German public broadcaster SWR has today started DRM transmissions of its SWR cont.ra service on 711 kHz from its site in Obereisesheim.
(Source: DRM Software Radio Forums)
Germany’s SWR starts DRM transmissions on 711 kHz
11 Comments on “Germany’s SWR starts DRM transmissions on 711 kHz”
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on May 31st, 2010 at 18:03
I want to read , at least for a first time, something like “starts regular transmissions” rather than starts DRM tests.
on May 31st, 2010 at 18:19
Sorry, I posted this item in a hurry just before leaving the office, and you’re right - the original source did not say they were tests. My apologies. I have corrected the headline.
on May 31st, 2010 at 18:50
Only German PUBLIC stations do DRM, since they dont know what to do with teir MW channels.
In the meantime causing more and more interference for analogue transmissions.
NO commercila station will do DRM ever (except Lux, target area, again …… Germany).
on May 31st, 2010 at 18:51
Andy, your first post wasn\’t wrong. SWR website announced the transmission as a test, pls. see http://www.swr.de/frequenzen/
on Jun 1st, 2010 at 07:44
Are there actually any cheap, portable DRM radios to listen to these broadcasts on?
on Jun 1st, 2010 at 07:54
There are some receivers, but they’re not exactly cheap.
on Jun 3rd, 2010 at 16:51
Anyone know the power ? I’ll have to fire up my Himalaya again then !
on Jun 3rd, 2010 at 17:51
Cont.ra in DRM? What for?
The people in the area who have a digital receiver can already hear the programme in DAB and those who don\’t have now lost the programme altogether.
Can anyone explain the logic behind this to me?
on Jun 3rd, 2010 at 18:51
The power is presumably below 1 kW. I think they use the same transmitter that was formerly located in Kaiserslautern (420 W) and Wolfsheim (300 W).
on Jun 3rd, 2010 at 19:36
@Remy Friess:
Listeners on Mediumwave can alternatively use Mühlacker 576 kHz, 100 kW, only 35 km from Heilbronn away. So the Heilbronn transmitter was redundant and ideal for testing.
Another reason is, that the AM transmitter was defective and running with low power on reserve. Switching to DRM gave SWR the chance to continue on that site without investing in a new transmitter for a very, very small audience.
on Jun 3rd, 2010 at 20:40
A bit of background: The Heilbronn transmitter has been established only because interference from distant signals (if one can call Wöbbelin, until 1979 even Wiederau instead, “distant” at all) severely curtailed the coverage of the Mühlacker transmitter at night. But now, with the co-channel Wöbbelin, Ulbroka and Vidin transmitters being shut down, 576 kHz is an almost exclusive frequency and no fill transmitter for Heilbronn needed anymore. So they now use it for DRM experiments instead of just shutting it down, as they already did with its Heidelberg companion. And, of course, by declaring these transmissions as an experiment they reserve the right to take them off anytime.
By the way, Mühlacker at present gets a new Transradio transmitter. The current main, a Nautel, will become an aux, while the current aux, a Transradio PDM tube transmitter (same product line than, as an example, KPN’s Flevoland equipment), will be scrapped. And now the interesting detail: Word has it that this new transmitter will get a classic AM modulator for 7 kHz audio bandwith. I understand that the Transradio DRM modulators can only produce postfromm (whatever may be an English translation for that) 4.5 kHz AM audio. So the gossip is plausible, and there will not even be short-term DRM transmissions for acceptance tests, as it was the case on some other transmitter projects.