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Author Topic: All Digital AM broadcast  (Read 2849 times)

Offline BoomboxDX

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Re: All Digital AM broadcast
« Reply #15 on: November 16, 2019, 1035 UTC »
I don't agree with the notion that the AM band is better off with less stations. A dead medium is less useful in the eyes of government than a slowly dying one.

I know a lot of DXers complain about the plethora of signals they have to dig through to hear that rare one on the other side of the continent, but do we really want a dead AM band?

In most of Europe right now, there are no MW stations. Is that the kind of band we want?
An AM radio Boombox DXer.
+ GE SRIII, PR-D5 & TRF on MW.
The usual Realistic culprits on SW (and a Panasonic).

Offline pinto vortando

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Re: All Digital AM broadcast
« Reply #16 on: November 17, 2019, 1459 UTC »
I don't agree with the notion that the AM band is better off with less stations. A dead medium is less useful in the eyes of government than a slowly dying one.

I know a lot of DXers complain about the plethora of signals they have to dig through to hear that rare one on the other side of the continent, but do we really want a dead AM band?

In most of Europe right now, there are no MW stations. Is that the kind of band we want?

No, we don't want a dead AM band, but it's kinda like a tree... you prune out the dead wood and the tree is healthier.
You gotta wonder how financially viable are stations that run 44 or 26 watts or 6 watts of power in the evening.
All it does is add to the QRM and render the  frequency useless.


Das Radiobunker somewhere in Michigan

Offline pinto vortando

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Re: All Digital AM broadcast
« Reply #17 on: November 17, 2019, 1504 UTC »
The last bastion of AM radio is the drive times.  If you want to screw that up, just go digital.
The all or nothing nature of digital would mean complete signal dropout as a vehicle moves
through areas of fluctuating signal strength.
Das Radiobunker somewhere in Michigan

Offline BoomboxDX

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Re: All Digital AM broadcast
« Reply #18 on: November 21, 2019, 0344 UTC »
No, we don't want a dead AM band, but it's kinda like a tree... you prune out the dead wood and the tree is healthier.
You gotta wonder how financially viable are stations that run 44 or 26 watts or 6 watts of power in the evening.
All it does is add to the QRM and render the  frequency useless.

True, but they generally don't have listeners in the evening... Radio in general usually doesn't, comparatively. Numbers apparently drop off after 7 p.m. or so, according to radio experts I've interacted with on a different forum.

My concern is that everywhere in the world -- Europe especially -- that the MW band has been 'pruned', it disappears. The Americas are basically the last holdout for a fully used MW band, and even at that, countries like Mexico are giving up on MW -- only certain stations are allowed to continue on indefinitely -- until they decide to leave the band, or simply leave the air altogether.

As for the 44 or 6 watts, such low powers are obviously (in many recent cases, anyway) placeholder, for licensing reasons... A station in my state just dropped night power (and day power, also) after getting an FM translator which covers the same area at a couple hundred watts. They're just holding place legally.

The band is aging out, and it will gradually 'prune' itself, regardless of what we radio enthusiasts think. I just find suggestions that we need a thinner band to be counterproductive in the long run -- to me it sounds like wishing for the die-off to happen prematurely.

It will happen, just the same, though... On that I think we can all agree.
An AM radio Boombox DXer.
+ GE SRIII, PR-D5 & TRF on MW.
The usual Realistic culprits on SW (and a Panasonic).

Offline Brian

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Re: All Digital AM broadcast
« Reply #19 on: November 21, 2019, 1506 UTC »
The UK have reduced it's number of high power AM transmitters with Absolute switching off some of it's network, although it will be several years before it's switched off completely.  Low power community may continue for longer. The BBC went through a period of switching off local transmitters to judge if anyone is listening to them. Most, if not all transmitters have returned to air.
Spain seems to be the opposite. Every time a channel in Europe becomes vacant, the Spanish put a transmitter on it. I can receive, at night, about 8 or 9 frequencies broadcasting the exact same programming.