Monthly Archives: April 2010

India To Go DRM

In the broadcasting world, All India Radio has been an early adopter of DRM technology. I was pleased to find this article from the DRM Consortium via Andy Sennitt at RNW Media Network:

The Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) Consortium has welcomed the Indian government‘s approval of All India Radio (AIR)’s ambitious plan of converting its vast broadcasting network to digital using the DRM standard. India is one of the first countries in the world to implement such an extensive and well-researched plan to upgrade its radio infrastructure using the global open DRM radio technology and thereby ensuring that it can maintain significant reach to its 1.2 billion strong population whilst delivering enhanced radio services.

India’s Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure on Thursday 8 April gave its approval to the proposal from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting regarding 11th Plan of Digitalisation where Rs 9.20 billion (approx US$200 million) have been earmarked for AIR to convert to digital which will cover approx 70 per cent of the country. By converting to digital, AIR will deliver enhanced radio services that offer crystal clear sound, increase user experience with additional functionality such as automatic tuning by station name, interactive user interface through digital screens that offer slide-shows and many other services like EPG, Journaline.

The digitisation scheme involves the installation of over 40 digital (DRM capable) transmitters as well as other digital enhancements and networks for both state radio and television.

All India Radio (AIR) began moving towards digitisation with the adoption of the DRM standard after extensive field trials and tests since 2007 that was offering in their opinion the most ‘robust, reliable’ technology. Last year, it started a regular DRM broadcast from one of its high-power shortwave transmitters located at Khampur near Delhi and this year it acquired two high powered mediumwave DRM transmitters.

Source: DRM Consortium via RNW Media Network

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3rd Edition of “Radio Monitoring – A How To Guide” Available As Free Download

Author Skip Arey is now offering his third edition of the popular “Radio Monitoring – A How To Guide” as a free download via the NASWA website. This guide was originally published by Index Publishing Group and later released by Paladin Press–it had two very successful editions that sold for many years.

The guide recently went out of print but Skip has released it on line (for FREE) via Creative Commons license.

You can download a copy thanks to the North American Shortwave Association (NASWA) who have consented to be the primary online source for distribution. The direct link is .

On Skip’s Facebook page, he said, “The hobby has been good to me over the years. I am happy to give this book back to
the radio community. Enjoy.”

Thanks Skip! We will enjoy your fine publication.

I would strongly encourage you to use this as an opportunity to become a member of the NASWA.

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