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RTE 1 and telephone lines?

  • 29-10-2014 10:21am
    #1
    Comhrá
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,906 ✭✭✭


    Apologies if this has been raisd before now, but can anyone say why the live telephone calls made from RTE Radio 1 are so frequently of poor quality?

    Pretty much every day, I hear Sean O'Rourke, Marian, Joe Duffy, Mary Wilson having to call people back because of unacceptable line quality, dropped calls and so on. Is this an RTE issue or is it the Eircom phone lines into RTE?

    It seems to me to have gotten worse in recent times and it's a bit tiresome at this stage, to be honest.


Comments

  • #2
    SEPT 23 1989
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 43,028 ✭✭✭✭SEPT 23 1989


    On Liveline the listener can hear the caller but the host cant(or chooses not to)


  • #3
    former legend
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,309 ✭✭✭former legend


    Is it not far more likely that the callers are on their mobiles and have dodgy reception?


  • #4
    QuadLeo
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 625 ✭✭✭QuadLeo


    tippman1 wrote: »
    Pretty much every day, I hear Sean O'Rourke, Marian, Joe Duffy, Mary Wilson having to call people back because of unacceptable line quality, dropped calls and so on. Is this an RTE issue or is it the Eircom phone lines into RTE?

    It seems to me to have gotten worse in recent times and it's a bit tiresome at this stage, to be honest.

    This is actually an interesting side effect of modern life. I worked in radio many moons ago and virtually every caller was on a landline, and homegrown stories accounted for 90% of the content. These days most callers are on a mobile phone, and nowhere near a landline. And as I personally can attest to, many people don't even have landlines at home anymore. This, along with the fact that the world is a much smaller place, therefore more international stories, accounts for a generally poorer quality of on-air phone calls.

    The reason why mobile phones sound so bad most of the time is that the microphones used in mobiles are small and cheap, where as household phones have better components. Also, the specific locations of the microphones in modern mobiles is chosen because of the phone shape, or design, rather than what's best for the audio quality. The network coverage can be patchy, as we all know and have experienced. It's no different for radio stations.

    And I imagine the reason you notice it more on RTE is that most, if not all, of their stuff is live, where other stations may pre-record a lot of their interviews. But I heard a really bad phone line on fm104 last night, and regularly on today fm too. So it affects all stations really. It is annoying though, I'll give you that.

    It's such and old technology, I don't understand how it hasn't continued to improve.


  • #5
    Harry Palmr
    Closed Accounts Posts: 40,061 ✭✭✭✭Harry Palmr


    Two failed lines so far today on News at One.


  • #6
    Flukey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 11,001 ✭✭✭✭Flukey


    SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »
    On Liveline the listener can hear the caller but the host cant(or chooses not to)

    As long as Joe can hear his own voice, sure that's all that matters. When the line goes bad all he has to do is keep rolling out a few of his common phrases and it sounds like he actually is listening to the caller. A three card trick, radio style.


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  • #7
    Lapin
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 18,184 ✭✭✭✭Lapin


    tippman1 wrote: »
    Apologies if this has been raisd before now.......

    It seems to me to have gotten worse in recent times and it's a bit tiresome at this stage, to be honest.

    I brought it up almost three years ago but its worth mentioning again because as you say, it seems to me to have gotten worse recently.

    I got some reasonable explainations but I'm still not convinced by them all.

    That thread is [URL="http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?
    p=75566293"]here[/URL].

    Yesterday a yoke the size of a fridge landed on a comet somewhere while moving at 35,000mph after travelling 4 billion miles to get to it with all the latest technology when it was launched - 10 years ago. And now its sending back perfect pictures and giving scientists hot flushes the world over.

    Yet Mary Wilson can't talk on the phone to some reporter a half a mile up the road without it sounding like a plane has just come through the roof.


  • #8
    Comhrá
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,906 ✭✭✭Comhrá


    I brought it up almost three years ago but its worth mentioning again because as you say, it seems to me to have gotten worse recently.

    I got some reasonable explainations but I'm still not convinced by them all.

    That thread is [URL="http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?
    p=75566293"]here[/URL].

    The thread doesn't seem to be available any more.


  • #9
    Lapin
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 18,184 ✭✭✭✭Lapin


    Apologies for that. Dunno what happened there. ^^^

    This link should work.

    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=75566293


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