On Wed, 11 Aug 2010 09:59:51 +0100, "David Looser"
wrote:

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote

Which is why I never listen to R3 in the car.

Indeed. Although DAB was originally intended to give you the ability to
reduce the dynamic range.


I wasn't aware that DAB had been originally intended to work that way, but I
do know that even in the 1930s it was being seriously suggested that radio
broadcasts should be compressed on transmission using a known law so that
those who wanted could use a complementary expander on reception to give the
original dynamic range, whilst other people could listen to the volume
compressed version.

David.


I bought one of the early Arcam DAB tuners (before it became
unlistenable). I believe it has four compression settings built in.
The idea was that all (and I do mean all) DAB broadcasts would be made
in full dynamic range, and you would choose the degree of compression
you wanted at the receiver. That, of course, lasted about 2 minutes
once the service started.

d