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DAB radio

My unit has six buttons (on which I can save a set for DAB, FM, and AM), but the DAB set (not sure about the others) can actually store 18 services - 1-6 are obviously OK, but it's such a faff getting to the others directly that I can't remember how to do it and just use inc/dec from an existing 1 or 6 (I can step through by saved services or by transmitted services).
 
Trev said:
I know 'we' are a Humax based forum but I was just wondering whether anyone here has DAB experience.
At the moment I am running my, now broken, FM radio using a 'T' of 300 ohm feeder pinned to the picture rail. When it was working, this was fine.
I am toying with the idea of getting a DAB/FM tuner device, and wondered whether there is any expertise WRT DAB indoor aerials and, if outdoor is required, how to combine and split the signal down one co-ax.?
Any takers please.
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I am not keen on the stand alone DAB transister type radios, they have a sharp (too clear) sound for my ear. I prefer the warm sound of FM. However, when DAB first arrived, I bought a Genus DU1 adapter, connected to a stereo amp and altered the tone controls for preference. Sadly these little gems are no longer available, I don't know whether the firm went bust or were taken over by rivals, but they made some great radios.

The two I purchased are still doing sterling work in our daughter's house, having shipped them to Lancs as they have a much greater (not better) range of stations than we receive in Cumbria.

I have a dedicated FM aerial connected to a tuner/amp, plus of course connection to the amp via optical from the FoxT2.
 
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Standalone DAB radios are fine for speech but when using them to listen to music I hook them up to an external sound system. This is why I deprecate the lack of aux out on most modern radios and am in no rush to replace my old one I use in the living room hooked up to my main hi-fi even though it is non-DAB+ capable.
 
I was having a fiddle with my car radio today (setting up the profile for SWMBO's key) and found that within the DAB settings you can engage Station following which will look for other options in the DAB stream, or failing that try to find one in the FM using the station ID, provided there is a strong enough signal. There wasn't a corresponding option in the FM setup (not even AF that I could find), so on mine at least it's one way.
 
I am going to switch ours to fm. Dab seems useless round here, and I never listen to its extra stations. I will monitor whether the unit swaps frequency when the signal is low. If it does, it will outperform its own dab abilities. Plus, at least it is possible to step up and down the stations in FM, without the enormous delays I get stepping up and down dab stations. For what Toyota charge for this unit, they could at least have included s dab station list. Even the satnav is based on TomTom but is inferior.
 
gomezz said:
This is why I deprecate the lack of aux out on most modern radios and am in no rush to replace my old one I use in the living room hooked up to my main hi-fi even though it is non-DAB+ capable.
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Ditto. My Pure Evoke-1 is connected to my hi-fi and computer via the aux out. Haven't seen a suitable DAB+ replacement.
 
The worst alarm radio I ever owned was a Pure model, Tempus? When I set it to come on at the start of the Today programme, at 6am, I expected it to switch on at 6am. Pure boasted about the time keeping of their radios, locked as they were to the time signal of FM broadcasts. What they neglected to mention was that

1 The time signal was only acquired when the radio came on.
2 There was no attempt to acquire the time maybe 15 minutes before the alarm time.
3 The old crock of a digital clock inside the radios was capable of losing or gaining up to 3 minutes in a day.

The result was that the main items of news had passed by the time the radio came on, else I had to set the alarm early and suffer whatever preceded the Today programme for a few minutes.

My exchange with Pure was lengthy and heated, starting amicably but ending in vitriol. They eventually admitted that the radios were deficient, but said they had no intention of fixing them, ever, even though they were new and still being sold.

My revenge was to post the entire exchange as a comment to my review, which got high ranking on Amazon. Someone else commented that he looked inside his and had never seen such bad workmanship nor so many dry solder joints before.

The moral? Despite a dishonest campaign, Brexit won, and despite an execrable campaign, Trump won, and Pure still sell loads of junk, and despite so many missed or late bug fixes Humax sell loads of boxes. Go figure!
 
RobH1 said:
I prefer the warm sound of FM
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Haven't heard any since using my original tranny, with copper aerial attached to water pipe, and listening to Radio Luxembourg 'til it faded into static at about 7.30 pm.
 
Mike0001 said:
Nope, it isn't.
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So you are saying that as you drive across the country it doesn't swap transmitters automatically? My car radios have done that for decades. The RDS data contains alternative frequencies, and (I think) a second tuner monitors for better reception (the switch is instantaneous, so I assume there must be a second tuner).
 
Black Hole said:
So you are saying that as you drive across the country it doesn't swap transmitters automatically? My car radios have done that for decades. The RDS data contains alternative frequencies, and (I think) a second tuner monitors for better reception (the switch is instantaneous, so I assume there must be a second tuner).
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I thought RDS was just the data (display) system and AF was the channel following, though obviously they may be linked. On the cars I've had they've always been separately switchable.
 
Black Hole said:
a second tuner monitors for better reception
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I had one in a couple of cars ago, that if Alternative Frequency' (AF) was switched on, the audio had short glitches every now and again. I assumed this was the AF having a quick look at the other frequency for a few milliseconds on the tuner. My current one does not do this, but I have not noticed it switch frequency. Indeed, I don't even know how to find out if it has.
MikeSh said:
and AF was the channel following
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It is, but it must get its alternate frequency data from somewhere.
 
There is no display of what is on, just the channel name. It may have TA but I would never use that so I don't know.
 
I think in the early days frequency switching was achieved by merely scanning for another station with the same ident in its data stream. These days the data stream does indeed include "shortcuts" to suitable alternative frequencies in surrounding transmitter areas. The whole process on a modern car radio is so seamless you probably don't know it's happening, and I doubt it can be turned off (why would anyone want to?).

Ditto station following in DAB. Nobody would want to stop it switching to another transmitter before signal break-up unless the process was somehow imperfect.

The only thing one might want to opt out of is fall-back to FM in the event of DAB loss (which I do, because I find that if I lose DAB I also lose FM).
 
Black Hole said:
The only thing one might want to opt out of is fall-back to FM in the event of DAB loss (which I do, because I find that if I lose DAB I also lose FM).
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Yes, the time delay difference is a pain. My car switches from DAB to FM and back twice as I pass under the bridges between the M1 & M62. It works but the interview that's invariably on at the time jumps back and forth.
 
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