Nova continue to lead the way with high bitrate streaming for both Smooth and Nova networks. A whopping 320kbps streaming is available! SCA and ARN lag behind with only 32kbps for SCA and 48kbps for ARN.
Nova even provide an “HD” streaming button on their websites to access the 320kbps streams.
I’ve just dug out my old AIWA Internet radio to use for general listening as I’m sick of being tethered to Bluetooth and my phone/laptop. I’ve even managed to log in to MediaU and add some stations manually.
Unfortunately it seems BBC Radio 2 no longer works as it solely uses HLS streams, and evidently the radio is too old to support them (I tried manually adding the working HLS stream I have in VLC, but no dice). I’m assuming newer devices natively support HLS.
The BBC seems to be the only content provider that has ditched mp3/AAC streams entirely. They’ve done this, I assume, to force people onto the BBC Sounds app. The ABC, by contrast, still provide mp3/AAC links along with the HLS links:
This is the same issue I have with my Yamaha MusicCast gear. Yamaha uses the airable internet radio directory and the HLS streams on airable do not work on Yamaha equipment, only traditional AAC and MP3 streams do.
The other advantage of a stand alone Internet radio is having the track data visible (where available) rather than having to constantly Shazam everything. I can still use Bluetooth with the AIWA radio and so this will have to do for the BBC streams.
I wish RadioApp worked in general on Apple HomePod devices!
IHeartRadio and TuneIn seem to be all that is available on HomePod via Siri voice command which means alot of SCA and Nine Radio stations are instantly missing. Nova and ABC are hit and miss too.
I saw this on Facebook from a guy who runs a radio station in the USA, apparently Get Me Radio from the end of this month will be charging $5 per month, just for the station to be listed on it & he’s refusing to pay it, so anyone listening on that app will have to find somewhere else to listen, he expects other apps to start doing the same & other stations not paying & dropping their streams off apps. It’s thought the app makers are going to start cashing in from stations streaming & listeners having to stream stations with car makers waiting to or starting to drop AM & likely FM from car entertainment systems.
This will either go with stations not streaming anymore or maybe only available on 1 app or the big networks running their own apps & cashing in by making you pay with no free access, & quite possibly with car manufacturers having their own user pays app to access music on the in car entertainment systems. Not good for radio or anyone really except those raking in the cash.
Wishful thinking when greed takes over, $5 a month doesn’t sound much but think how many stations are listed on radio/music apps if they all have to pay $5 & these apps don’t host any stations, they only divert you to the stations own streaming host/server web address, money for nothing.
Manufacturers won’t stand for this though. We saw what happened when Yamaha’s provider (YTuner) turned to a paid model for users. Yamaha were very quick to turn to a different provider (Airable) with a firmware update and we all moved on.
Good luck to “Get Me Radio”, but I think their model will fail and they will fall into an insignificant pit of irrelevance.
Just noticed this setting in RadioApp on iPhone. Previously higher quality streams only worked when on WiFi. Keen to test and see what higher quality I can get.
I think only the SCA metro stations and even then it’s hit and miss depending what app you use. I’ve only been able to get 128kbps when using the Listnr website. Even the Listnr app on WiFi only appears to be 32kbps.
A massive 320kbps! But only works if you sign in to their website/app. I’d be interested to see what they make available on RadioApp. I’ve previously posted the direct 320kbps URLs in this thread for use in VLC.
Anyone else noticed that pre-roll ads have disappeared from a lot of stations in the last few months? It might just be me as I do run adblocking software.
I recall late last year nearly every commercial station (Ace, ARN, Nine, Nova, SCA) were all running pre-rolls ads in RadioApp, Listnr, IHeart, etc…
Might be your software… I got a pre roll ad on iHeart Radio last night.
But maybe because I’m not in an ARN market, I didn’t get different ads inserted like I do on Listnr. I heard the local ones for businesses in that area, which I was happy about.
