HD tanks yet again

(Photo by the so-called “old guy” with the dreaded and
utterly reprehensible Nikon D100 with flash.)

This morning (Sunday, May 17, 2008), as I usually do after rollout, I turned on our fantabulous bedside HD radio.
As it usually does, it brought in the analog signal for a few seconds, and then it switched over to HD.
Nothing. Deafening silence.
Uh-ohhhhhhh........... Sounds like Dubya-Hex-Hex-Hi has lost its HD signal again. Wouldn’t be the first time.
I turned on our PAL analog radio.
Actually, I’m very happy with our HD radio, although I think it’s more the radio than the fact it’s an HD radio.
Boston Acoustics has done a bang-up job to extract good sound out of a tiny 3-inch speaker.
I suspect they’ve boosted the base to offset the limitations of a tiny speaker. Plus they’ve ported out the back.
In fact, you can vary the base-boost to fiddle for room acoustics.
I have it near a wall, so had to back it down.
Bose (“Bohz”) did this with their fantabulous 901 speakers I bought back in the ‘80s.
A phased array of nine tiny speakers with turbojet-shaped porting out the back.
The system also had an “equalizer,” that boosted the base way up.
I thought it sounded pretty good for what I wanted, and I was comparing against systems with 12-inch woofers.
The Bose sounded “silky,” which was what I wanted with classical music.
Classical music on other systems sounded harsh — not much different, but noticeable.
Woofers were probably better for Jimi Hendrix, but Hendrix was good enough on 901s.
This Boston Acoustics HD radio sounds pretty good too; when the HD signal works, which is usually.
Our HD radio replaced Tivoli PAL radios — I still have both.
The PALs replaced my ancient boombox when I finally gave up on it.
As always, the given was for whatever we bought to fit our bedside bookcase (see pik), which has a well on top for indoor plants.
We no longer put plants in there, but the boombox fit, as did the PALs.
I measured. An HD radio had to fit that well too.
I bought the boombox years ago after comparing it to other boomboxes.
It had better sound.
The PALs had better sound than the boombox, which may have degraded. It has two six-inch speakers.
Our HD radio is much better than the PALs.
I was gonna get rid of one PAL, but hung onto it in case Dubya-Hex-Hex-Hi’s HD signal tanks.
I also play the PALs when I leave the dog alone in the house.
The HD signal is always about a tenth of a second behind the analog; which I can only discern when I hear both.

RE: “‘Old guy’ with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100.......” —My macho, blowhard brother-from-Boston, who is 13 years younger than me, calls me “the old guy” as a put-down (I also am the oldest). I also am loudly excoriated by all my siblings for preferring a professional camera (like the Nikon D100) instead of a point-and-shoot. This is because I long ago sold photos to nationally published magazines.

“Dubya-Hex-Hex-Hi” is WXXI-FM, 91.5, the classical-music radio-station in Rochester we listen to.

The “Tivoli PAL” (Portable-Audio-Laboratory) is a small portable analog FM radio.

Our dog is “Killian;” a rescue Irish-Setter. He’s over 10; we don’t know his birthdate.