Swedish Radio now supporting DAB+

29th March 2007

Like Bavaria, Swedish Radio was not so long ago one of the biggest supporters of the old DAB system, and it was only 16 months ago that the Swedish government turned down their request for funding to roll-out DAB to more of the country. And they even clung onto the hope that they would still be able to launch DAB for a few months after this -- probably more for pride's sake than there being any realistic chance of them being able to roll-out DAB.

But now it seems that the reality has sunk in that DAB+ is rapidly gaining support around the world, and because it's a DAB-based system it'll allow them to save some face, as well as make use of their numerous DAB transmitters dotted around the country that are currently doing precisely nothing -- DAB transmitters can also transmit DAB+ because it uses exactly the same frequencies.

To this end, Swedish Radio commissioned a report on digital radio that strongly favours using DAB+.

However, although I agree with their view that they should use DAB+, Swedish Radio is apparently less keen on using the other platforms to carry digital radio, such as Internet multicasting and digital TV, both of which are less constrained in terms of bandwidth, so they should allow higher bit rates to be used. Internet multicasting in particular is likely to become the highest audio quality source of radio over the next few years, so it would be a big mistake not to use this.