HD Radio

[nsmitchell]

Has anyone ever seen or heard a deck with HD Radio?

I might just get this little baby http://www.crutchfield.com/S-5vrCA9I5AWe/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?g=300&tab=review&i=257KDHDR1#Tab

I'm a Panasonic fan, and Panny does make an HD Radio as well, but it is a lot more ca$h. I think this JVC unit has digital amps as well for super clean powerful sound from the head unit.

From what I read, if you tune to a station that is also broadcast in HD it will automatically switch to HD mode. With HD you can have multiple channels for one station as well. Like NPR could have 3 channels on one frequency. Talk, classical music and jazz, all on one station. Pretty cool technology and it is digital, so it is "near" cd quality.

Just curious to find out real world knowledge of these things.

[Violin]

That's the one I have. I'm very happy with it. I tend to listen to XM more, but the HD broadcasts are great, especially the hidden channels - they tend to play more obscure stuff because they don't have to answer to their advertisers.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/1103/rjenkie/photo001Medium-2.jpg

[paultyler_82]

HD Radio is nice, but it's overhyped, it's not a standard yet, and not every area has stations that broadcast it, so it really depends on your region more than anything... kinda like that RDS technology that one of my cars used to have on the stereo, I think maybe one station in town actually broadcasted RDS data... I'm not knocking it, it's nice when it works, but I just can't justify blowing the coin on a feature that I can't really use as often, or that the technology for may fade into obscurity (Betamax... Minidisc...) Maybe when HD Radio becomes a standard I'll get it, kind of the same thing with BluRay and HDDVD, I'm waiting to see which format wins before I sink my cash into it.

[eTiMaGo]

HD Radio is nice, but it's overhyped, it's not a standard yet, and not every area has stations that broadcast it, so it really depends on your region more than anything... kinda like that RDS technology that one of my cars used to have on the stereo, I think maybe one station in town actually broadcasted RDS data... I'm not knocking it, it's nice when it works, but I just can't justify blowing the coin on a feature that I can't really use as often, or that the technology for may fade into obscurity (Betamax... Minidisc...) Maybe when HD Radio becomes a standard I'll get it, kind of the same thing with BluRay and HDDVD, I'm waiting to see which format wins before I sink my cash into it.

Weird... RDS is pretty popular in Europe, at least in France more or less every channel has it, it's quite useful too, especially for nationwide channels broadcasting on different frequencies, it will automatically change the frequency when you take long trips.

[Violin]

Most stations in the New York and Philadelphia markets have HD stations now. I read that it is really cheap for them to do it - like $10,000. You do have to be reasonably close to the transmitter to get a constant signal though.

That JVC is a pretty cheap head unit - it's not like getting a $1,500 Alpine HD unit. If HD goes away, it's no biggie

[paultyler_82]

I live in the midwest though... about 2 hours from St. Louis, Nashville, or Memphis, and about 5 hours from Chicago or Louisville. So for those of us that aren't in the big city, we're shit out of luck when it comes to goodies like HD Radio and RDS. I still do listen to AM FM from time to time though, which is why I have a personal preference for Pioneer, best AM/FM tuners on the market, period.

[nsmitchell]

Most stations in the New York and Philadelphia markets have HD stations now. I read that it is really cheap for them to do it - like $10,000. You do have to be reasonably close to the transmitter to get a constant signal though.

That JVC is a pretty cheap head unit - it's not like getting a $1,500 Alpine HD unit. If HD goes away, it's no biggie

Amazon has them for about $150.00. Does it have digital amps (Tripath chip or TI chip)? If it does, it must sound awesome with no external amps needed. Am I right Violin?