January 31, 2006
Boston Acoustics Slashes Receptor Radio HD Price by $200
Sales of the radio must have been very brisk or very poor--I'd guess the former: They dropped the list price from $499 to $299 for this very lovely radio. At $499, it was an early adopter item, clearly designed to be worth every penny, but out of reach for more casual consumers. They must have the profit margin in the item to push out more for lower cost, which is why I guess demand was very high rather than low.
January 25, 2006
Broadcast Flag in HD Radio?
The recording industry wants to control whether digital music played over public airwaves can be recorded: The RIAA wants a broadcast flag, which are digital rights controls embedded into the music streamed over HD Radio. (They want the same for all broadcast media.) With the broadcast flag, the owner of the content can control how it's used, including whether it could be recorded at all and how long it may be retained.
The rules that the RIAA wants for HD Radio broadcasts are fairly onerous, including requiring only blocks of time be recorded.
If legislation that the RIAA wants passed is put into place, then all existing and in-process HD Radio receivers would no longer work. Both the National Association of Broadcasters and the Consumer Electronics Association are opposed in varying degrees to this form of broadcast flag. The NAB apparently supports a TV broadcast flag.
January 23, 2006
HD Radio Starts Accelerating
Less advertising, more programming try to push HD Radio growth: In a terrific update of a piece that I wrote six months ago for The New York Times, Eric Taub files this article today that covers the state of HD Radio, looking at the latest partnerships and projections for listeners.
Various radio chains are trying to fill missing programming options through multicasting on their FM stations. Many chains have grouped together to avoid broadcasting in overlapping formats, and have agreed to an ad-free set of formats to expand listener options. At this point, the industry wants to drive people to buy HD Radio sets, so competition and advertising aren't yet useful.
An analyst quoted in this story expects 500,000 receivers to be sold by the end of 2006. I've heard 1,000,000 from other sources, but it's entirely dependent on integration as a base option in cars, frankly. iBiquity's CEO expects $200 home HD Radios by the end of the year, and that conforms with what I've heard, too.
January 9, 2006
PRI Launches HD-only Spanish Language Programming
Public Radio International will distribute BBC Mundo on secondary HD Radio channels: KPCC (Los Angeles), KVCR (San Bernardino), and KNAU (Flagstaff, Ariz.) are among the stations that will offer the PRI/BBC programming. PRI is also distributing a 24/7 (24 hours a day, seven days a week) classical station and BBC Radio in English as HD options.
January 8, 2006
HD Radio Makes A Small Splash at CES
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) had a huge array of HD Radio products on display: While HD Radio is still entering the marketplace, CES could be considered its real public debut. While there were products and some big announcements in Jan. 2005, there was plenty of product--some of it shipping, most close--on the floor More importantly, the technology and cost issues are finally being solved.
At the iBiquity booth, HD Radio's creators, they were displaying several high-end receivers incorporating HD Radio and six tabletop radios. Three are known mostly by their early announcement and later release: Boston Acoustics' Receptor Radio HD (on view at the show and shipping), Radiosophy's Multistream HD, and Polk Audio's I-Sonic. Radiosophy's radio is still a couple months away from release, and appeared only at iBiquity's booth. At Polk Audio's booth, they had two I-Sonic units to show, but engineering issues have delayed release another few months. Still, because the I-Sonic uniquely plays DVDs and CDs, has built HD Radio support, and has a slot to insert a $49 XM Radio module, it has a niche that isn't nearly filled.
iBiquity had three other radios on view, none of which I'd heard of. One is a concept design that's looking for manufacturers who want to buy it. I foolishly failed to note the manufacturers of these three radios, assuming the information would be publicly available elsewhere. Nonetheless, the radios are on their way.
Etón wasn't showing an HD Radio at their booth, but an existing form factor radio that currently has satellite digital radio module support will be released possibly as soon as summer with an HD tuner.
Some intelligence gathered from iBiquity's booth indicates that newer, cheaper chips on easier-to-integrate circuit modules should be out starting around April. Chip modules cost about $60 now but will drop a bit in price, but the real savings will be on a simpler engineering approach.
January 5, 2006
Review of Receptor Radio HD
I spent a few weeks with the Boston Acoustics Receptor Radio HD and reviewed it for The New York Times: This is the first all-in-one tabletop HD Radio receiver, and it's quite remarkable. The $500 price tag will scare off folks who aren't audiophiles and early adopters, but if you're looking for tremendous sound in a small form factor and are enamored of the idea of HD Radio, this is definitely the box to buy.
In Spring, we'll see Polk Audio's $700 home entertainment system that includes HD Radio. It's a DVD and CD player as well, with integrated speakers. (DVDs require an external video display.) Radiosophy will also then ship its sub-$300 tabletop system with a removable tuner that can be used in a car with an audio power adapter.
Universal Digital Head Unit Design for HD Radio
iBiquity announced a digital head unit that will work with 200 existing receivers: The digital head unit reference design--a working prototype that is licensed to manufacturers for production--plugs into models from major car audio makers that use the digital interface to add satellite radio. This obviates swapping out a receiver for folks with high-end stereos.
January 4, 2006
WGMS Moves Frequency, But Adds Two HD Channels
In an interesting move, Washington, D.C.'s WGMS adds two classical digital-only program streams: The station will move its primary classical broadcast programming to 103.9 (D.C.) and 104.1 (Frederick area) from 103.5. A news, traffic, and weather sister station, WTOP, will locate itself on 103.5.
But both the 103.5 and 103.9/104.1 stations will broadcast a second HD Radio channel (typically called HD2) of classical programming. On 103.5 FM, what's called "long-form, in-depth classical programming" will air. On 103.9/104.1, HD2 will feature Viva La Voce, a classical vocal station that's also streamed online.
iBiquity Says 1,200 Broadcasters in 2006
iBiquity, developers of the HD Radio technology, released their year-in-review statistics: They say 624 stations now broadcast digital AM or FM, with 70 stations offering multicasting. (I found about seven in the Seattle market alone.) They note that $200 million will be spend through in-house advertising by the HD Digital Radio Alliance, a group of broadcasters. Testing of HD Radio is now underway in countries around the world.
The significant remaining elephant in the room that's not mentioned? The failure for the radio industry to figure out how to identify HD2 and subsequent FM digital-only channels in a tuner. Yesterday, Ross Oasis had this screed against dilly-dallying posted at Radio Ink.