Herald: HD Radio Hot, Actual shows are not

[Stephanie Weil]

On Tue, August 29, 2006 10:32, Shawn Mamros wrote:

> Is IBOC catching on with AM stations much?  Sid's got a good point -
> if it can't be run 24/7, why bother?  Especially if one of your
> primary programming sources is sporting events that either start
> or run into the evening hours.

It's weird, that's a fact.

Here in New York City, we had a slew of AM stations go IBOC this summer: 
WFAN, WABC, WNYC, WCBS and WADO (66, 710 WOR since 2003, 77, 82, 88 and
1280).

Guess what WFAN and WCBS do when they're doing sports - even doing the
day?  They turn the IBOC off, because of the inherent delay in the system.

WNYC had a problem and turned their IBOC off on AM.  Supposedly they're
back to their old wide-band setup.  WADO had a problem for a few months
with hardware, but now they're back to IBOC.

WABC also turns their IBOC off during their Saturday afternoon/evening
oldies show - the sun hasn't even set yet locally.

Seems like the decisions to install this junk were made from "up high" -
and the engineers couldn't do much about it, except to do as they were
told.  But it's making my radios sound like crap.  :-/

-- 
Stephanie Weil
New York City, NY, USA