HD radio in office building?

Question

Hello again folks!

This question is geared towards people with some technology/radio knowledge, I have posted a few questions about my situation at work with my IT department blocking all Internet Radio access for the company. The desktop radios I have tried get no reception because of how large the building is and that I am nowhere near a window, and happen to be on the second floor.

The Radio Remote attachment for the Ipod works OK but does not get the 3 local stations I listen to on a daily basis, so my next step is to maybe invest in a Portable HD Radio, I found a few on CNET and the reviews were decent. My question is, does HD radio transmit differently then a regular FM radio? The main issue is the concrete and metal in the building blocking out the ability for good FM reception. But I’m curious to know if the HD signal is stronger and may give me a stronger signal than I would get from a regular FM signal.

If anyone knows this and can help me out It would be much

Answer 1

Opposite.. HD radio signals are actually weaker than regular radio signals as Radio stations broadcast many things... In that broadcast you hear the music, they also send a signal to tell your radio to decode the stereo information, the actual stereo sepearation information, The RDS signal (telling you the call letters for instance) and the digital signal.... the digital signal is weaker by law than the main signal so if you can't catchem with a regular radio, you can't catch them at all on HD pretty much

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fm_broadcas...

You get hardly no radio reception due to the faraday cage concept.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_cag...

The metal has a habit of shielding all but the strongest of signals.

You never said if they are blocking by IP address or by application however (such as going to the website of a radio station 300 miles away, will it play?)

Answer 2

I presume HD radio is a high bitrate version of Digital Audio Broadcasting in the UK.  That being the case, the HD signal would not be stronger.  The assumption being is that digital radios will be looking for a stream of '0's and '1's which should be easier to find in the air.

The only difference between digital and FM is that for FM the signal contains analogue information.  Unfortunately with digital, you either have everything or nothing, whereas FM you can hear the signal degrade with more white noise (hissing and crackling).