Re: Why keep knocking DAB?

DAB sounds worse than FM wrote:
Roger Thorpe wrote:

Richard Evans wrote:


Well for the past few days this newsgroup has been rather quiet.
Hardly people going on an on about how bad DAB is. It was only
somebody trying to say how good DAB is that sparked thing off. So in
this case at least I'd say it is the DAB supporters that are going
on and on and.... (oh I can't even be bothered to cut and past).

Richard E.

Ummm. From where I sit it looked as if the insulting and intemperate
response from DSWTFM started it. A thoughtful answer might not have
been too much trouble...



Please, please think of a thoughful response to give to a newbie coming on
here telling those of us with years of experience on this issue that we're
all wrong, that "DAB sounds excellent", and he basically said at the end of
his post that the problem with the audio quality must have been caused by
buying £25 portable DAB radios - yep, our mistake, the only possible
explanation for why those of us that think the audio quality is closer to MW
than FM is because we bought a £25 sodding portable radio, whereas Mr Expert
has bought a new-fangled micro system.

Come on, find a way of providing a thoughful response to that (importantly,
one that he'd understand, and that doesn't require 17 hours of teaching him
all the basics on the subject from first principles, because he obviously
doesn't have the first clue about this subject).

Also, it wasn't insulting, it was simply stating the truth.

Sorry, but if someone comes on here and effectively directly says "you're
wrong" (not just to me, but to a load of us), I reserve the right to say
they're bloody wrong back. If that's okay with you, of course?


I'm going to try here, but it's hard to separate the quotes since I'm cutting and pasting. I hope that you will be able to make sense of it


Ok, the original message was
"I finally got a DAB (Hitachi AX-M140 and the audio quality
is excellent. I don't see why people keep knocking DAB.

Admittedly I seem to be in a really good RX area with
all bars lit up on the signal meter but there is no
background noises, hiss or oddball tones whatsoever.

Maybe people are buying these crappy 25 quid sets
and expecting to get decent sound from that?"

I think that I might have replied by:
Writing about how the initial claims of 'CD quality' had led to an expectation that has not been filled.
Pointing out that the perception of quality depended on the type of material that you listen to. After all DAB seems adequate for a lot of highly processed stuff that passes for music today(pardon my sniffyness).
Observing that If you're not accustomed to MP3 and other compressed formats then the artefacts are more noticable.(although, of course once you start to notice them it's hard not to actually listen out for them)
Adding that when you change from FM to DAB it's a bit like moving from cassette to LP, the fist thing that you might notice is the lack of hiss, better frequency response and reduced wow and flutter. Then you start to get pissed off by the clicks, the mis-tracking, off centre records.
You are in a far better position than me to discuss the technical limitations.
Hell, you could have even go on about how, in an I-pod world of compressed audio there will be some people who will be quite happy with DAB at 120Kb/s but maybe that would be too much of a concession.

You could have done much more without resorting to:
----------------------------------------------------------------
"Then you clearly have not got the first clue about audio quality. Sorry."
The "Sorry" doesn't really soften the insult that preceded it.
---------------------------------------------------------
"Because the audio quality on DAB is miles worse than on FM, OBVIOUSLY."
This is just refutation. Shouting "obviously" is at best patronising.
-----------------------------------------------------
"Look, you have a 0.0% chance of changing anybody's view of DAB on this
newsgroup, so if you think you will by saying how "excellent" the audio
quality is, I'll tell you now you're completely wasting your time. All you
will achieve is to let it be known to anybody that reads your ill-informed
posts that you've never experienced good audio quality and you haven't got a
clue what you're going on about. Sorry, but that's the truth."
I'm not sure that the OP was trying to change anyone's mind. I hope that you can understand that anyone who is satisfied with DAB might view this forum for the fist time and wonder what all the fuss is about. That doesn't make them an idiot.
--------------------------------------------------------------



The worst thing about this forum is the hostility to new posters and the intolerance of positive views on DAB. On the other hand there has been a sensible discussion on cables and hifi bullshit here that would have been impossible in some other newsgroups.
Roger


--
Roger Thorpe

My email address is spamtrapped. You can work it out!
.

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