DRM - Digital Radio Mondiale - Reception in New Zealand

www.owdjim.gen.nz & www.threetomcats.com - The "Three Tom Cats" Website
DRM - Digital Radio Mondiale - Reception in New Zealand

4:38am NZST
Sat, 04 Sep 2010

DRM™ - Digital Radio Mondiale - Reception in New Zealand

This page documents some of the experimenting I have being doing with reception of digital shortwave broadcasts from my home in Wellington, New Zealand. To date I have been able to receive broadcasts from transmitters located in the Netherlands Antilles, Canada, Portugal, the UK, Luxembourg, Morocco, Sri Lanka, Kuwait, Thailand, The Netherlands, Germany, Russia, China, France, Sweden, Norway, Chile, Austria, Spain, New Zealand, Australia, India, Ecuador, Bulgaria & Romania.

About DRM™

Digital Radio Mondiale, DRM™ for short, is a method of broadcasting on AM radio using digital signals rather than analogue - it's like listening to an audio stream on the Internet, but broadcast on medium or shortwave radio rather than via the net.

In addition to potentially crystal-clear reception, DRM™ signals can also carry multimedia information in addition to the audio signal, or to carry multiple program streams on one signal:

Screen capture of multi-media DRM broadcast
(courtesy Michael Dressen, Germany)

Screen capture of DRM broadcast from DW Sines using multiple streams to carry news in four different languages

DRM™ can also send web pages via shortwave:

VT Merlin test website broadcast images
(courtesy Richard Beales, UK)

Amateur radio operators are also using DRM™:

Screen capture of ham radio DRM test broadcast on 3605 kHz
(courtesy Carsten Knütter in Germany)

Screen capture of 1st HamDream intercontinental QSO
PY4BL - HB9TLK 14255 kHz

More information about ham application of DRM visit the HamDream web site.

I have also experimented with transmitting DRM around my house using the DReaM software, which includes a transmitter option, and a Jackson Harbor LF to HF Converter module which converts the sound card IF output up to the HF range. This has a range of only a couple of meters, but I have been able to transmit data and audio from my own LPFM radio station, WorldFM around the house. You can see some screen shots of weather station data being broadcast here.

You can learn more about DRM™ at these web sites:

The DRM logo is a trade mark of Digital Radio Mondiale Association and is used under license. DRM logo ©DRM Association 1998

My Receiving Setup

I am listening from Tawa, a suburb of Wellington, the capital city of New Zealand. It's a residential area with houses filled with TVs, computers and other noise-generating electronics. My house is no exception!

The receiver I am using is a Yaesu FRG-100/DRM supplied by SAT-Service Schneider in Germany. You can see the range of DRM™ products that they offer on this web page: SAT-Service Schneider DRM page. The FRG-100/DRM is fitted with a 12 kHz IF output and has bandwidth filter changes to receive DRM™ broadcasts. In my receiver I've had the wide AM filter bank used for DRM™ - this results in AM Wide being *really* wide when used for normal AM transmissions.

In December 2004 I also purchased a Digital World Traveller receiver from Coding Technologies. This is a small MW/SW/FM & DRM receiver that is designed for connection to a laptop or PC via USB.

In March 2007 I purchased a Morphy Richards DigitalRadio 27024, primarily for monitoring DAB test transmissions, but it also receives DRM quite well. I wrote a review of this radio for the April 2007 issue of the New Zealand DX Times magazine.

Thanks to RNZI, I have also had the use of a loaned SAT-Service Schneider DRT1 receiver, and a UniWave Di-Wave 100 receiver.

Yaesu FRG-100/DRM		i Morphy Richards 27024
Digital World Traveller		DRT1

My own DX setup

My antenna is a 30 metre wire in the garden. This feeds my receiver through a JPS (now Timewave) ANC-4 noise reduction unit to help cut down some of the local noise from my PC (though it appears to make little, if any, difference to DRM reception quality).

I have also fitted SAT-Service Schneider DRM IF modules to my AOR AR-7030 and McKay Dymek DR33C receivers. Both perform well, but overall I find I use the Yaesu most.

SAT-Service Schneider DRM Mixer

I'm running the "DRM Software Radio" program on a dual processor 1 GHz Pentium III computer running Windows XP/Pro to decode and listen to the broadcasts.

"DRM Software Radio" Main Screen

Schedules

Current DRM Transmission Schedule

Recent Reception Results

Here are some examples of what I have been able to receive recently here in Wellington, New Zealand. Feed of latest logs:

Earlier results can be found on these pages:

Reception in Europe

The BBC is running a DRM trial on mediumwave 855 kHz from BBC Radio Devon in Plymouth. Thanks go to Frank G0GSR for providing this recording of their test loop

Carsten Knütter from Germany has kindly allowed me to host these recordings of early test transmissions from RTL, Luxembourg, on 6095 kHz:

RTL_3_209.mp3 (1.220.023 Byte, 20,9kbps)
RTL_5_209.mp3 (862.041 Byte, 20,9kbps)
RTL_6_145.mp3 (991.818 Byte, 14,5kbps)
RTL_6_209.mp3 (1.005.609 Byte, 20,9kbps)
RTL_7_209.mp3 (1.704.020 Byte, 20,9kbps).
RTL_6_247.mp3 (998.713 Byte, 24,7kbps).
stereo_347.mp3 (2.383.621 Byte, 34,7kbps).

Chinese tests to Europe

These brief recordings are from CRI 27.4 kbps stereo tests to Europe, recorded by listeners in Europe.

easyfm.mp3
cri_274stereo.mp3

If you have any comments about this page, or DRM™ reception, please feel free to email me.

chris.www@owdjim.gen.nz (or chris@digitalradio.co.nz)

In This Section

Recent Reception
2010 Reception
2009 Reception
2008 Reception
2007 Reception
2006 Reception
2005 Reception
2004 Reception
2003 Reception
Reception Highlights
All Reception Results
DRM Schedule
DRM on RNZI Mailbox
RNZI DRM
RNZI DRM Recordings
DRM data images
Tests on 657 kHz

In This Section

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