Let's keep the Dem's on the run!
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Posted on 10/05/2003 7:32:48 AM PDT by Behind Liberal Lines
GENEVA — A Geneva radio station is getting some help in going digital.
WEOS-FM 89.7, Hobart and William Smith Colleges’ non-profit student station, learned late last week it will receive a $48,000 federal grant to buy some of the equipment it needs to broadcast digitally.
The grant money, announced Thursday by Rep. Sherwood Boehlert, R-24 of New Hartford, will allow the National Public Radio station to buy equipment that will be installed within the next three to four months. Listeners should notice an improvement in sound immediately after it is installed, said General Manager Mike Black.
An all-out conversion to digital radio, which requires even more expensive equipment, is still at least two years off, Black said.
Digital radio, according to the Federal Communications Commission, offers virtually static-free reception and allows broadcasters to offer multiple programs simultaneously on one frequency.
Geneva’s other radio stations don’t seem to be racing to broadcast in the new technology, though. Currently, no radio station that can be heard in Geneva broadcasts in digital, although Rochester and Syracuse television stations have begun to switch over.
Digital signals can be picked up only by digital radios, and one reason WEOS isn’t rushing into the arena right now is that it’s unlikely many listeners in this area have the expensive sound systems, said Black.
The replacement equipment to be purchased with the grant money will be part of the digital conversion, Black said.
“It’s hopefully going to be something that helps us stand out a little better,” Black said of the work, planned for coming months.
He said WEOS’ sound quality is already quite good, but to go completely digital, the station would have spend tens of thousand of dollars on a new “microwave link,” which sends its signal from the studio to its main transmitter in Stanley. The transmitter is digital-compatible, he said.
Russ Kimble, owner of WYLF-AM 850 in Penn Yan and WFLK-FM 101.7 in Geneva; and Alan Bishop, general manager of WSFW-AM 1110, WGVA-AM 1240, WNYR-FM 98.5, and WALL-FM 99.3, said their stations are at least a few years off from going digital.
“We’ve looked at it. It’s extremely expensive. No decision has been made,” Kimble said.
Bishop said upgrading the equipment at WGVA and the five other stations of The Radio Group so that they can broadcast in digital would cost $500,000, and the sound quality isn’t that much better.
Let's keep the Dem's on the run!
Click the Pic!
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