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All posts by Michael Rogers

Below are all of Michael Rogers's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.

M
Digital radio section | Digital radio
Saturday 2 April 2011 9:22AM

Sadly, not every change constitutes progress. L-Band via satellite would work - rather like WorldSpace. The basic concept of having both terrestrial and satellite broadcasting in the L-Band would appear sound. Is it not used in the US? If France implements the concept successfully, we may follow one day... However, in the present economic climate, futher innovations, such as L-Band and DRM are doubtless receding into the realm of wishful thinking. Apropos portable indoor reception, it is reported that modern aluminium-coated insulation panels can turn a house into a Faraday cage :-)

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The main DAB concerns remain:-
- coverage, portable and mobile reception
- audio quality
It is extremely unlikely that DAB will be abandoned now. With futher DAB roll-out, reception will improve - to an unpredictable degree. The "least bad" compromise would be to retain FM alongside DAB and allow broadcasters to opt for FM or DAB or both, spectrum permitting. For static reception, internet (for those with a civilised download speed...) and DTT radio will deliver hifi to the living-room sound system.

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RS and Chris : I agree with you, but am mindful of the "real world" of the vested interests of government and broadcasters when I conjecture on a feasible compromise. I doubt that DAB coverage will equal FM for mobile and portable reception. Ideally I would like to see FM fully retained and MW and LW to gradually adopt DRM. However, vested interests usually prevail, not the preferences of the electorate.

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See the Guardian Media article for informed
option on both sides of the DAB-FM issue. (Link may need to be "reconstituted") : Digital radio chief apologises for 2015 switchover 'confusion' | Media | guardian.co.uk .

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Caradon on the Bristol Channel coast:-
- ch21,27: fine as normal
- ch28: quality variable, as normal - 2xCCI
- ch22,25: 2xCCI, never
- ch 24 : normally fine, currently variable
Could be due to the atmospheric high.

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RAI 1,2,3 and News have moved to 10992GHz, Vertical, 27500, 2/3. Restrictions will presumably continue as before. See my previous posting above.

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Caradon transmitter engineering post of 9-5-11 (above) indicates *TV analog* ... What analog transmissions are still being broadcast from Caradon post-DSO?

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RAI 1,2,3 and News have moved to 10992GHz, Vertical, 27500, 2/3. Primetime restrictions will presumably continue as before. If an automatic rescan does not find them, tune this transponder in manually with the above parameters.

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RAI 1,2,3 and News have moved to 10992GHz, Vertical, 27500, 2/3. If your receiver can be manually tuned, enter the above parameters and RAI should reappear as before with a good signal, probably at the end of your channel listings. You can then move the new RAI channels to the positions they previously occupied in your channel list. An automatic retune should do it just as well, but you might have to hunt amongst the end of the list of hundreds of channels to find RAI again. If all else fails, a factory reset would do it, but then you would have to re-arrange channels and preference lists.

Primtime estrictions will presumably continue as before. See my previous posting above.

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RAI - Martin, good to know you have had some success. Hard to diagnose at a distance, but the following possibilities come to mind:-
1. dish slightly out of alignment. Judicious
movement left-right, up-down whilst watching the on-screen signal quality bar would resolve this.
2. 10.992 is nearer the lower end of the spectrum. It is just possible that your LNB
does not perform as well in this frequency range. Compare with other signals in this lower range. If they are all weaker, a new LNB would be in order. It is also possible that the LNB skew is not optimally set - but that is getting a bit technical and less likely to be the issue.
Briantist and others may have further suggestions. Hope you get it all back satisfactorily. RAI 4 and 5 have been encrypted for quite some time. You would need a Tiva receiver registered to a bona-fide address in Italy to get one.


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