"Radio Ronn" lq6dpvk02-at-sneakemail.com wrote in message
. ..

No, HD offers better fidelity capability than analog. (The radio is a
seperate story.)

What does "fidelity capability" mean?

For one thing, it means stereo.

That's not clear, but I'm assuming you mean better stereo rather than stereo
capability.

And, since marketplace decisions have come up in this topic, it's clear that
radio buyers either think FM stereo is still superior to HD radio -- or
buyers don't care alot about stereo.


The people who could have expected most NPR stations to end up on FM were
at
the FCC.

But the people who have made it sucessful were listeners on their radios.

True. And there are also AM NPR stations who have shared in NPR's success.



And I know our local NPR station was broadcasting mostly mono into the
90s.
I believe it was NPR network policy to broadcast with the stereo pilot
off
unless the program was in stereo.

I know some did that in the 70's...I have nvever heard of a station doing
so
after that.

Around 1990 or so, I heard a "World of Radio" episode in which Glenn Hauser
complimented the FM NPR stations which turned off the carrier for mono
programming, and he complained about the majority of stations which
needlessly left it on all the time.


Plus, NPR does not define policy at local stations.

Could be. I recall an explaination from WBEZ (Chicago NPR) that they liked
to keep the pilot off unless they were playing stereo programming. They
started running the pilot on mono programming because that's how it was
coming in from the network.

But it was sombody's policy or procedure or whatever.


An excellent policy, in my opinion, as FM
mono is capable of a much better signal to noise ratio than FM stereo.

If it was purely technical, but most listeners would tune especially
analog
dials, with the stereo light.


The best visual aid for analog dial FM tuning is the center channel
indicator, which most listeners manage to do just fine without. A signal
strength indicator is almost as good an aid, but not so common as the stereo
light which can be shining brightly even when a station is audibly mistuned.
And, while the stereo light is an inferior visual tuning aid, it is an
excellent indicator of a stereo pilot.

None of this actually matters, as most analog dial listeners have learned to
get tuning feedback by listening to the radio, rather than looking at the
radio.

Frank Dresser