In article <h218qh$bq1$1@news.eternal-september.org>, Fredxx
<fredxx@spam.com> scribeth thus
>
>"Ian Smith" <news0807REMOVECAPS@orrery.e4ward.com> wrote in message
>news:YvidnZyq4cW7f97XnZ2dnUVZ8kudnZ2d@brightview. co.uk...
>> DAB sounds worse than FM wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> In other words, you live in a crap FM reception area.
>>
>> There is some truth in that.
>>>
>>> Reception quality is different to audio quality, and anybody who has
>>> reasonably good reception quality on both DAB and FM will receive higher
>>> qulaity on FM.
>>
>> Well, most people don't agree with you. Whether they are discerning or
>> not, I don't know.
>>
>> I don't agree with you in terms of quality. I have an excellent sound
>> system and I've never managed to get anything that gets near hiss-free on
>> FM.
>>
>> This is very much like the vinyl v CD discussion. Vinyl have me crackly
>> playback, oven on a good deck and with a new pressing. CD gave me click
>> and pop free playback - no matter what any HiFi mag says, the 'quality' of
>> my CD experience is higher.
>
>On paper the CD should be miles ahead of vinyl. Most CDs uses 2 channels
>of 16 bits at 44.1kSamples/sec. There is no sompression so there are no
>artifacts. The data rate is an astounding 1.4Mb/s. 16 bits give 72dB audio
>range which is better than my ears.
>
>>

I remember once being given a demonstration of Vinyl-v-CD by Derek
Scotland of Audiolab fame.

I was amazed at how good he got the Vinyl to sound, and that it seems
was due to the right equipment and some Japanese pressings. OK not quite
the same in terms of distortion and absolute signal to noise ratio but
very impressive indeed;!..

>> Likewise, the 'quality' of my DAB experience on radio 3 is higher than I
>> could have ever achieved with FM (in any location I've ever tried it).
>> Arguments about R4 speech radio in mono being compared to FM are just
>> futile and don't relate to any real user experience.
>
>It's easy to show that performance of FM is generally superior to DAB,
>however it just goes to show how subjective the human ear-brain interface is
>that it can be fooled into thinking otherwise so easily.
>
>

Well FM given a sufficient signal, and remember too that DAB needs a
sufficient signal to work properly, can be very good indeed. And unlike
DAB where that is degraded due to the "cost of bits" FM degrades to Mono
only because of the signal level.

I've had a FM versus CD setup here using a first class NCO type
modulator and only about one person could reliably tell the difference
and that was on solo soprano voice!.
--
Tony Sayer