No New Benefits

Unlike TV, most people who listen to the radio are loyal to one or two stations. They get up to Wogan and listen to The Archers. Or they stick with the music station that plays what they want.

So ultimately, there's no benefit to more channels. People don't hop around and they like what they've got. So why should they buy digital?

For the other people, who might be more techy or be avid radio listeners, the sound quality on DAB is crap. Only the big stations are passible. Chill, Gaydar and The Core all appear to be broadcast at 96kbps Mono MP2 (yes - mpTWO).

What about satellite and cable ?

Maybe people don't bother with DAB because Satellite and cable carry digital radio, as well as stations broadcasting over the internet (I've listening to Radio 6 in Real Player at the moment).

I reckon that the biggest barrier to widespread adoption of DAB is the complete lack of DAB installed by default by car manufacturers (as well the cost and inconvenience of upgrading one's car radio). They can do Bluetooth, iPod connectivity, MP3 paying CD players and USB ports, but they can't do DAB. Twats !

What about the quality?

They might notice that the quality of digital radio is lower than decent FM analogue radio, as too many stations have been squeezed into the availible bandwidth.

I personally think it is criminal that the government is going to sell off the analogue radio bands to the highest bidder- I asume this will render all analogue radios useless which is such a waste- personally I quite like having an old school valve radio in my front room which sounds nice....

Also if they wern't so interested in selling off the frequencies they could be allocated for comunity/local/interesting use! I would love to be able to listen to a good radio station which wasn't just motivated by comercialism in my car/at work... These frequencies could be freeed up for public use- circumventiung the facist maner in which they are currently assigned (how many local radio stations are there with more than a week license which arn't just comercial?).

My two pennith worth.

Invest in the manufacturers, not sell to the end users

The problem is people don't know or really care why they need digital radio in their lives. Their cars don't have it so why should their alarm clock or kitchen radio have it?

Instead of pushing it down consumer's throats with marketing or scare tactics, the government should invest in the manufacturers of the devices to get them to wind down the production of analogue in favour of cheaper digital devices.

Once people start buying them it will soon become the norm to just tune into a DAB broadcast.

Just wondering ...

... how many people actually use more than one or two stations? My listening is confined to three - the ones I have programmed into the car. At home it's mainly one - when the radio is on, which is fairly seldom.

So why the play on multiple channels? Is it really going to attract more people? Is there really an advantage in shelling out more money for the same thing?

And are there digital music centres? is there a DAB boom box? How many cars are DAB equipped from new? Why are the DAB radios around either plain 1950's style or so funky that they'd be out of place in 99% of the places they could be used?

And why is the display so bloomin' small that the those who rely on radio, blind and partially sighted people, have difficulty using them?

And in case you're wondering, no, I haven;t bought one yet.

There must be a better way.

Consumer choice?

So government carping on about consumer choice ignores consumers when we dont make choice it wants, nice one!

What's a radio?

Do you mean wireless routers and 3G devices? Surely they're all digital already, aren't they?

Taskforce?

I can tell you why right now. DAB radios cost 10x the price of normal radios, radio listener numbers are dropping and most of the listeners left are happy with the quality and availability of channels on FM. I'd also imagine the combination of large capacity MP3 players, podcasts, radio on TV and radio across the internet are not helping.

How can DAB channels survive? Stream your channels over the internet and stop relying on a 20th century band aid fix for 19th century technology perhaps?

Job done. Where can I get my cheque?

The old favourites are on analogue anyway

Why would I want to switch to digital radio to listen to the exact same thing?

I typically listen to 2-3 stations at most and they're all on analogue radio. I might get some extra stations with digital radio, but the benefits aren't as obvious (like a 24 hour news channel).

There's also the issue of DAB and DAB+, which most regular users probably won't realise. So we've got the prospect of all existing DAB radios being obsolete to upgrade to the newer standard. Compare this to say Freeview and an HD Freeview coming along in a few years time, the difference between the two is obvious - the HD viewers will get a higher quality picture. With DAB+ people won't see much benefit apart from slightly higher quality, the main benefit will be the government who can reclaim old frequencies yet again.

TV's can be upgraded to digital with a simple set top box, a radio needs to be replaced. Why would anyone want to remove a perfectly working radio?

20%? Who's complaining?

"With only 20 per cent of UK households being DAB-enabled (Digital Audio Broadcasting)"

American broadcasters would cream their jeans if they could attain half that level of adoption for IBOC aka "HD Radio," the hobbled North American answer to DAB. I'd suggest that this a pretty reasonable level that will grow steadily as people replace radios and stereo gear.

Because.....

The sound quality is crap. Really crap.

And it will take about eleventy years before car manufacturers fit them as standard which, based on my review panel of me, is where most people listen to the radio.

How many people are buying new radios at all?

It may simply be that people aren't buying new radios and see no need for a new one while the old one still works.

Also may be due to the ipod generation who aren't listening to broadcast radio as much anymore.

Perhaps they need to do automated request radio - text a song title (& band if ambiguous) to a number and have it played. Might work as there doesn't seem to be any shortage of people willing to inflict their music sense on the random public!

Patently obvious

There isn't going to be a mass switchover to DAB until the big BBC stations go digital only, which will probably be the *last* thing to happen, not the first. Until then why would you spend more money on a DAB radio that gets you a load of extra stations but you won't listen to any of them because A) they're crap B) they're filled with adverts and C) you only really listen to radio1 anyway. There isn't any good reasons to do it full stop.

DAB problems

Main problem for people like me outside of the main metropolitan areas is that the signal's too weak. The first (small) DAB radio I tried at home could pick up literally nothing. A second more costly and mains-powered model works OK provided it's in a window on the right side of the house, but otherwise gives useless reception so pretty inconvenient in general. Do I live in the back of beyond? Not really - 15 miles from Cambridge.

Another problem is the battery appetite if the radio is not mains powered. People just aren't used to needing a new set of chunky batteries every few hours to listen to a radio. If I ran Roberts etc I'd make a mains-powered DAB base unit that could sit in a window and rebroadcast at least one channel at a time eg via Bluetooth to a cheap & compact audio-only (ie no DAB tuner) repeater unit that would have a long battery life. That's the only way I can see to get around the weak signal in many parts of the country which presumably won't improve materially for years to come.

There are other parts of the DAB experience that are either poor or unfamiliar. There's no instant-on for example - the radio takes several seconds, subjectively a long time, to scan the channels after switch-on or when changing channels. And the fact the very few cars - probably where people listen to the radio more than anywhere else - have DAB means that most people aren't familiar with how DAB channels work.

Bad Reception

The reception on DAB in many areas is non-existant, I have family in Norfolk and Yorkshire and neither can receive DAB at all (these are areas covered by FM and all the mobile phone operators), if the government, OFCOM etc are serious about DAB then perhaps they should ensure that it covers the whole country.

Quality, forward compatibility, power consumption...

Just a few reasons for not buying a DAB radio include:

- The quality being lower than FM at the bit-rates currently used. (For optimum audio quality, use a Freeview receiver.)

- The possibility that all existing DAB radios will stop working if/when the encoding scheme is changed from MP2 to AAC. (I'm not aware of any being re-progammable.)

- The fact that DAB radios use vastly more power than FM ones. (Just look at the numbers on the wind-up FM/DAB one - it's something like 40 mins per wind on FM and 3 mins on DAB.)

Pause and rewind might be useful, but the feature is not currently present on the vast majority of DAB radios on the market.

I have only found one DAB-only station that I might be interested in, BBC 7.

So it's not hard to see why it's not appealing....

Just how many radios do you have?

If the digital switch for radio is handled as badly as the digital switch for TV, we'll all have to buy new radios.

Without including those provided by Sky or Freeview I have 5,

Car Radio

Lounge Radio

Study Radio

Kitchen Radio

Clock Radio

I'm sure some people have many more, for example MP3 players, mobile phones etc. No doubt the Government would like us all to replace our fully functional analogue radios with digital ones. Allowing us to give the Government another wedge of VAT.

Can we have a picture of Parliament in flames?

It's obvious really

When DAB offers Joe Soap something he wants that's available only via DAB then he might consider it. Things like improved quality. Oh, hang on a minute, the BBC had to retract its claim that DAB provided 'CD quality' because it demonstrably doesn't. How about better programming, instead of yet more indistinguishable "Yo, get down" stations with the same playlists being spewed out by indentical motormouths. If it worked in cars or outside cities it might just help as well.

It's an answer looking for a problem.

Now where's the "It's not rocket science" icon?

Playlist

'enjoy the delights of Planet Rock's 12-track playlist' - you must be getting it confused with Smash Hits or Virgin. As their jingle goes 'If you don't like it, frown at the radio'.

More take-up of DAB will require better reception coverage

Digital quality

Perhaps many haven't wanted to downgrade the quality of their listening pleasure? DAB for the most part sucks when it comes to sound quality in the UK.

This is an easy one...

Analogue radio set = about £5 at the bottom of the range.

Digital radio set = £50.

I don't believe Freeview really took off until you could get a set-top box for about £20 so maybe they should take a leaf out of that book.

"to work out why more people don't want digital radio"

...maybe more people would care if they could get a signal in their area.

I believe that DAB coverage has a long way to go before it will be a worthy replacement to good ol' FM.

The Persuaders

A very moot question, as it is now clear that at least half of England's Bingo halls will close due to the smoking ban, and their customers will need something to take their minds off the vandals who made it happen.

A very simple answer is to make it a crime punishable by a fine up to £2000 to not have a DAB radio AND and not having it playing at 70dB for at least 8 hours a day (all technically feasible).

With not much ingenuity it should be possible to have DAB radios report their usage stats back to the broadcasters, and fines for non-use issued automatically.

Of course that is not the idea. The idea is to have "experts" confirm that the analogue bands must be shut down to improve the service quality of the digital ones. The panel is necessary because well founded objections can be made that that is not an adequate solution, and it is these arguments that need to be concluded (i.e. trounced).

The whole little exercise is a model lesson in social engineering through applied psychology. It is not unique. (As if the Culture Secretary would be the first minister allowed to such mind-bending technology on a population of 60+ million!).

Try this for starters :

Since the Government are clearly too bloody stoopid to realise why people aren't bothering with DAB let me claim the "Captain Obvious" award for this thread.

1) I already have a number of existing radios in my car and house.

2) They work perfectly well thank you very much. And the quality is fine too.

3) Given statements (a) and (b) why on earth would I consider shelling out loads of money for DAB replacements?

Let's not even get into stupid points against DAB, like the shit coverage, the fact that I don't actually need either replay or pictures with my radio, or the fact that nearly all the new DAB stations I've heard about sound shit.

Is that enough to hold a select committee hearing around?

Chicken and Egg

I will not buy a DAB radio until I can get DAB broadcasts! In the meantime people will listen on their FreeSat or FreeView box, if the broadcasters produce anything worth listening to.