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Global Radio axes all regional/local breakfast shows

(February 2019)

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LL
London Lite Founding member
Smooth Extra is now 40k DAB+ as well.
JT
jolly turnip
Long live the current Chill station. I listen to that station more than any other. Lucky enough to have it in DAB in East Mids as well
JV
James Vertigan Founding member
Heart ’90s has launched and Capital Xtra has moved to DAB+

Looks like Global are moving most of their services on D1 over to DAB+ to fit in these new stations. Capital UK and Radio X should be the next to make the switch, I’m not sure they’d risk it with Classic FM though. Will be interesting to hear if there’s many complaints from people with DAB-only sets.



Blimey I hope the majority of Moyles’s listeners have DAB+ compatible radios - I remember the comments on Moyles’s social media outlets when he moved to Radio X that people either couldn’t find the station or needed to buy a new radio in order to be able to listen!
BU
buster
And this is the problem. Not only are there still lots of DAB-only sets out there, they are still being sold!
As well as that, but on the older sets the DAB+ stations appear in the station list, but are silent when you select them. You couldn't have a worse user experience if you tried. No wonder Global have gone for the softly softly approach, but presumably they are confident enough now that the commercial/listener benefits outweighs the inevitable listener complaints.
JV
James Vertigan Founding member
And this is the problem. Not only are there still lots of DAB-only sets out there, they are still being sold!
As well as that, but on the older sets the DAB+ stations appear in the station list, but are silent when you select them. You couldn't have a worse user experience if you tried.


Some manufacturers are providing software updates to enable DAB+ on their radios - I’ve just updated a Pure radio for DAB+ but I had to order a USB cable to connect to the radio and download the software onto my PC. I’ve also got a Cambridge Audio DAB tuner that displayed the DAB+ stations but as you say they were silent, said tuner has recently died (display stopped working) and Richer Sounds say it can’t be repaired so am waiting until I have enough funds together to get an Onkyo DAB+ tuner I’ve been looking at.
MA
Markymark
And this is the problem. Not only are there still lots of DAB-only sets out there, they are still being sold!
As well as that, but on the older sets the DAB+ stations appear in the station list, but are silent when you select them. You couldn't have a worse user experience if you tried.


Some manufacturers are providing software updates to enable DAB+ on their radios - I’ve just updated a Pure radio for DAB+ but I had to order a USB cable to connect to the radio and download the software onto my PC. I’ve also got a Cambridge Audio DAB tuner that displayed the DAB+ stations but as you say they were silent, said tuner has recently died (display stopped working) and Richer Sounds say it can’t be repaired so am waiting until I have enough funds together to get an Onkyo DAB+ tuner I’ve been looking at.


Only some of the newer vanilla DAB receivers are s/w upgradable, however most of the DAB radios in use are using chipsets designed from almost the last century, and are certainly not upgradable, they are 'hard coded'. It's the more modern stuff that uses DSP decoding
VM
VMPhil
Heart ’90s has launched and Capital Xtra has moved to DAB+

Looks like Global are moving most of their services on D1 over to DAB+ to fit in these new stations. Capital UK and Radio X should be the next to make the switch, I’m not sure they’d risk it with Classic FM though. Will be interesting to hear if there’s many complaints from people with DAB-only sets.



Blimey I hope the majority of Moyles’s listeners have DAB+ compatible radios - I remember the comments on Moyles’s social media outlets when he moved to Radio X that people either couldn’t find the station or needed to buy a new radio in order to be able to listen!

It’s certainly not a decision that would have been taken lightly. They evidently believe that these new spin-off stations will be successful enough to offset the loss of listeners and complaints when vanilla DAB services switch to DAB+.
DM
DeMarkay
Quite frankly, as someone who was part of Global’s school, and seeing what they’ve done to the industry, these radio stations are absolutely pointless and will add no significant value in the long run. Especially not in Q3.
LL
London Lite Founding member
Quite frankly, as someone who was part of Global’s school, and seeing what they’ve done to the industry, these radio stations are absolutely pointless and will add no significant value in the long run. Especially not in Q3.


Not in the short-term, but will increase Heart and Smooth's overall share in the long term. Absolute have been running decades stations for 10 years now and it hasn't done them any harm, to the point that Bauer have largely left them alone when the station was sold to them.

Heart FM does nothing for me, but I'll listen to Heart 70s, 80s and 90s. It's another way of attracting listeners to brands they wouldn't normally try.
DV
dvboy
Agree, Heart West Midlands doesn't appeal to me at all but I've listened to Heart 80s and Heart Dance a lot recently.
:-(
A former member
Hearts 80 will just play the same old stuff over and over again. It will create no one content unlike absolute and deffo want create any buzz for the station. Forgotten 80s anyone?
LL
London Lite Founding member
Hearts 80 will just play the same old stuff over and over again. It will create no one content unlike absolute and deffo want create any buzz for the station. Forgotten 80s anyone?


And what happens when you play a tight playlist? It attracts the listeners. Commercial radio on the whole isn't for musos, unless you listen to a specialist station like Jazz FM or Planet Rock who have profit making larger sister stations which can ensure their viability.

Forgotten 80s is scheduled between 9-11pm on a Sunday night, a dead slot in radio.

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