DRM reception reports

CVC is a religious broadcaster from Australia. This broadcast was caught on a Saturday afternoon during the Rugby world Cup. It came from Moosbrunn in Austria and was aimed at the UK.

RCI's Sackville transmitter is my local DRM site. They sublet their airtime every day to other broadcasters such as Radio Sweden, Vatican etc.

I got this from DW's Sines transmitter in Portugal. Note that they are sending a Journaline text broadcast too.


This is DW's Journaline broadcast. The blue coloured headlines are actually web links which will open up the story in DReaM's mini web browser.


I got this one from Moosbrunn in Austria. Notice that there is no Journaline with this broadcast. This is unusual for DW.


This broadcast starts with the Call to Prayer. It comes direct from Kuwait and does very well here on the East Coast of the US.


In the DRM world these guys rock!! Not because they have lots of flashy stuff embedded in their data stream or because their programming is excellent (which it is!) but rather because they are a low power station running a mere 4KW. Yet despite their low power they are able to reach their target audience with a 100% decodeable signal. This broadcast was bagged whilst they were aiming their antenna towards Europe.


Unfortunately many SW stations don't seem to respect the fact that they share the bands with other broadcasters. In this picture we see an AM carrier right in the middle of the DRM carrier. The AM station clearly thought that the DRM noise was just that; noise. So they popped up their carrier thus trashing the DRM signal I was listening to. Click the picture to hear the result.


China Radio International comes from Radio Canada's Sackville site.  It's an English language service aimed at North America.


Radio Sweden is another Sackville client. Indeed they even mention during their sign-on that they are being broadcast from Radio Canada International's Sackville transmitter. I really like their magazine programme "60 Degrees North".


This is RFI's offering from Montsinery in the Caribbean. It was a special broadcast to the NAB show in Las Vegas which is held every April. It was actually aimed at the West Coast of the US but was very well received here in NJ. Despite the English speaking target audience it was in fact a French and Spanish language output.


RNW has a number of DRM outputs that reach us here in the US. This one was on 9800KHz from Sackville. They also have one from their Bonnaire station in the Caribbean. On good propagation days we can also get their 5865KHz output from Luxembourg.


Radio New Zealand International is a bit of a stretch for me. They must the the absolute farthest DRM station from my location. I can usually hear their carrier but can rarely decode their data. However, over on the West Coast they come crashing in.


Just like it says! I bagged this one directly from Italy on 11630KHz. Vatican radio are a major player in the DRM world. They have outputs on SW and MW all over the world. They are also a lessee on Radio Canada's Sackville transmitter.


This is another tough one for me. This is RFI's 1KW station on 3695KHz from Issodoun in France. It's a local French broadcast that seems to get out here to the East Coast very well at night. The tough part is that it's in the middle of the US 75 meter ham band. Both RFI and DW have an output in this band. I've heard many a comment from an ignorant ham operator complaining about the 10K wide "noise". They just ignore it an park their conversation on the top thus killing the DRM transmission stone dead.


Again, another tough one. This is Bayern RundFunk's news headlines output "B5 Aktuel" (B5 Notices). It's a 100W local output on 6085KHz. It's really only available when the band conditions are favourable. Note that they are sending some multi media as well as the audio stream. I was not able to get any better signal that this so couldn't decode the audio or multi media.


Another European capture. This one is from Radio Romania International (30KW Kvitsoy, Norway). Local broadcasters were to blame for me not getting this one also.


Damn those God bothering religious shortwave broadcasters! I had an S9+40db signal from Radio Prague (100KW Wofferton, UK) but couldn't decode much of it. Just 5kHz below them was one of my local God bothers prattling on about the book of Galations and he was spilling over his channel allotment something awful! So much for "love thy neighbour".
 

Sometimes getting up early in the morning pays off. I bagged this Spanish broadcaster at 3:45 in the morning on 9730kHz. It appeared to be a current affairs programme but I'm not sure as my Spanish is about as good as my American.


I snagged this one totally at random. It's a 100kW signal from Woofferton in the UK. VT are one of the big players behind DRM and act as an airtime wholesaler. They own/manage a bunch of transmitters in the UK. This particular broadcast was on 9850kHz at 1230UTC. It was a relay of a Radio Taiwan Intl programme.


Having been out of the DRM listening world for a few months I returned to find this station from Bulgaria on 11900KHz. I was only able to get about a 50% decode but it was a pretty strong RF signal at over S7. Not bad for the side of their curtain. Note the switch to KDE on Linux. No more Micro$not Win$sucks here.


"Bloody Belgians!" As if being Belgian wasn't bad enough this station insists on broadcasting in French!


Wooohoooo!!! I've only been trying to bag this for the last 5 years. For some odd reason today, at the bottom of the sun cycle it was crashing in here. Bear in mind that this station is running 100W from the roof of a German university. It's not a monster shortwave broadcaster but rather a student radio station. The Journaline came out OK but I was unable to read the EPG.


Oh how I miss the shipping forecast. Dogger, Humber, German Bight force 3 to 4 westerly. Now they've put it on Naxtex it's not nearly so good. So this is a somewwhat hard one. 35KW from Kvitsoy (an island in the North Sea) in Norway.  Next to New Zealand I think that this must be the farthest station to date. I would have been able to decode it too if there weren't any God botherers 5KHz either side. I'm beginning to hate the 49M band.


I know it looks like I have listed this one twice but it's actually a different broadcaster and frequency. This is VT's hosting of NHK World on 9760KHz from Wooferton (near my dad's house!). They also broadcast RTI, KBS and Radio Prague one after the other every Friday morning. Do the clicky thing on the picture to hear a sample.


This is another one I've been trying to bag for a while. Voice of Russia comes from Taldom. I guess that today was a pretty good day for propagation despite being at the bottom of the sun cycle. No audio here as the signal was not good enough. We need 3 green lights (below the signal level) for audio.


Damn those God botherers. Damn them I tell you! A 40dB over S9 signal from RTL and it's all fudged up by some woman 5khz down blathering on about reconciling us. I swear these God botherers just like to hear the sound of their own voice. Hang on. Doesn't the Good Book say something about how women shall not be the teachers of men? And what's this rubbish about making a reservation for next Sunday's service? Do the clicky thing.


An example of the Auto Frequency Schedule (AFS). This is additional data sent by the station telling listeners what other frequencies they'll be on and when.


See what a mess an AM station makes of DRM. This is the above God botherer messing with RTL. And yet still I was able to get snipets of RTL audio. In the above audio sample you can clearly hear the DRM signal mixed in with the AM signal. My suspicion is that these broadcasters neither know nor care about other band users. I think they simply state what frequency they are going to use and then use it.


The BBC and DW are combining to create a new European DRM output which (at the time of this capture) is undergoing tests. This decode was grabbed on 9545KHz (100KW Wooferton) and was a rock steady signal for a few hours until it closed down for the day.


This is an example of a frequency schedule transmitted by a DRM station. This one is from the BBC/DW joint venture. The green squares denote which frequencies are currently active.


Tests are now over and the new service is now on the air as of December 10 2008. This was on their 13590KHz frequency (a former DW analogue frequency). Do the clicky thing and you'll hear a BBC/DW DRM promo I recorded off air.


This is an Electronic Programme Guide (EPG). It tells listeners what programs are on and when. It's very similar to an EPG that you'd get via digital TV. Again, this one is from the BBC/DW venture.


It's been almost a year since I've updated this page. I missed a few transmissions and bagged very little as the summer went by. Then out of the blue I grabbed this from German contract broadcaster SNR. They were broadcasting Radio Romainia International and also DW both in german. I grabbed this on 9775KHz/20091015/1820UTC. Notethe really low signal level. Despite this they were still 25db above my noise floor. This is a true demonstration ofthe power of digital radio and DSP. Do the clicky thing on the picture for a sound sample.

CopyWrong Mark A Phillips. All rights abandoned