Digital Radio
BBC doubles iPlayer radio quality, DAB weeps
All of the BBC's national radio stations are now available streaming in Adobe Flash. The quality of live radio streams has been roughly doubled too, to the same format and quality the iTunes Store used at launch (128Kbps AAC).
This has been available for a while in the BBC Labs, but as of today the final versions are live on the public iPlayer. Continue reading...
Digital Britain: Wave goodbye to high-quality FM radio
We've long maintained that the idea of digital radio is a good one. We also like DAB, on the whole, but we can see it has quite a number of very obvious failings too. But now the government has announced in its Digital Britain report that it will be migrating all radio to DAB, and that it plans to switch off analogue radio by 2015. There's a substantial caveat here, in that at least 50 per cent of all radio listening will need to be via DAB before they'll consider flipping the switch.
We aren't yet sure how the government thinks it's going to get DAB listening up to such high levels. It's claimed it will work with vehicle manufacturers to ensure digital radios are installed in cars, which has been a massive barrier in the take-up of DAB. But even with brand-new cars potentially getting new radios, where does that leave the millions of older cars on the road? We can't scrap them all, even for a discount on our next vehicle. Continue reading...
The Prince Charles of broadcasting: Does DAB have a future?
In the next few years, analogue TV will die a death. It will be a well planned, gentle and carefully orchestrated passing away, but make no mistake, it will be stone dead by 2013, and digital TV will reign. Digital radio, on the other hand, has no pre-ordained date of succession. If something isn't done soon, it will become the Prince Charles of broadcasting -- waiting for years and years for its moment, until finally it becomes irrelevant.
The main issue facing digital radio is the millions upon millions of FM radios in homes up and down the land. Look at your own dwelling -- we'll wager you've got quite a few of them, perhaps even ones you're unaware of. Lobbing an FM radio in any old thing is commonplace these days -- your phone probably has one, your AV receiver does, most DAB radios do, as do many Internet radios. Continue reading...
PURE Digital to launch MP3 store via DAB radio systems
Buying MP3s through your DAB digital radio will soon be possible, as British DAB manufacturer PURE Digital has announced it's developing an extremely interesting take on the music download store model.
We spent several hours this week with Imagination Technologies -- PURE's parent company, which licenses designs to chip manufacturers, and designed graphics processing technology used in the upcoming Samsung Omnia HD and Apple's iPhone 3G. During the trip we got a look at a very early version of the company's as-yet unnamed music store. Continue reading...
Interim Digital Britain report: Broadband for all by 2012
Lord Carter's eagerly awaited interim Digital Britain report arrived today, promising broadband to every house in the land by 2012. First impressions are that the report is more than a little vague, and although we were surprised by such a concrete commitment to universal broadband access, we're left with as many questions as answers.
Such as whether we really need broadband for all? How will it work? Is 2012 realistic? And the elephant in the room: who's going to pay for it? There is a recession on, after all. Continue reading...
PURE Digital Avanti Flow: Slick Net and DAB radio
Back in the day, Avanti was the name of a superb map on the original Half Life mod, Team Fortress Classic. It is also the name of a Durex condom. But now the name has been recycled for the latest and greatest Internet and DAB radio from PURE Digital.
Its full name is the Avanti Flow, and it's the second model from PURE to come with the company's Internet radio service, following on from the Evoke Flow earlier this year. The Avanti is much larger, with an integrated down-firing sub woofer and a pair of 76mm (3-inch) main drivers, backed by a power-efficient Class D amp. Continue reading...
Hands-on with the Tangent Uno FM radio
Being at the journalistic forefront of the technological juggernaut that is the 21st century, Crave doesn't often cover tech that's been around since the first half of the previous century. We've made an exception today for Tangent's Uno -- a monaural, FM/AM tabletop radio.
"What? Are you high? There's no DAB? You must be joking," we hear you exclaim. Well, high (on the third floor of the CBS Interactive building) we may be. But joking, we most certainly are not. This is truly a back-to-basics piece of work from Denmark, with the main feature being its lack of features, a gorgeous design and a sub-£100 price tag. Continue reading...
Roberts solarDAB: Pray the Sun keeps his hat on
As the Earth's population gets more and more obsessed with making friends with trees, being nicer to clouds and refraining from weeing in rivers, the consumer electronics industry has been making some shrub-friendly innovations. So many in fact, our good friends at SmartPlanet have built an entire Web site dedicated to talking about such objects of dreadlockian desire.
One of our favourite hippy-friendly devices is the Baylis Eco Media Player -- an MP3 player that's powered with pure-grade elbow grease. But Roberts Radio knows something more powerful than the human arm: a little thing called the Sun. Continue reading...
PURE Digital One Mini: Outdoor DAB bargain
If the Digital Radio Working Group has its way we'll all need to chuck out our lovely FM receivers and invest in DAB equipment before too long. Good news, then, for PURE Digital, a DAB favourite of ours. And it's just released its new One Mini -- an affordable and portable version of the popular PURE One.
It's a little monaural speaker-equipped radio that'll go for about £40, and with an optional battery pack will serve as a decent companion to any sun-drenched UK picnics, festivals or glue sniffing you've got planned for yourselves and the kids.
Continue reading...
Denon D-M37DAB: High-end name, low-end price
For those of you who can't stretch to the gorgeous Denon CX3 system, a much more affordable entry into the Denon world is coming your way towards the end of June. It's the D-M37DAB, and as you may have guessed from the title, it's got an integrated DAB radio receiver. Brill.
It's a contemporary design, sporting the sleek brushed silver look we've come to expect from even more expensive hi-fi separates, and comes with or without a pair of Denon SC-M37 speakers. Continue reading...
