Technology Defamed: The Marketeers (And Engineers?) Should Be Ashamed

I did a double-take earlier this month when I saw this post to the Dealnews website:

Buy.com offers the JVC HD Radio Tuner with FM Transmitter, model no. KTHDP1, for $44.99. Pay via PayPal and the price drops to $34.99. With free shipping, that’s $165 off list and the lowest total price we could find by $45. This tuner brings HD AM/FM functionality to your present car stereo. It features a built-in wired and wireless FM modulator, installation kit, swivel mount, and more. Deal ends July 4.

Why, you might wonder, was the product available for sale at "$165 off list and the lowest total price we could find by $45"? Maybe, perhaps because JVC found itself unable to sell the product at anything close to its MSRP…because consumers wisely saw through the marketing hype and found insufficient return-on-investment value in the product?

To be clear, I’m not saying that HD Radio (which I’ve been following for years, back to when it was initially rolled out as iBiquity Digital) itself is value-less. Much like ATSC versus NTSC, it has the potential to deliver higher quality audio (dependent in part on how many digital programs the station attempts to squeeze within a single channel) versus its analog radio predecessor. And its support for blended digital-to-analog handoff in diminished reception situations addresses the ‘cliff effect’ phenomenon that plagues some digital-only TV reception settings. Admittedly I wish surround-sound material was available in abundance…

But given that high quality audio is the crux of HD Radio’s sales pitch, I’m flabbergasted that companies like JVC are selling digital radio receivers with built-in analog FM transmitters. Yes, yes, I realize that such a scheme eases aftermarket integration into existing automobiles, thereby cultivating a (potential) rapid market ramp. But as anyone who’s used an FM transmitter already knows, such a setup is plagued with interference woes, thereby injecting egregious hiss and other artifacts into the digital audio presentation. A channel that’s noise-free in one spot might be unacceptable a few miles down the road. You’re competing for broadcast spectrum not only against high-power FM radio stations but also against the FM transmitters in others’ vehicles around you. And even under best-case reception conditions, you’re squeezing a wide-frequency digital radio presentation through an analog FM ’straw’ that rolls off at 15 KHz (or less).

I can rationalize the use of FM transmitters with Sirius Radio receivers, because such a service provides many channels’ worth of audio material that’s not available through conventional broadcasters. In fact, the enhanced (and consistent across-country) content is the crux of satellite radio’s sales pitch. But for HD Radio, whose raison d’être versus legacy analog radio centers on its claimed sonic superiority versus its analog predecessor, encouraging consumers to experience it through a degraded analog radio intermediary seems to be a surefire recipe for abundant returns and eventual demise.