News

RNE para todos', the world's first radio experience for deaf people, has been awarded in the IV edition of the Contigo Awards, given by the City Council of La Roda. This RTVE initiative has been awarded the prize in the category ‘Media involved’. The award ceremony was held on Friday 29 November in the Auditorium of the Casa de la Cultura in La Roda. The head of Strategy at RTVE's Innovation Centre and member of the WorldDAB Steering Board, Javier Sánchez, and RTVE's Director of Audiovisual Policies, Public Service and International, Ángel García Castillejo, collected the award during the ceremony, which was attended by personalities from different fields.

Former Manchester digital station Max is relaunching this weekend playing 80s music on DAB in Newcastle. The station, run by ex-BBC radio executive John Ryan, has hired actor Louise Jameson as the station voice. John says: “Max is the 1980s radio station for people who were there, back then. For me, it meant the years between 12 and 22 – leaving home, first jobs, first loves – and three very happy years living and working in Newcastle! Give us a try and relive your 80s memories – with Max.” Max 80s will launch at 1200 on Sunday 1 December 2024 on DAB and online at max80s.co.uk. The station previously existed from 2015 to 2020 on the Manchester small-scale multiplex.

Gorka Zumeta writes: The 30s is shaping up to be the decade of FM switch-off in Europe. The latest WorldDAB summit recently held in Croatia, another of the countries that has made a firm commitment to the implementation of Digital Terrestrial Radio in DAB+ standard, has highlighted the problem of costs when it comes to dealing with the analogue-digital migration of radio. The aim is to reduce them and not to increase them with an unnecessary landscape of duplicity of networks to be rearranged with the FM switch-off.

The Media Strategy of Montenegro 2023-2027 plans to adopt Amendments to the Law on Digital Broadcasting in order to create preconditions for the implementation of the project to introduce digital radio in Montenegro. The Ministry of Economic Development, as the relevant authority, will form a working body with the task of drafting these amendments. One of the goals of the amendments is to enable the implementation of the Digital Radio project and the introduction of the DAB+ system, including the first national multiplex for T-DAB+ technology. In this context, the Ministry of Economic Development invites non-governmental organisations dealing with this field to delegate their representative as a member of the working group for drafting the bill.

Hessischer Rundfunk (hr) has put three new DAB+ transmitters into operation this year. This significantly improves digital radio reception in eastern and central Hesse. In Eastern Hesse, the Rhön transmitter will start its regular broadcasting of hr stations in the DAB+ standard on 28 November 2024 and will ensure better mobile coverage in the region, for example when driving. The new transmitter also improves coverage in buildings from Hilders to Gersfeld and Ebersburg in particular. Since July and August 2024, hr has also been broadcasting via the Schlüchtern and Herborn-Burg transmitters in central Hesse. The further DAB+ transmitter network expansion of Hessischer Rundfunk for the year 2025 is currently being planned and prepared.

Noise-free radio broadcasting is already available for the majority of Slovaks. It is free and offers a dozen stations. For many years we have been using the term FM broadcasting. Many radio stations are broadcast over the air and we listen to them at home or in the car every day. Radios have been a part of our lives for decades, and many of us may not even realise that today's terrestrial analogue broadcasting has a younger counterpart. Yes, it is digital broadcasting, which has been provided by Towercom for a few years now. Terrestrial Digital Audio Broadcasting (T-DAB), which operates in Slovakia in the T-DAB+ standard, often called simply DAB (or DAB+), has undeniably more advantages than analogue.

SRG will switch off the FM frequencies of its radio stations at the end of 2024. Radio SRF 1, Radio SRF 2 Kultur and Radio SRF 3 can then also only be received via digital radio (e.g. DAB+, internet radio or cable). The SRG Customer Centre has received several hundred emails and calls on this topic in recent weeks. Here are the four most frequently asked questions - and the answers. 1. how can the stereo system be made DAB+-ready? Although newer stereo systems are equipped with DAB+, older models often are not. In most cases, they can be retrofitted with DAB+ using an adapter. It is important that the stereo system has an aux-in or line-in input.

WorldDAB President and Digital Radio Netherlands Project Director Jacqueline Bierhorst talks about the future of DAB radio technology, which has been built in most EU member states, including Croatia, where there are currently nine radio stations with digital broadcasting. Last week, the “World DAB Summit 2024” was held in Zagreb, organised by the WorldDAB forum, the global industry forum for DAB+ digital radio. This conference is their main annual event, which brings together experts from the profession and presents news, the latest technological achievements and inspiring creative initiatives. It was emphasised that the DAB plus signal represents progress in radio broadcasting because it primarily “increases the cake”, i.e. the number of channels, and reduces broadcasting costs and environmental pollution.

The first of the eight winners of the auction of frequencies for networks dedicated to digital broadcasting of commercial radios has reported meeting the development criteria of the Czech Telecommunications Office (CTU). Teleko digital, a company from Příbram, has covered at least 40 percent of the population of all regions for which it has won frequencies with DAB+ signals. "Digital radio transmitters have been launched in Liberec, Kralovehradec, Vysočina and other regions in the east of the Czech Republic - Moravian-Silesian, Olomouc, Zlín and South Moravian regions - on the final channels issued by the CTU. This makes us the first DAB network operator to meet the development criteria set by the licence in advance," announced the owner of the company, Tomas Řapek.

In cooperation with IDEE MEDIEN and Milling Broadcast Services GmbH, the new radio station ‘Radio Grammo’ will be launched on 1 December 2024 at 12 noon. The motto is clear: Digital clear noise-free reception with shellac ad absurdum, plus only in mono, because radio must rustle, rumble and crackle and not be a standardised mishmash. ‘Only genuine with 78 revolutions’, because only music titles are played that were first produced on shellac; and gramophones turn at 78 revolutions on the turntable. The DAB+ capacity on the DAB multiplex in the Bad Kreuznach-Mainz-Bingen area (Rhineland-Palatinate) will be used for the launch, which will be broadcast via three transmission towers. This will technically reach around 480,000 listeners. This multiplex is operated by Milling Broadcast Services GmbH from Nettersheim / Eifel.