Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

Congress Wants AM Radio in All New Cars—Trade Groups Say That's a Mistake

posted by janrinok on Wednesday May 24 2023, @10:47AM   Printer-friendly

owl writes:

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/05/ev-advocates-join-tech-groups-and-automakers-to-oppose-am-radio-mandate/

Congress wants to force AM into every new car for emergency alerts.

The fight over the future of AM radio got a little more heated this week as organizations representing the auto and technology industries told Congress that its plan to mandate this mode of radio wave reception is poorly conceived and will hinder progress.

AM radio has seen almost every other in-car entertainment option come and go—vinyl, 8-tracks, cassettes, CDs—and it might predate just about everything other than playing "I Spy," but time is catching up with this old broadcast technology. It is starting to get left behind as new models—many of which are electric vehicles—drive off into the sunset, streaming their audio instead of modulating its amplitude.

[...] "As more and more Americans adopt electric vehicles, we must ensure that they are equipped with AM radio. AM radio is—and will remain—an essential communications channel for emergency alerts and for disseminating news and other important information to residents of our district and communities across our country. I am proud to co-lead this bipartisan legislation which would ensure that EVs continue to be equipped with this basic but critical capability," said Rep. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), another co-sponsor.

Original Submission

 
This discussion was created by janrinok (52) for logged-in users only, but now has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Congress Wants AM Radio in All New Cars—Trade Groups Say That's a Mistake | Log In/Create an Account | Top | 81 comments | Search Discussion
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.

  • (Score: 2) by RS3 on Friday May 26 2023, @12:42AM (1 child)

    by RS3 (6367) on Friday May 26 2023, @12:42AM (#1308239)

    Ah yes, that 4th one is very interesting. Notice that it covers 10MHz - 3.5GHz, but the bandwidth is only 30.72MHz. That means the RF analog circuits can handle the entire range (and likely much lower), but the sampling / DSP can only do up to 30.72MHz, so you basically tune somewhere and you have a 30.72MHz range, or "window" into that frequency span (often called a "band"). That matches up with what I was saying before, and makes sense based on what reasonably cheap hardware can do these days. Maybe someday we'll be able to sample and DSP in the GHz ranges! Not likely soon.

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  
    Total Score:   2  

  • (Score: 2) by RS3 on Friday May 26 2023, @12:48AM

    by RS3 (6367) on Friday May 26 2023, @12:48AM (#1308240)

    A bit more research says the "LimeSDR Mini" has Bandwidth: 61.44 MHz, which is 2x 30.72, so maybe the spec. in the YT video meant the bandwidth is ±30.72MHz. Hmmm- that may be for the LimeSDR, not "Mini"... Either way it's quite useful.