Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 19
By Huseyn Valiyev - Trend:
Azerbaijan will consider the possibility of switching to digital radio, if the receiving equipment of users reaches a peak point, the Teleradio production association told Trend.
The source noted that Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) can be considered a standard for digital radio.
"We do not exclude the introduction of digital radio in the country in the future. But everything will depend on the customers, that is, from radio broadcasters. In the meantime, both in Baku and in the regions, customers prefer broadcasting in the FM band. As a standard for digital radio, DAB and HD radio can be considered. The latter is mainly used in the US and the DAB standard is common in European countries. For example, today Norway has completely switched to DAB. In Italy and the UK, DAB broadcasting are conducted in parallel with FM broadcasting, " the source said.
Technically, the transition to DAB, as the source said, will not require much effort, but a deterrent is that 99 percent of the user's receiving equipment supports FM broadcasting.
"The vast majority of users listen to radio in cars, and cars' reception equipment works in the FM band. So in the current situation the transition to DAB would not be acceptable. However, not cars supplied to the market now have equipment providing the DAB standard, which of course opens the way for application digital radio in the future. We launched a test broadcast of digital radio in 2012. The radio channels "Respublika" and "Public Radio were broadcasted in the digital format in parallel with FM. The results of the survey revealed that digital radio does not attract even two percent of the population. Therefore the test broadcasting was suspended," said the source.
Twitter: @h_veliyev