Digital DAB Broadcast Radio.

[Joe_Cole]

I recently fitted a DAB radio to my boat and it really has been a great success. I'm a fan of Radio 4 anyhow, but we are also able to receive all the normal BBC stations plus BBC 7(Great!), BBC World Radio, all the local stations plus far more stations than we've ever been able to get before. All with Digital quality! Wonderful.

It's transformed sitting in a harbour in poor weather.

Highly recomended.

Just thought that I would mention it!

Joe

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[bobnewbury]

I'm currently being beaten viciously about the face and shoulders by SWMBO. She's been looking for one of these for ages. "Go on - hurry up - ask him where he got it - how much is it" etc etc.

Any fear of your sending me the necessary info before I end up looking like someone who's received an unsolicited visit from Special Branch?

I should never log on whilst Liz can see over my shoulder.

Read into that what you may.

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[Joe_Cole]

I've got two: both from Argos.

On the boat I've got a "Ministry of Sound" Car Radio/CD. Cost about £150. Kenwood speakers (also from Argos) cost about £20; you could spend a lot more but they are fine though I wouldn't fit them in the cockpit. I ended up making my own aerial as I couldn't find a suitable marine one elsewhere. I posted about his a while ago, but if you end up needing details then PM me. It was easy enough to make, but any ordinary FM aerial may work in your area.

At home we have a "Portal" portable radio, which you could use on the boat with an adaptor. Don't bother trying to run them on Dry batteries, they eat the things. I think that they've reduced the price to about £50 now.

Joe

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[rwoofer]

I installed a Bluepunkt DAB52 car radio, £250 at http://www.bluespot.co.uk/

Got a DAB radio, FM,MW,LW normal radio, CD player and the most useful thing for me a MP3 player. That way I get to keep about 250 albums on board with only 20 discs.

Excellent sound quality as well.

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[Trevethan]

We picked up a little DAB radio at John Lewis for about £90. Works very well -- swmbo is a great fan of BBC7 and Oneword (oneword is sort of a book at bedtime, but all the time)

No battery option which was a bit annoying so went down to maplins and got one of their cigar ligher car adaptor jobbies which plugs into where the mains transformer goes (cost £7.)

I think now we are going to buy an incar cd player with line in and hook that up.

Only question is how do you connect the head unit to the speakers/power. Modern in car equipment seems to use some kind of single push in connecting system, which of course the boat doesn't/

Any advice?

Nick



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[steve_cronin]

Can\'t see the point....

..of these little DAB radios. What quality improvement over VHF broadcasts one gets is surely attenuated by the rather modest loudspeaker fitterd to these trendy little wooden boxes.

BTW, don't do any astro navigation by the time signal on digital. It is a couple of seconds behind GMT. The echo effect drives you potty when the HiFi is on and a portable is carried around the house for improved local clarity.

Also be aware that "The Powers That Be" will control what you are receiving if the whole broadcast spectrum goes digital. No room for pirates, local interest - without regulatory approval or listening to foreign stations.

Steve Cronin



<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion

 

[Trevethan]

Re: Can\'t see the point....

The speakerss on ours are pretty good,. but I also want to be able to route through a car stereo system when the boys next door come over and want to party.

I hooked the radio up to some decent PC speakers and the sound was pretty good.



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[Benbow]

I thought about this about 1 year ago, but looked at the coverage and it seemed very limited and non existent a few miles offshore. Has the sitauation improved ?


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[Witchdoctor]

I'm interested in fitting a DAB / FM / MW / MP3 all singing all dancing combo unit, but have heard there may be some compatability problems with certain car aerials. I am hoping to use my existing masthead VHF and splitter set up. will this work with DAB? Also do these combo radios still tune down to 198 for the good ole shipping forcast?

Julian

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[DeeGee]

Re: Can\'t see the point....

Nor can I.

I got one just before we left in June, and was upset to find it only works in uk. So I think it will mean a trip to eBay to get rid of it (MoS, going for £60.....! )



<hr width=100% size=1>Black Sugar - the sweetest of all

 

[rwoofer]

The DAB aerial was the one I had the most difficulty with. Unfortunately it needs to be a completely separate aerial with special DAB fittings.

In the end I used a household DAB dipole aerial with a coax connected to a SAP1 connector which connects via another SAP1 to the DAB socket.

The aerial is located in my lazerette locker, which seems to work fine.

Can still tune to 198 for the shipping forecast.

RB

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[Joe_Cole]

The car radio I got came with everything that was needed. It included the socket that is normally already fixed in the car. All I had to do was wire it up and switch on..............well not quite! I then remembered that I had forgotten (???) to make the connections direct to the battery so that the pre-sets weren't lost. Really though it was all quite straightforward.

If you get one which doesn't have the socket I think that Maplin do them.

Joe

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[Joe_Cole]

Re: Can\'t see the point....

Steve,

You're right about the delay though I haven't found it a problem.

I can't agree with you about the quality though. We have always had a problem with radio reception here in darkest Somerset and even with a large roof mounted aerial I have only ever been able to get second rate reception on a limited number of stations. Even BBC has been poor. I can now get 48 stations, all crystal clear. I suspect that our case is exceptional, but it makes the point.

On the boat we can also get many more stations than we were able to get before, and they don't fade when the boat swings on its mooring (Admittedly probably because of the aerial)

Just as important though is that many of the new Digital stations are simply not available on FM or AM, and, for us at least, some of the new stations are real gems. Mind you some are real ****, but you pays your money and.................

I'm not really worried about the big brother thing!

Joe

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[Joe_Cole]

It depends on where you are. There are several sites (sorry, can't find the links at the moment) that you can use to enter your postcode and get a list of what you are likely to receive. We found that we could get a lot more than we were promised!

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[oldgit]

the point is.......

We live well outside the coverage area of the London stations but can receive all of then using a standard FM beam and TNC adaptor,the thing actually worked quite well on the TV aerial.Have a dedicated Dab tuner at home which enables me to receive around 30 stations.Best result was getting Jazz FM without all the interference from other stations both UK and continental.Use Evoke Pure on boat direct from 12dc supply.As for quality,how in how many standard non DAB portable radios have they bothered to used the actual radio case in a tuned port mode to give you decent quality sound.
Posted by a Hi-Fi pedant.
Get one,you will not be dissapointed,until that is,all the moron advertising lowlife starting infecting the medium with double glazing and carphone ads.Most stations are mercifully free of idiot DJs and happy happy lets have a quiz presenters./forums/images/icons/laugh.gif

<hr width=100% size=1>Nastro Azzurro.Hoegaarden.Chang.Tiger.

 

[Seven Spades]

Re: the point is.......

DAB isn't about quality. Quality was the intention but at the last minute the specifications were changed to allow many more stations. later there is a plan to start broadcasting DAB on band L, so a band L compatible radio is a good idea particularly on a boat as band L is used in other European countries. DAB is about choice and there are many stations that are simply not available on other frequencies. personally, I would like to add my vote to BBC7, radio station of the new millennium.

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