggy43 wrote: »

Are we now having the 'official' roll out of DAB in Ireland? If so I take it you will have the same system used in the UK.

Galtee Boy! If you are north of the Galtee's, you are in the overlap of 3 main transmitters. I am interested in your position as I left a DAB radio in South East Limerick last summer. I will be over in 3 weeks and I may have something to play with.

I'm near Mitchelstown on the Cork/Limerick Border with the Galty Mountains to the North East and Limerick slightly to the North West. I thought I was picking something up from Spur Hill in Cork City ( the only Dab signal in Munster as far as i know at the moment ), but when I face the aerial towards Cork, the signal fades away significantly, while facing in the general Limerick direction, the tuner display shows the words " Dab Ireland " on the screen and lights up 10 of the 16 signal "bars" on the display. But no stations are coming through, so that's why I'm wondering is it some kind of carrier signal, in advance of Woodcock Hill being switched on ( next one to live according to the rumours ) ? I think I might have a reasonable view to Woodcock, even if it is approx 30 miles away, especially with the band III loft aerial. Any ideas what I'm picking up and where it's coming from anyone ?

Thanks.

Foggy43

galtee boy!

How reliable this information is I do not know but I am sure 'someone' dropped me a hint here, sometime ago, that it more than likely is.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=755169

Antenna

Attached are pictures of RTE NL's Spur Hill site with both of RTE NL's masts, the new recently erected mast on the right carries the DAB.

One picture is a closeup of the actual DAB antenna, which is fairly directional, maximum coverage
to cork city.

Antenna

Incidentally, as a PS to my last post, the very top of the main mast at Spur Hill has a transmit antenna for one of the repeaters of the 11GHz Digital TV service in the Cork area - a controversial topic with Watty and others:)
See attached picture. its the vertical thing protruding above the mast

keith99

it appears DAB in Ireland does not want outside competition

from today's irish times
Independent broadcasters express concern over digital radio project
COLM KEENA, Public Affairs Correspondent

STRONG CONCERN was expressed at the inaugural Independent Broadcasters of Ireland conference in Dublin yesterday about the digital audio broadcast (Dab) project for radio transmission.

RTÉ and a number of commercial operators are currently involved in a pilot project for the new transmission system, but a number of senior representatives of the independent broadcasting sector expressed scepticism.

Communicorp chairwoman Lucy Gaffney, meanwhile, said the radio sector needed a new regulator who had a "clear vision" and who consulted with the members. "We need productive dialogue", not a regulator who adopts "a policing role", she said.

"Are we going to have a regulatory body that will let us make money?" she asked, referring to the proposed new Broadcasting Authority of Ireland.

She queried whether youth stations should be required to have the news and current affairs content that they broadcast at present, and said it would be a "disaster" if over-regulation drove listeners away.

Ms Gaffney expressed concern that Dab would allow the distribution of "targeting offerings" not subject to the constraints that currently applied to commercial radio licence holders.

She said this could undermine the millions of euro and intellectual capital that those represented at the conference had invested in their businesses.

Other much-trumpeted technological developments in the past had turned out to be "my arse", she added.

Wilton Radio chief executive Dan Healy said it was time to stop the Dab project, "or our industry will tank". He said that £400 million (€263 million) had been spent on Dab in the UK, but it was a failure. While 10 per cent of listeners in the UK used Dab, 94 per cent of them could get the same signal using analog delivery. "What problem does digital solve?" he asked.

He said young people were interested in news and current affairs content that they believed was relevant to their lives, and it allowed stations develop a distinctive identity in a fragmented market. "News and current affairs doesn't have to be 10 minutes at the top of the hour," he said.

Pat Donnelly of Channel 6 warned that Dab would be used by UK radio stations to "swamp" the Irish market.

The deputy chief executive of the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland, Celine Craig, said policy on digital radio transmission would be developed in consultation with the industry.

"There is no switch-off date for analog at the moment and we are not anywhere near that," she said. Other fears that had been expressed by the industry in the past had not been realised, she added.

It was not that existing FM content would simply be transferred on to digital but rather that content could be offered in a variety of ways. "There are lots of different opportunities there," she said.

A speaker from the floor from RTÉ said he was disappointed with the level of the debate on Dab.

The chief executive of Co Mayo-based Midwest radio, Paul Claffey, said the radio cake was "being sliced smaller and smaller" with each new station that came on air but that "when local radio fulfils its brief, it beats the competition hands down".

© 2008 The Irish Times

DMC

I dunno what planet yer man from Channel 6 is from! UK shareholders are leaving the Irish market!

Interesting to see the divide there. The established players, like Communicorp (98FM, Newstalk, Today FM) wants DAB to work well, yet Dan Healy (i radio, new station) want it to fail. And then you have the Mid-west types who want to protect their little empires (remember the NWR/Ocean FM licence fiasco!)

DMC

Antenna wrote: »

Attached are pictures of RTE NL's Spur Hill site with both of RTE NL's masts, the new recently erected mast on the right carries the DAB.

Nice one. Why does the new mast scream "temporary" at me?

Big Tone

DMC wrote: »

Nice one. Why does the new mast scream "temporary" at me?

Well if Comreg dont approve (though its unlikely) it'll probably be taken down again.

watty

And as the rest of Europe ignores DAB as a failed technology, or turns it off the crisis on DAB in UK gets deeper.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/06/dab_fail/

Really Radio stations transmitted on the DVB-h standard using ACC codec gives 1/20th the mobile power consumption, uses a cheaper chip set (built into some phones) and gives much better quality at same bit rate.

DVB-h isn't just mobile pictures.

Unless RTE changes their mind and adds BBC Radio, I can't see the point. Yet they are prepared to talk about BBC TV on DTT.

david23

The DVB-H system is totally unsuited to local and regional radio because each multiplex takes up three frequency blocks in Band III as a result of a DVB-H multiplex being so wide. It's fine for national TV/radio where one DVB-H mux can cover the whole country but very inefficient for a patchwork of local/regional multiplexes.

By contrast DAB+, which also uses AAC+/AAC and RS coding (and can handle MPEG Surround) only uses one Band III block per multiplex and is ideal for an efficient digital radio system delivering local, regional and national radio.

As for efficiency, the new DAB+/DAB/Wi-Fi compatible chips from Frontier-Silicon have a battery life of 150-170 hours, far more than the old inefficient DAB chips.

L1011

They appear to be minimising the amount of time the bandwidth stealing RTE 1 Extra runs for on DAB - theres currently a split service on analogue but they're using RTE Sport rather than run 1 Extra at the moment.

watty

david23 wrote: »

The DVB-H system is totally unsuited to local and regional radio because each multiplex takes up three frequency blocks in Band III as a result of a DVB-H multiplex being so wide. It's fine for national TV/radio where one DVB-H mux can cover the whole country but very inefficient for a patchwork of local/regional multiplexes.

Er.. Rubbish.

DVB-h can be used on whatever frequency you like and as small as 1MHz per multiplex. Local Radio could use UHF which gives less range and more frequency reuse. But it won't happen.

It's also in handsets now. RTE aren't going to change to DAB+ or DVB-h so there is no advantage to DAB+. Nor much point in arguing what is the "best" system. My only point really is that DVB-h even before RTE rolled out was a proven deployed, pan-European endorsed better system available already in handsets. DAB+ or DRM are not as mature, nor have any advantages for VHF.

The Local Radio people actually argue that DAB even is unsuited. More channels and more competition. They want FM only

We are stuck with DAB now, probably for the next 10 years...

DMC

MYOB wrote: »

They appear to be minimising the amount of time the bandwidth stealing RTE 1 Extra runs for on DAB - theres currently a split service on analogue but they're using RTE Sport rather than run 1 Extra at the moment.

I have found (last week) that when the Radio 1 Extra kicked in for Friday night Eircom League of Ireland coverage, that the output was duplicated on the rolling sports channel.