Digital radio switchover gets poor reception

wrote:
Then, if the M1 was blocked at j29 say, like is often is,
I'd get advance warning and I could go via Chesterfield. Whereas if I
let the radio hop about between Sutton C and Holme Moss like it
usually does I might miss it. Is that right Mark? Yes, you can hear R
Sheff right down there, in case anyone's wondering.

Chesterfield R1-4 is a relay of Sutton Coldfield, and is also a Radio
Sheffield relay, so I presume both Holme Moss and SC would have to carry R
Sheffield's EON bursts. If so, then in theory you should get Sheffield travel
news in and around the town.

--
Mark
Please replace invalid and invalid with gmx and net to reply.

www.paras.org.uk

Andy Champ wrote:
Mark Carver wrote:

Neatly combining both your points into one, I have indeed, while in
Southampton, caught the last 3 seconds of a (wanted) Radio Solent
flash, that came after an (unwanted) BBC Berks flash.

That's interesting.

I'm in the BBC Berks area and I've pretty much given up on them.

Firstly the signal is so weak the radio hops between the two
transmitters with annoying regularity (and sometimes gives up, and
switches to BBC Oxford which seems to be stronger). Don't know how you
managed to pick them up down there.

104.1 from Hannington ? It covers most of Southern England, along with Heart
Berks (formally 2-Ten FM 102.9). It's difficult not to receive it !

Elevates those two stations into regional status really.

--
Mark
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www.paras.org.uk

On 5/25/10 10:14 PM, Mark Carver wrote:
wrote:
Then, if the M1 was blocked at j29 say, like is often is,
I'd get advance warning and I could go via Chesterfield. Whereas if I
let the radio hop about between Sutton C and Holme Moss like it
usually does I might miss it. Is that right Mark? Yes, you can hear R
Sheff right down there, in case anyone's wondering.

Chesterfield R1-4 is a relay of Sutton Coldfield, and is also a Radio
Sheffield relay, so I presume both Holme Moss and SC would have to carry
R Sheffield's EON bursts.

That depends on the way the repeating is done. If the entire signal with
sub carriers is 'converted' to the other frequency you would get the
same RDS information. If the audio would be demodulated and the LF taken
to feed the repeating transmitter it could be the same, or not.

gr, hwh

Mike Henry wrote:

Ah, that explains something. This can be a problem - sometimes when
there's a "bad day" with a lot to read out which takes longer than the
timeout, it means the car cuts off the end of the bulletin and tunes back
away from the TA station! I'd always assumed it was someone in the station
actively releasing the flag too early. So it's actually because the
timeout is too short?

Yes, I don't know if they extend the time out if the UK is being affected by
severe weather, they don't seem to because no station seems to get to the end
of their bulletin during such conditions.

Do the news bulletin flags work in the same way? My car radio has a
function to automatically tune to news bulletins which *appears* as a user
to operate in the same way as TAs, but I'm guessing it must be looking for
PTY=News.

Similar I think, I used to have a tuner that supported the function, only
seemed to work between national BBC networks though ?

I've often noticed radio 2 music programmes being incorrectly
flagged as News, instead of just the first few minutes (ie the actual
News). Particularly at weekends.

GI-GO :-)


--
Mark
Please replace invalid and invalid with gmx and net to reply.

www.paras.org.uk

hwh wrote:
On 5/25/10 10:14 PM, Mark Carver wrote:
wrote:
Then, if the M1 was blocked at j29 say, like is often is,
I'd get advance warning and I could go via Chesterfield. Whereas if I
let the radio hop about between Sutton C and Holme Moss like it
usually does I might miss it. Is that right Mark? Yes, you can hear R
Sheff right down there, in case anyone's wondering.

Chesterfield R1-4 is a relay of Sutton Coldfield, and is also a Radio
Sheffield relay, so I presume both Holme Moss and SC would have to carry
R Sheffield's EON bursts.

That depends on the way the repeating is done. If the entire signal with
sub carriers is 'converted' to the other frequency you would get the
same RDS information. If the audio would be demodulated and the LF taken
to feed the repeating transmitter it could be the same, or not.

Chesterfield in common with all relays of that size is a 'dumb' transposer I'm
sure ? So the RDS data from SC just flows straight through ?

--
Mark
Please replace invalid and invalid with gmx and net to reply.

www.paras.org.uk

On Tue, 25 May 2010 21:58:19 +0100, Mark Carver
wrote:

Ah, that explains something. This can be a problem - sometimes when
there's a "bad day" with a lot to read out which takes longer than the
timeout, it means the car cuts off the end of the bulletin and tunes back
away from the TA station! I'd always assumed it was someone in the station
actively releasing the flag too early. So it's actually because the
timeout is too short?

Yes, I don't know if they extend the time out if the UK is being affected by
severe weather, they don't seem to because no station seems to get to the end
of their bulletin during such conditions.

I detected no evidence of it back in January. In any case, the timeout
happens at both ends of the link. The value is tweakable at stations using
my software, but you can't override the remote end. The actual TA time is
obviously the minimum of both values.

On Tue, 25 May 2010 16:38:34 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

You'd have thought that the stations in a given group could come to
some arrangement over timing of their TAs. One station has 5 past
another 10 past then next quarter past(*1).

That can often happen because in many cases the travel announcements
come from the same person in the same place, and they just feed
numerous local stations one after the other.

--

On Mon, 24 May 2010 11:58:31 +0100, Mark
wrote:

On Sun, 23 May 2010 20:14:50 +0100, "Max Demian"
wrote:

"Brian Gaff" wrote in message
...
Well lets hope the new government will axe the changeover to save some
money. I have not been impressed with dab in its current form. The bolted
on radio via tv is actually better quality for home use but for many this
means the totally stupid thing of running a tv to listen to the radio.

You also need a decent aerial to receive Freeview radio in most areas.

Here, we need decent aerials to receive /everything/. I can get
decent FM & analogue TV but no freeview. DAB is hit and miss.
Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. There is no graceful
degradation of quality, it just cuts out completely.

I can get Freeview pretty well here, but they can't on t'other side of
town (yet).

I've been told the whole area is a no-go for DAB.

On Mon, 24 May 2010 12:47:46 +0100, Mark
wrote:

On Mon, 24 May 2010 11:44:58 +0100, "Max Demian"
wrote:

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Michael Chare wrote:
Perhaps he is promoting traffic jams, as DAB radios don't switch to
traffic info broadcasts which tell people where there are jams that
they may be able to avoid.

I've yet to have any of these traffic broadcasts warn me of a jam - just
tell me much later I'm in one...

I've never found that facility much use either - it's all right having a
vague traffic report as part of a programme, but it the radio is going to
interrupt a programme/tape/CD the report needs to be *very* specific.

Agreed. You've usually already passed the last junction on the
motorway before you find out there is a 20 mile tailback starting
before the next. ;-)

Things happen fast.

I checked a visitor's route home on the internet just before he left.
THEN there was an accident resulting in a two hour tailback . . .
(I told him not to use the M25)

"Albert Ross" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 24 May 2010 11:58:31 +0100, Mark
wrote:

On Sun, 23 May 2010 20:14:50 +0100, "Max Demian"
wrote:

"Brian Gaff" wrote in message
...
Well lets hope the new government will axe the changeover to
save some
money. I have not been impressed with dab in its current
form. The bolted
on radio via tv is actually better quality for home use but
for many this
means the totally stupid thing of running a tv to listen to
the radio.

You also need a decent aerial to receive Freeview radio in
most areas.

Here, we need decent aerials to receive /everything/. I can
get
decent FM & analogue TV but no freeview. DAB is hit and miss.
Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. There is no
graceful
degradation of quality, it just cuts out completely.

I can get Freeview pretty well here, but they can't on t'other
side of
town (yet).

I've been told the whole area is a no-go for DAB.



And where, Albert, is 'here?'


--
Woody

harrogate three at ntlworld dot com