@Dan As a broadcaster who is doing HD, I would have to agree with you on some of those points, however, it's the system we're stuck with. It may not be the best technical solution but it does have a number of advantages to digital listeners like higher audio quality, reduction in multipath interference as well as 2nd and 3rd audio channels.
You mostly have the commercial broadcasters to thank for the fact that iBiquity is what it is. If they had their way initially we wouldn't even have HD2/HD3 channels! They were afraid of diluting the market...It really is the public broadcasters who are pushing the envelope on this one. NPR worked closely with iBiquity to invent that capability. Most Public broadcasters care enough about quality that their audio channels don't sound like crap.
Regarding the bitrate and sound quality, it really isn't fair to compare it to MP3. Apples and oranges. The codec used by iBiquity is HDC which is essentially an implementation of AAC+. XM also uses an implementation of this codec. At 96 kbps it sounds absolutely amazing. Better than FM quality and nearly CD quality. The biggest advantage over FM is not dealing with a pre-emphasis curve and corresponding de-emphasis.
When you split the 96 kbps HD channel into 48/48 or 48/24/24 to do HD2 or HD2 and HD3 it starts to get a little worse but still better than the bitrates that satellite radio is running on their channels...
Regardless of how you feel about HD Radio, it's here to stay.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Shane @ Sep 27th 2007 11:39PM
@Dan
As a broadcaster who is doing HD, I would have to agree with you on some of those points, however, it's the system we're stuck with. It may not be the best technical solution but it does have a number of advantages to digital listeners like higher audio quality, reduction in multipath interference as well as 2nd and 3rd audio channels.
You mostly have the commercial broadcasters to thank for the fact that iBiquity is what it is. If they had their way initially we wouldn't even have HD2/HD3 channels! They were afraid of diluting the market...It really is the public broadcasters who are pushing the envelope on this one. NPR worked closely with iBiquity to invent that capability. Most Public broadcasters care enough about quality that their audio channels don't sound like crap.
Regarding the bitrate and sound quality, it really isn't fair to compare it to MP3. Apples and oranges. The codec used by iBiquity is HDC which is essentially an implementation of AAC+. XM also uses an implementation of this codec. At 96 kbps it sounds absolutely amazing. Better than FM quality and nearly CD quality. The biggest advantage over FM is not dealing with a pre-emphasis curve and corresponding de-emphasis.
When you split the 96 kbps HD channel into 48/48 or 48/24/24 to do HD2 or HD2 and HD3 it starts to get a little worse but still better than the bitrates that satellite radio is running on their channels...
Regardless of how you feel about HD Radio, it's here to stay.