I have been using HD-FM & AM for a year now in the Milwaukee Wisconsin area and think it's great!! Almost all of the FM and some AM broadcaters are sending HD signals some are also "multicasting" commercial free music and comedy. I find myself listening to more radio now, even more AM since it sounds great with no crackles...I even pickup Chicago AM radio stations in digital during the day.

I agree, radio is dead as an effectve medium for music entertainment. I do listen to a local talk radio station but only because it is on local issues. I used to listen to a music station every day until one day management fired the complete staff and went to some mindless syndicated format. I also had XM for a while. I enjoy a wide range of formats but all XM did was put boring dj's on and repeated the same very small selection of songs every day. I could almost predict the song by the time of day...What a wasit of money for the receiver and the subscription...both XM and Sirus are doomed unless they get the gab off and go commerical free..

Will that "suck" less or more than Sirius and XM?

Well, that should finish off HD-radio.

From the article: "Sony is one of the first leading consumer electronics companies to offer quality HD Radio-enabled devices".

No they're not. High quality HD radio products from other leading consumer electronics companies have been on the market for quite some time.

Exactly what I was going to say.

In the Sirius CEO: 'We Suck Less' Than XM article I posted about HD radio. Ed Oswald, are you getting news idea's from me? :P

2 points...I love the rant against ads on radio - despite the fact that subscription radio is devoid of them. But if they follow him around, it should serve as a warning to avoid him!

Radio is dead...yeah, right.

But the real story may be that Sony is endorsing the format! After their resounding success with Blu-Ray, they may just succeed in crippling radio with a mortal wound as well. ;-))

despite the fact that subscription radio is devoid of them.

Really? What service are you using? Both XM *and* Sirius started doing it quite some time ago...

Personally, I can't stand radio. Be it satellite or otherwise. I want to listen to music not commercials. It's bad enough they bombard me with commercials non stop on TV, but they try to do the same on the radio. My cable TV costs around $50 a month and that doesn't even include all the premium channels. I'm paying for my programming, yet they still cram ads down my throat day and night. My point here is that I would even be willing to pay for radio, if it meant no commercials at all. But i don't see this ever happening. Even if I paid for it, they would still bombard me with ads I'm sure. My car radio has MP3 support anyway, so I can fit around 10 hours of quality music on a single CD.

I hear ya...
Re cable: the 'best' original selling point was no commercials, now I often count as many as 6 minutes of ads shoved down our slut throats/eyes.
I'm actually surprised to NOT see ads during ifomercials(make the program appear more real/normal, and that revenue could be shared / help defray cost)

Re music on radio, it's either: hard to find the type one wants / format is too varied(thus lots of unwanted song types) / too much dj inane banter and-or commercials / same songs over & over....
that it actually makes talk radio a viable & often-more enjoyable alternative-- commercials are less a rude interruption, talk is a bit more high-minded....

I'd rather listen to my zune any day over the drek that is on regular radio. Being in HD isn't going to make radio suddenly better.

Radio is dead. Honestly, who listens to it anymore, sure maybe if your digital mp3/music player blows up, but I would just opt for silence rather then listen to inane commercials. Besides, there is nothing on the radio worth listening to. If per chance you find something half way decent to listen to (after you listen to the 10 seconds on the song you manage to hear) it will no doubt be followed by a Celiene Dion power block of shrieking cat noises. Why in the heck would you want to keep this antiquated monstrosity alive?

really, its not that bad.

Actually, radio has been enjoying modest growth in all major markets last I heard. Its free, FM sounds fine on a good receiver and you get local interest stuff like talk shows, sports and news. You can pick up live broadcasts indoors, which satellite has real trouble with, plus no messing with CDs, USB cables or Itunes, etc. Yes, I do agree that the big syndicates have really homogenized it to a ridiculous degree - on the top 40 stations you hear the same 7 songs forever. I'm hoping HD brings some new blood to the business, but that remains to be seen. If nothing else I suspect that radio will be serving young kids, older folks and anyone who likes simple, no-cost entertainment for many years to come (which includes an awful lot of workplaces).

The dilemma re new blood:

whether to go to all-digital w/o analog-- allowing for as many as 7 broadcasts per channel(but obsoleting most present equipment)... keeping analog really only allows one extra broadcast(and both not @ highest quality-- so no two music broadcasts, but more like one talk & one music) -- so how much more variety are we really going to see?

Who's next to endorse it? Hillary Clinton? Center for Science in Public Interest?

Look, HD radio is good. It's definitely an improvement. But right now, it's still the crap they spew on the regular stations sounding better.

The in-between and public radio stations, classical, jazz, et al., are really the biggest winners in HD radio.

If you happen to be buying a radio, it's worth the money most likely. But if you're going to run out and get a tabletop radio... seems weird. HD is best suited for being connected to a home system, or in-car. Otherwise, it's not so different -- think about the tabletop radio... how good will that sound anyhow?

My Bose sounds quite good. :)

Best $500 Ive ever spent on home-audio.

I can only hope the Wave Radio II has better sound than the first Wave Radio. My first generation Bose Wave Radio seems to output considerably more bass from the right speaker than the left. This minor defect makes the audio from stereo FM radio sound like mono audio.

Otherwise, the first generation Wave radio outperforms every other brand of analog FM/AM clock radio on the market.

Warranty?

Get it fixed. :p

"HD Radio is billed as a competitor to XM and Sirius, as it provides similar audio quality at no cost"

I thought the whole point of HD was that it had "better" audio quality than satellite radio. If it has only 'similar' quality, then why should I buy?

By most accounts, it is better than XM/Sirius at this time. That said, be advised that it's all subjective. Without getting into the codecs and the bandwidth allocated, you just have what sounds better. On that alone, HD generally sounds better, and that's a function of Sat radio splitting their signal 170 ways. Sat radio could be better, and may be in the future, but at this point, generally HD radio is better since per-station, HD doesn't have to crimp the bandwidth.

Three words:

No monthly bill.

I have never heard HD radio, but I just can't see this being a big hit...Is raising the bitrate really going to get anyones attention? Anyone out there that has heard HD radio? Is it worth it?

It will be a sucess, just like hdtv...not just due to the better quality, but because the extra bandwidth allows as many as 7 broadcasts per channel-- in theory we could now get the progamming / music we've been yearning for-- no matter how niche.
Two potential hold-backs:
1. To facilitate all those channels requires dropping analog totally, immediately obsoleting all current analog equipment.
Also, when the signal strength weakens, there would be no fall-back to analog-- as presently occurs with stereo broadcasts-- otherwise count on only two stations per channel(& both NOT at the highest sound quality) w/ fallback capabilities kept.
2. Portable appliances: hardware needed draws too much power for battery usage-- although supposedly by end of this year some products might come out to overcome that.

It will help if internationals, currently observing this-- adopt common standards more compatible with ours-- as opposed to present radio situation.

Is "Xplod" really the best name for Sony's product line of car audio products considering their battery problems last year?

lmao...

Now there's honesty in product naming for ya.

Surprisingly, Sony's XDR-S3HD is cheaper than some of the other brands, such as Crutchfield's. It isn't often you see Sony cheaper than anyone. This is a good sign.

That will surely spell its doom.

Heh, oh dear. That was the first thing that went through my mind too.