DAB in Ireland: RTE multiplex closed

the case would need to be against the BAI rather then comreg as it's the BAI refusing to implement any framework to allow any full time legal operations.

the question is who would have the money and would want to take such a case, anyone i reccon that would want to take it wouldn't have the funds i suspect but who knows.

can't see such a case happening personally.

maybe, maybe not.

the truth is none of us know as nobody is actually allowed to find out.

what we do know is that dab+ even with more transmitters is a lot less cost to run then fm transmissions as that was shown a while back.

Even in Dublin there are free FM slots so no, it's not too crowded.

I'm not saying FM is full, but the context of my post is that DAB would be suitable for niche radio and/or regional rebroadcasts, which would not be practical to do on FM.

A single DAB multiplex can have over 25 stations on a single multiplex. The broadcasting costs would therefore be lower, and is overall more space efficient than FM.

The recent FreeDAB enterprise showed that it can be done with investment that need not be outrageously expensive. By industry standards, their signal in Dublin was pretty low but still managed a wide enough reach over the entire city and county.

DAB works in providing choice with niche stations. If the established commercial stations are not interested in DAB, then any niche station which wants to transmit on DAB cannot possibly be any threat to them.

We're all familiar with the names of large advertisers on radio today - car dealerships, health insurance, travel agents, you name it. What about the smaller businesses? I think the likes of someone who owns a paint shop on Swords Main Street might jump at the chance to advertise on a city-wide DAB radio station if the price was right. It couldn't possibly take a slice out of the existing advertising cake. In fact, it would expand it.

If a DAB station can do that when nobody else is interested, then the authorities should open up the airwaves and let them have at it.

Completely agree end of the road.

DAB failed in Ireland because it seemingly needed to live up to the same requirements as FM. But it's not FM. There are pros and cons to both systems, but DAB could have flourished if it was seen as it's own thing.

RTE didn't publicize thier DAB broadcasts - at least until RTE Gold's remit started expanding, but by that time the writing was on the wall. As a result, Joe public had no awareness of DAB, and this lack of awareness was one of the sticks DAB was beaten with. It was a vicious cycle.

I would dearly love to see a breakdown of just how much money RTE have saved by shutting down the DAB broadcasts. It surely must be pennies in the grand scheme of things, considering all of the RTE digital stations are still chugging along. (I wonder it is less than the Toy Show Musical lost.....)

If there was any sense in the broadcasting industry, DAB licenses would be available so that the likes of FreeDAB can operate legally. If there was content there that people wanted to listen to, I would be bet you'd see DAB take-up spike.

Can you imagine if the BBC DAB multiplex was available in RoI - how much of the morning/commute listenership would it take from RTE? RTE would be terrified of the prospect, despite them claiming that there is no interest in DAB. Never going to happen / pipe dream, I know. Interesting to contemplate only.

BBC radio on FM, including Radio Ulster, can be heard anywhere in Co Louth, and lots of other places. People have no objection to having outdoor aerials to receive TV. If they went to the same bother for radio, they could probably get good reception in Dublin.

I don't think RTE take much notice of what the BBC are doing. If it was an issue they would be trying to stop the overspill which can be heard by hundreds of thousands of listeners in the South. And the BBC still rely on medium wave for their Radio 5 service. That can be heard easily in the "commuter belt".

If people are interested enough they will make the effort to hear BBC Radio Four or whatever. UK DAB is not going to reveal any hidden treasures which would make people desert Irish radio in droves.

DAB works in providing choice with niche stations.

This model holds in large markets like the UK. A very small share of a very large market might still be enough to justify your existence.

In Ireland, a very small share of a very small market would mean no-one could be able to keep the lights on. You'd be limited to non-profit stations like community radio, or relaying feeds of foreign stations - and the internet already does a nice job of that.

DAB unfortunately is a good technology that no one really needed. It is never coming back and pulling the plug was a great call.

I used to listen to FreeDAB a bit in the car. What happened to it?

Both DAB and DAB+ are anything but good technologies.

DAB was a late 1980's university research project, which used already then used out of date technology.

DAB+ added - mid 2000's - an extra layer of error correction already in use since 1982 on CD music disks.

Here the out of date technology means much higher TX power, more transmitters, worse coverage in special cases (mud sound DAB / drop out DAB+) and other problems.

DAB is not a technology to resurrect - let DAB RIP.

Lars 😀

Most people already have an internet radio in their pockets and the nationwide infrastructure to access it already exists (mostly). DAB would require a vast investment in a transmission network and the end user would quite probably have to buy a new receiver. That seems like a hard sell to both the stations and the potential audience.

Streaming is really inefficient at high volume though. The most recent listenership figures I can find for Morning Ireland are 433,000. Imagine replacing FM with that many unicast streams; at 64k per stream you’re looking at about 27 gigabits/sec of bandwidth required.

Not everyone wants or has access to data packages.