[IRCA] Digital radio

["Dan Strassberg" <dan.strassberg@xxxxxxx>]

If, as has been stated on this list, the magic is in what the medium is
called (and not in the technology), I suggest that the answer to restoring
the "sizzle" to terrestrial radio is at hand--at least from a technological
standpoint. Moreover, it requires no lies or even hyperbole. Most important,
it does NOT require a new transmission system, such as the highly
problematic and poorly thought-out HD Radio or even DRM. Certainly on the AM
band, it is now possible to construct receivers that are "all digital,"
possibly without even an analog mixing stage (although there is some doubt
about that last claim). Such receivers would clearly have to sell for more
than $9.95 each, although, even at the outset, it might be possible to sell
them profitably at prices in the $100 area. (Remember, $100 is substantially
less than the initial pricing of boom-box-style HD Radio receivers.) If
digital receivers for existing broadcast transmission systems ever became
popular, economies of scale would enter into the manufacturing cost and the
prices would come down--perhaps to the $50 area. I suppose that with a
sufficient level of integration of the RF functions into the radio ICs,
$9.95 digital radios might even become possible, although I hesitate to
forecast such a development.

The technology for building DSP-based receivers (which are digital in every
sense of the word) has been understood for at least a decade. These
receivers are vastly different from what the general public thinks of as
"digital radios"--analog receivers with digital tuning displays that have
been on the market for more than 20 years. Through software, DSP-based
receivers could be endowed with characteristics that would make them
superior to the vast majority of present-day analog receivers--although
probably not superior to communication receivers such as the Drake R8 and
its peers. What's more, if the industry put in place the proper standards,
DSP-based radios could be upgraded through software when significant
advancements became available. It is, in fact, not inconceivable that
schemes could be implemented for delivering software updates to the
receivers in a manner that would be transparent to users and would require
no user action. The technology is very powerful and, despite what iBiquity
and its co-conspirators would have us believe, it doesn't necessitate
killing the current broadcast system to save it.

--
Dan Strassberg, dan.strassberg@xxxxxxx
eFax 707-215-6367




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