Buying a digital radio

The switch to digital television may be causing a stir but in homes across the land people have been buying digital radios in droves for a few years.

Digital radios, also known as Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) radios, will be in 40 per cent of British homes by 2009 at current growth rates.

More and more people are being attracted by the range of available channels, the quality of transmission and being able to treat the radio more like a video recorder.

DAB radios pick up transmissions that have been converted into data, rather than by tuning into a specific radio frequency. This allows many more channels and doesn’t suffer as badly from interference. Where it can be received, the sound quality is good (depending on the quality each radio station outputs) and has the potential to be much better.

In this feature we’ll tell you what to look for in a digital radio and discuss the relative benefits of a selection of sets.

Features to look out for
The UK leads the world in the range of digital radio sets available. Radios can be bought in any size, from hi-fi separates to in-car systems and pocket radios for as little as £30. You can also pick up digital radio on some digital televisions and through cable and satellite TV services.

Slightly more expensive models have useful features that could be a surprise to traditional radio users. Most digital radios allow you to pause the transmission and then resume when ready; handy if the phone rings during a programme.

Top of the range radios can be set to record programmes and store them on a memory card; the same card can be used to transfer music from a PC to play through the radio’s speakers.

Note that digital radios consume more power than their predecessors. Running a digital radio on batteries will quickly become expensive and a mains connection is advisable.

Before buying you should also check whether you can receive digital radio at all (see ‘checking your signal’). Although 85 per cent of the country is now covered, the signal is weak in some areas. The quality of stations can vary too; most programmes broadcast by radio stations are transmitted at a bitrate of 128Kbits/sec, which provides an acceptable level of audio quality. The main exception is BBC3, which raised its broadcast quality to 192Kbits/sec after listeners complained.

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