50/50 chance but nope.
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Can he phone a friend?
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I guess we can only wait and see if Labor will allocate funds to it, and it also depends on how keen CRA are wanting a DAB+ rollout to the regions. If CRA are not that interested in rolling it out, then most likely the Fed govt wonât allocate funds to it.
So the only other option is for CRA and the commercial operators of regional licenses to fund it themselves, which is how the Gold Coast DAB+ roll out was managed. Therefore it will most likely come down to how keen ARN and SCA (and a few others) are in rolling it out to the larger regional markets.
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Maybe Gold Coast will be the only market that gets dab+ If the commercial networks have to fund it themselves. I just cannot see them wanting to do it.
In Newcastle is SCA and SRN going to enter into a joint venture to do this. SRN seem to have lost interest in dab+ they donât even maintain their streams on their current digital stations and SCA is pushing Listnar.
Central Coast again SCA and Nova Ent, I cannot see this happening either.
Maybe Wollongong might go dab+ eventually with the ARN take over of Grant, and ARN showing some interest in dab+ from whatâs happening on the Gold Cosst.
They can get 2ST on air in Wollongong and the other iHeart radio stations too.
Maybe with 2ST on dab+ From Brokers Nose / Saddleback Mountain they wonât worry about the Saddleback fm translator which still to this day has not had itâs licence issued by ACMA.
It is disappointing that dab+ has not taken off near Sydney from a dxing perspective.
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Donât West Coast Radio own and operate the Mandurah DAB+? Currently it is only them, SEN, and Kix Country SW. Who is the main commercial player for the Gold Coast radio? And who else would jump on it (lots of unused space on the Mandurah one)?
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Sorry I meant other then Mandurah.
On the Gold Coast it is a joint venture between ARN and SCA. ABC are not interested in establishing dab+ on the Gold Coast. Rebel Media want in too but SCA and ARN will not allow them access to the future Gold Coast mux.
ABC has very little to no interest in dab+ they want DRM. CRA lobbied the government and got their way in getting dab+ up and running.
Now the commercial networks are showing lack of interest in dab+ and are focusing on their streaming platforms.
That is why we may not see dab+ come on line in any other markets other then the Gold Coast.
Dab+ the Beta video recorder of the 21st Century!!!
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I doubt weâll see an âindustryâ-led rollout of DAB+ or DRM while media companies are actively looking at ways to slash their operating costs.
Broadcasters are keen on AM-FM conversions on cost grounds (and it also helps the CRA almost goal of locking out competition) - I suspect that there will be decent objection to FM band reorganisation without some kind of financial sweetener (although if the TV green paper is anything to go by, it wont be enough to convince the industry)
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You could be right. It would be hard for the commercial networks (esp. SCA and ARN) to make any kind of money by investing in the regional rollout, without fed govt. support. If the govt. subsidised the rollout then it would be much more likely for them to launch DAB services, and help them save on streaming royalties for their iHeartRadio and LiSTNR stations.
Itâs a shame as Wollongong, Newcastle, Central Coast would be ideal for DAB as they are large regional centres and it would help to eliminate the digital divide in these areas. Ditto Sunshine Coast, Toowoomba, Townsville and Cairns in QLD and Bendigo, Geelong, Ballarat, Mildura in VIC.
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I say use it or lose it.
Give them 2 more years - if they arenât on air, have an open auction for the multiplex transmitter license. If itâs not economical the market can prove that.
There were so many anti-competitive measures put in place, like the embargo on new FM licenses, to protect a dab rollout that didnât happen.
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That has to be reason. It canât be cost otherwise the âpoorerâ West Coast Radio wouldnât have been able to afford DAB+.
To this day I really donât know what they benefit they get out of it. Sure if you are in the reception area you get the best quality DAB audio at 96 kbps, but that misses out a big chunk of Perth metro with little payoff from Mandurah/Rockingham which are not renowned for aspiring to quality audio (compared to the more up market inner Perth).
The Wollongong and Newcastle demographics and population size would far better support quality digital radio than Mandurah.
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I agree. If the current radio operators arenât interested, offer it to new entrants. Theyâve had long enough already. Watch them all of a sudden become interested.
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Unfortunately I have no radio friends other than the ones on this forum 
.
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Hereâs another idea to expand the FM band, this time without additional spectrum. Instead of stations being on frequencies 0.2 MHz apart, could you put them 0.15 MHz apart? Then the 20.4 MHz of the FM band would only require 15.3 MHz. The freed up 5.1 MHz could be used for additional FM stations in state capitals or other aeras if congestion is a problem - up to 8 stations if theyâre 0.6 MHz apart or 17 if theyâre 0.3 MHz apart.
Thus you would be able to convert every commercial, community, government and open narrowcast AM station in every capital city to FM.
One issue I could see is that some radios with digital tuners could only tune in 0.1 MHz increments, but would that even be a problem? Also is 0.3 MHz too close together for stations from the same location?
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Iâd say that almost no consumer radio with a digital dial could tune to 0.05 frequencies. That would cause problems with trying to receive those stations, so they would be at a disadvantage. If the tuners were able to still get a signal it would be subject to interference from the next adjacent frequency that would be 0.05 closer. That would negate the advantages.
And it would be a branding nightmare for commercial FM stations.
eg. Hit104.75 ⌠they would HATE that!
Yes. An FM stereo signal is 200khz wide. The frequency you tune to is is the centre of that range. For instance, a station on 101.1 MHZ is actually covering 101.0 to 101.2. The closest theoretical next station is therefore 101.3, covering 101.2 to 101.4.
That doesnât work in space practice though. Broadcast gear and settings are never 100% perfect and will bleed over the specified bandwidth, especially at higher transmitter powers, so when stations are that close they will interfere with each other from time to time. Thatâs why the minimum spacing in the same area has been set at 0.8MHz to give each station enough space to not interfere with one another.
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I think some Asian countries use 0.05 MHz (50 kHz) splits as well as some Italian stations (pirate?) But yeah, unlikely to happen here.
It is a wonder 100 kHz spacing isnât used here as in most of the world. You could jam in a few more stations that way, just look at NZ and the UK. You would need to accept a higher level of co-channel and adjacent channel interference, though.
On a personal level though, itâs good that we have the even splits for DXing.
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in Vietnam itâs mostly 0.1 (also note: stations quite like to use .0 frequency)
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Agree, and for some odd reason I like that we have the âoddâ numbers after the decimal points (so there are no âpoint zeroâ stations in the BSB band at least).
I think it might be Thailand that uses the 50 kHz splits but I might be wrongâŚhave also seen listings for Indonesia in the past, though all the Indos received in Australia via Es have been on conventional 100 kHz splits.
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