Curious where you’re getting DAB dropouts “all the time”. I can’t remember the last time DAB dropped out anywhere for me in the greater Brisbane area, or indeed driving to the Gold and Sunshine Coasts. The only exception is the tunnels where DAB doesn’t transmit. I find it rock solid. Unlike AM which is largely unlistenable due to electrical interference.
These are just my Melbourne experiences -
First DAB+ radio I got was the Richter RR20. Even in the display picture you can see the reception is low. You need to have the very long antenna extended the entire way to get any usable DAB+ reception at all. Works OK as long as you stay home and have the antenna up the whole way. Take it out of the house, moving around etc and you’re screwed, even with the antenna up all the way (which is ridiculous and unwieldy) it’s still dropping out constantly. This is a $150 radio.
Then I got one of these cheap ones off eBay thinking it might be better suited to moving around outside. It was worse. So many dropouts it was completely unlistenable. $40.
Finally I got the Sangean DPR-35 which doesn’t drop out that much. I think I paid something like $160.
All that hassle, and I bet if I had just typed in “AM/FM radio” with like $30-50 to spend and grabbed the first thing that came up, I would have gotten a better product that would have worked more reliably. And DAB+ is a newer technology.
AM has well-documented issues like interference from tram lines, appliances, etc. But in my opinion DAB+ is at least just as bad, only in different ways. I would prefer interference to dropouts overall. Compression not so much an issue in this instance since it is mostly a spoken-word station.
DAB units can vary wildly, even with car tuners. My own i30 can get mostly good reception in Bungendore but on other car radios, the signal from Canberra is barely there and unlistenable with all the dropouts. I am in a fringe area though.
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Inside buildings, DAB reception can be patchy, but you just need to buy a decent aerial and you’ll have no problems, even in built-up parts of the city. Reception can also be patchy on a wireless device if you’re going for a walk, depending on your location.
However, as most radio listening is done in the car, reception is fine 99% of the time.
Curious, which area of Melbourne are you? South East can be patchy, as can outer North or North West.
Possibly/hopefully, not the case for most blind people listening to 3RPH, as likely they don’t or shouldn’t drive. I assume for the convenience factor and importance, a lot would listen via voice activated “Alexa play 3RPH” type systems, but then again that maybe Alexa is not so high on the financial priority list and listening uses an old AM/FM radio in which case the AM switchoff becomes a bigger issue.
Curious if anyone knows, what portion of 3RPH listeners are visually impaired, where and how much they listen to both 3RPH and other stations. I’ve never seen them in ratings. Am guessing that Vision Australia, the RVIB, and other state associations behind RPH will have done their research.
I think this also becomes a question of how much DAB has penetrated different audience segments. I am probably not as focussed on the audio gear that some on MediaSpy would have and my car has only AM/FM reception (reflecting its age) whilst the house has three radios - AM/FM alarm clock radio, an AM/FM cassette player with a broken aerial in the laundry and a FM/DAB kitchen radio with an iPod classic connector, which has an inbuilt flexible wire aerial out the back. Like @IRIS my DAB reception is patchy (depending on where you stand in the kitchen). At three radios, this is probably more radios than the average house and I wonder to what extent DAB is listened to (and hence RPH would be available) in houses. Maybe online only?
I guess it’s only a matter of time that their FM frequencies are switched off they actually had a studio In Mildura but, that was shut down & reading of local papers is now broadcast on Hot FM with the Vision Australia station playing a dirty feed from Melbourne, I’m assuming that after the close of their Melbourne AM service the broadcast will be coming from the DAB signal.
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I believe the Mildura service relays 3BPH from Bendigo (which is mostly but not entirely a relay of the main 3RPH service)
Speaking of, I noticed recently that 3MPH is listed in the ACMA database as a TCBL. Has this always been the case?
It was previously listed as a ‘Community’ licence up until late 2021/early 2022.
I’m guessing they lost it for some reason, possibly for the reason you said, in not having any local content?
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In the Mildura Variation from 2002 3MPH is actually licensed they actually had a transmitter proposed for Robinvale but RPH must have said they were not wanting to provide that area with a service so that frequency was made an open narrowcasting service for Mildura.
MILDURA_LAPVAR_OCT02.pdf (51.6 KB)
I wonder why Sydney keeps going then on AM and FM?
2RPH is a different organisation to Vision Australia which runs the RPH stations in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.
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Yes. I actually think the VA RPH stations are superior since they are the only ones that read from The Fin Review, Crikey, The Conversation etc. It’s fairly time consuming to listen to all of these though.
The RPH network is fairly unique in the world. There used to be an RPH outlet at Levin, New Zealand on 1602 (and I believe on shortwave as well) but this is long gone. There are some RPH services on FM subcarriers in the US but I think only one or two on regular AM/FM. I am not sure about the UK.
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RNIB is the only dedicated station.
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The north, and not even that far north. And these are issues AM and FM don’t really have, right? “FM can be sketchy in (multiple huge areas of the city)”
Also I was just thinking, could 3RPH not save money by just shutting down overnight? Surely it must add a lot to their expenses to broadcast BBC World Service for six hours every morning. Sometimes NewsRadio is even doing the same thing just a flick of the dial away.
You should be fine for reception in the car.
If you have a mini HiFi with DAB, you can buy a good indoor aerial from eBay or Amazon.
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They still airing college student shows at night?
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Gee, the AGM report makes for some fascinating yet depressing reading. Handwritten submissions, only around $2,000 in net assets, volunteers loaning equipment and cash(!!) to the station. Grim.
My goodness, just from the cursory glance I’ve had at the reports, there are primary school spelling errors galore. I know grammar and spelling isn’t everything, but it’s possibly a sign of unprofessionalism. That said it’s sad to see yet another community station go.
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