Despite warning of the impending DAB+ changes to ABC Sydney Stations, there were plenty of complaints from ABC listeners who were caught out after the changes came into effect yesterday.
Listeners contacted ABC Radio Sydney this morning complaining of intermittent disruptions on their digital receivers despite retuning them following yesterday’s re-boot.
Wendy Harmer and Robbie Buck fielded a number of complaints from listeners as both home and car digital receivers appeared to be affected this morning.
Drop out of the digital signal appeard to be happening frequently as ABC technical staff scrambled to fix the problem.
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It was amusing that after the adjustment to the ABC's DAB+ transmission facilities to find I was listening to JJJ when I pressed the preset on the receiver to RN.
For me, it was straightforward to rescan the receivers at home and in my car and reassign the presets to the latest transmission facilities adjustment.
It may not have been straightforward to rescan and re-assign the receiver's presets for those who are not so "savvy". It may well be the situation that the person who purchased the DAB+ radio needed assistance from another person such as a relative, friend or the sales person at the retail store with the "knack" (no, not the "My Sharona" knack) to tune DAB+ receivers.
The purpose of the readjustment of the ABC's DAB+ transmission facilities was to reallocate more kilobits per second ('kbs') per channel to music-oriented stations and less kbs to the spoken word, reference article and comments by Mr Alan Hughes/Mr St. John https://radioinfo.com.au/news/abcsbs-change-dab-digital-radio-quality-and-reducing-broadcasting-costs.
Consequently, the inconvenience required for this kbs reallocation exercise says that the ABC did not plan for kbs allocation of its channels since the commencement of DAB+ transmissions. The plan is simple, lower kbs for spoken word with the option to transmit in mono resulting in lower bandwidth requirement, and higher kbs where there some music and some spoken and much higher kbs for mainly music channels as exemplified by ABC Classic's increase from 70kbs to 120kbs.
Yet, when the commercial networks such as Nova and ARN adjust the kbs allocations of their flagship and auxiliary stations, there was never a need for receiver adjustment.
Go figure,
Anthony of exciting, compare-and-contrast Belfield
Dear Mr St. John,
I used the hyperlink provided in your response, and the response was "not found". However the same information is at https://help.abc.net.au/hc/en-us/articles/360004041656-ABC-Digital-Radio-Upgrade-2021-key-dates-and-tips-to-help-restore-ABC-stations-on-your-DAB-radio. Hyperlink looks the same as yours, but this one worked.
Frankly, I could not perceive any difference in quality of the old ABC-fm at 70kbs and the 128kbs ABC-fm post kbs reallocation exercise.
Maybe you can comment on this. I compare the audio quality of the ABC-fm (92.9MHz) service and the DAB+ service.
Can you explain why I perceive the analogue service to sound more 'spatial' than the DAB+ service. By 'spatial' I perceive the analogue FM service to be more 'stereophonic' than the DAB+ service.
Is that due to the imperfections in decoding the L and R channels in the FM receiver resulting in minute phase differences in the L and R channels?
Listening to the spoken word channels, RN, ABC News and ABC Sydney (2BL) on DAB+, I don't perceive any perceptible change in quality.
Similarly, I don't perceive any noticeable difference in the auxiliary ABC music channels before and after the kbs reallocation exercise.
When comparing the sound quality of music from the ABC with a commercial station, one needs to play the same sound track. In addition the commercial stations may be adjusting the sound processors for their own particular sound. Even twenty years ago, 2SER-fm of which I was a former volunteer and part-time employed supervisor had an audio processor which could be adjusted or pre-programmed for spoken word, general programming, rock and classical music.
Overall I could not perceive the change in audio quality of the ABC's DAB+services after the kbs reallocation exercise.
I still say that the ABC should have planned its kbs per channel allocation at the start of DAB+ transmissions. Low kbs and/or mono for spoken word, slightly higher kbs for spoken word and music eg RN and ABC Sydney (2BL) and higher kbs for music channels.
It would spare any confusion experienced by listeners who may not be tech savvy in regards to setting up their receiver..
Thank you,
Anthony of exciting, practical and common sense Belfield
Anthony,
ABC information https://help.abc.net.au/hc/en-us/articles/360004041656-ABC-Digital-Radio-Upgrade-2021-key-dates-and-tips-to-help-restore-ABC-stations-on-your-DAB-radio
Did you notice any changes in sound quality, particularly in the car?
How does the quality, particularly the ability to locate the source of the sound on ABC Sydney when playing music recordings compare with the other music channels.
Anthony,
I don't know what is going on with links, I copy and paste them in.
I am currently rewiring my amplifier system for remote control so I cannot compare sound quality except on headphones. This is unfair particularly with stereo, which shouldn't come from inside your head! Low frequencies can also be a problem.
It is nice to see you had a listen, unlike the keyboard warriors who rubbished classical sound music quality from the 80 kbit/s vs FM in the early days.
The only effects on FM broadcast sound quality caused whilst the transmission is in the air are added hiss and if there are reflected signals distortion and reduced separation. ie sounds at the side move towards the middle.
I have a DAB+ clock radio feeding a pair of widely spaced computer speakers on a pelmet opposite my bed. It is great to wake up ABC local radio when they play music, because it is in stereo unlike AM. What I like the most is that they have one news gathering phone which has a stereo mike attached. They use it away from the studio. You can hear the stereo acoustics, it really sounds like you are there in the news.
Radio National is in stereo. I have heard plays in stereo. Great. I wish they would record "Conversations" with a stereo microphone because there is an interviewer and interviewee and the reflected sound in the studio. It would be gripping with a gripping topic as well.
Back in the days of AM stereo, one of my trainees was fired up about stereo and broadcast the cricket in stereo. The crowd sounds were all around you, great. When head office found out it was banned. Then to save money the second program line from the studio to the transmitter was cancelled. So ABC Sport should be in stereo!
If you look at the old ABC and SBS data rates they were half that of their music channels.
Anthony,
I don't know what is going on with links, I copy and paste them in.
I am currently rewiring my amplifier system for remote control so I cannot compare sound quality except on headphones. This is unfair particularly with stereo, which shouldn't come from inside your head! Low frequencies can also be a problem.
It is nice to see you had a listen, unlike the keyboard warriors who rubbished classical sound music quality from the 80 kbit/s vs FM in the early days.
The only effects on FM broadcast sound quality caused whilst the transmission is in the air are added hiss and if there are reflected signals distortion and reduced separation. ie sounds at the side move towards the middle.
I have a DAB+ clock radio feeding a pair of widely spaced computer speakers on a pelmet opposite my bed. It is great to wake up ABC local radio when they play music, because it is in stereo unlike AM. What I like the most is that they have one news gathering phone which has a stereo mike attached. They use it away from the studio. You can hear the stereo acoustics, it really sounds like you are there in the news.
Radio National is in stereo. I have heard plays in stereo. Great. I wish they would record "Conversations" with a stereo microphone because there is an interviewer and interviewee and the reflected sound in the studio. It would be gripping with a gripping topic as well.
Back in the days of AM stereo, one of my trainees was fired up about stereo and broadcast the cricket in stereo. The crowd sounds were all around you, great. When head office found out it was banned. Then to save money the second program line from the studio to the transmitter was cancelled. So ABC Sport should be in stereo!
If you look at the old ABC and SBS data rates they were half that of their music channels.