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Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

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Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#81

Post by adiabatty »

msh wrote: post #56

I know I am properly a outlier but how many people on HN actually listens to radio over FM/DAB/Other non IP systems? I dont remember when I last listened to radio. Even in the car the entertainment is one or more of the following from the connected phone: - Streaming or locally stored music - Podcasts (which may include shows produced by radio stations). - Audiobooks. At home its the same, either played directly on t…

I listen to the local NPR music station. My car seems like it's one year too old to have some sort of expandable input, and there's no sensible way to install a Lightning cable or Bluetooth adaptor into it since the stereo system is super-integrated.

Of course, once I do get a car that has a Lightning hookup…I'll probably just listen to podcasts at every possible opportunity. Right now I usually only turn the radio on if I'm going to be in the car for 30 minutes or more, which happens maybe once a month at most.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#82

Post by audunw »

dagss wrote: post #55

Consensus from a lunch table in Norway: It was stupid to spend money on DAB now, it happens right as people move from radio to streaming. Many will move to streaming on 4G instead of DAB (which seems to have as good coverage or better, at least for me...then consider if the money spent on DAB had been spent on cellular instead). The populist party that kicked it off in the first place is now the only party to oppose…

I doubt that 4G is capabable of replacing FM/DAB. Radio is broadcast, 4G is individual streams. For a whole morning queue full of cars, that's a lot of bandwidth.

Probably the next generation will be good enough to handle it.

But this still ignores other benefits of DAB over mobile data. One is emergency broadcasts, the other is future-proofing. DAB will probably be a standard for decades. But what if you want built-in streaming in your car, which standard do you support? There are none. You have to have apps. Do you think your car will still get software updates for those in 10 years?

I also think we tech geeks overestimate the popularity of streaming in cars. Hell, I'm a geek but even I actually prefer radio when driving.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#83

Post by nicky0 »

th0ma5 wrote: post #44

It is a real shame that the US went with the proprietary HD Radio scheme. The devices are so expensive and there hardly are any available. Just now I couldn't even find anything less than $100. What a scam. I feel sorry for all the radio stations that wasted money on this. Would DAB be able to gain ground in the US?

Be careful what you wish for, DAB is pretty horrible too.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#84

Post by nicky0 »

a1studmuffin wrote: post #28

Don't most smartphones have emergency broadcasts built-in these days? Who doesn't have their phone on them when they're driving in a car?

> Who doesn't have their phone on them when they're driving in a car?

Err... me? Don't assume the way you do things is the way everyone does things.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#86

Post by sundvor »

kagamine wrote: post #57
anexprogrammer wrote: post #5

Over 60% against ... but "more channels". OK solely money driven then. I have somewhere around 12 FM radios, ranging in price from £10 to £lots and 40 years old or newer. They all still work and often give LW and SW too. In the UK at least DAB is mp2 and an excuse to put out thousands of channels at horrible bit rates. Like down to 64k streams. OK for a noisy car, terrble for at home or headphones. They all work and…

I also believe this is primarily driven by money, but also a section of Norwegian society seems to believe that anything new and shiny simply must be bought and right away. In a country in which environmental concerns are marketed as paramount by the government and media there are some obvious dichotomies emerging. For one, the electric car market markets itself as green and while they are running on renewable energy…

New cars were still going to be built though so it's better that they are electrical, especially when you have 100% clean energy to source it (dam hydro).

The 24 month upgrade cycle is hardly unique to Norway; Australia being another where everyone and his dog gets a new phone biannually.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#87

Post by Nullabillity »

audunw wrote: post #82
dagss wrote: post #55

Consensus from a lunch table in Norway: It was stupid to spend money on DAB now, it happens right as people move from radio to streaming. Many will move to streaming on 4G instead of DAB (which seems to have as good coverage or better, at least for me...then consider if the money spent on DAB had been spent on cellular instead). The populist party that kicked it off in the first place is now the only party to oppose…

I doubt that 4G is capabable of replacing FM/DAB. Radio is broadcast, 4G is individual streams. For a whole morning queue full of cars, that's a lot of bandwidth. Probably the next generation will be good enough to handle it. But this still ignores other benefits of DAB over mobile data. One is emergency broadcasts, the other is future-proofing. DAB will probably be a standard for decades. But what if you want built-…

> But what if you want built-in streaming in your car, which standard do you support? There are none. You have to have apps. Do you think your car will still get software updates for those in 10 years?

None. You add a plain 3.5mm line-in plug.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#88

Post by sseppola »

kagamine wrote: post #52
a1studmuffin wrote: post #28

Don't most smartphones have emergency broadcasts built-in these days? Who doesn't have their phone on them when they're driving in a car?

The obvious flaws in that argument are battery life for one, and that whenever any major event happens, like New Years Eve, the mobile network slows to a halt. In a national emergency, a smartphone isn't going to last long enough to serve you, especially in a climate where winter temperatures are routinely as low as -25 centigrade and battery life is all the worse for it.

Word! Norwegian living in Oslo here, my iPhone 6 can shut down around 40-50% battery around -5 centigrade if I keep it out for long enough that it cools down (5 mins should do it). Now I always try to keep it warm in my hands and stick it back in my pocket asap, and I always keep it the pocket on my thigh, if I keep it in a pocket without close body contact it cools down as if it was outside.. I've heard something about this being caused by the aluminium covering the back of the phone and it accelerating the transfer of heat. Can't confirm it though, my last phone was an iPhone 4 which was equally terrible in the same environment.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#89

Post by beobab »

dtech wrote: post #77
ptaipale wrote: post #24

What do we do with more channels that we can't listen? If you really need a little bit of bandwidth around 100 MHz for other use, you could cut the spectrum from FM radio and still keep it running. The place where I usually listen to radio is the car. Car radios don't have DAB receivers. They all have FM receivers. And these days most cars have radio units that are integrated to the car electronics, steering wheel co…

Well, that's a chicken-egg situation, cars won't get DAB+ radio's until there's DAB+ broadcasts and it won't really be accelerated until FM is closely on the horizon to be shut off. Similarly it took quite a while for the first CD players to appear in cars, and a lot of older cars only had casette tapes, keeping casettes alive for quite a while longer just for car use.

I've actually got a iPhone to cassette interface (I would call it a cable, but one end looks like an actual cassette) in my desk drawer, so that I could play my music in my car.

New car now (well, new to me), so it's redundant.

Re: Norway to become first country to switch off FM radio

#90

Post by varjag »

kagamine wrote: post #57
anexprogrammer wrote: post #5

Over 60% against ... but "more channels". OK solely money driven then. I have somewhere around 12 FM radios, ranging in price from £10 to £lots and 40 years old or newer. They all still work and often give LW and SW too. In the UK at least DAB is mp2 and an excuse to put out thousands of channels at horrible bit rates. Like down to 64k streams. OK for a noisy car, terrble for at home or headphones. They all work and…

I also believe this is primarily driven by money, but also a section of Norwegian society seems to believe that anything new and shiny simply must be bought and right away. In a country in which environmental concerns are marketed as paramount by the government and media there are some obvious dichotomies emerging. For one, the electric car market markets itself as green and while they are running on renewable energy…

> For one, the electric car market markets itself as green and while they are running on renewable energy, the costs and sources of power for building them are reportedly a lot less environmentally friendly.

This is the kind of made up on spot arguments you hear from ICE vehicle owners. Until they switch to EV :)

"Manufacturing a mid-sized EV with an 84-mile range results in about 15 percent more emissions than manufacturing an equivalent gasoline vehicle."

http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-vehicles/electric-vehicles/life-...

15pct is not anywhere enough to offset the lifetime footprint of a fossils-driven vehicle, especially in case of Norway where effectively all electricity is hydro.

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