· What RDS features does the tuner support? (Entry last updated on March 3rd, 2003)If transmitted by the local radio stations, it displays RDS (Radio Data Service) text information, and will display the RDS clock when the display is set to the Info:Radio screen. Note that the RDS clock is separate from the player's internal real-time clock, so there may be a difference between the clock shown in the Info:Radio screen and the clock shown in the other screens.
As of version 2.0, the player also supports RDS-TA (Traffic Announce) and RDS-AF (Alternate Frequency tuning) where available. Please see the software release notes for instructions on how to use these features.
Note that, in the United States, very few radio stations support RDS at all, and even fewer support the advanced features. For those that do support it, the RDS equipment seems to get ignored quite often, almost as if the technicians don't even know it's there. As a result, they often broadcast incorrect information. So the RDS features are essentially useless for most of the United States.
However, in Europe, where RDS is widely supported, it's very cool.
If you own the tuner module in the United States, you can expect to see an RDS-capable station only once in a blue moon. And when you do see one, odds are that you'll get the station's call letters and little else. And there's no guarantee they'll even be the right call letters. If you're in "Info:Radio" mode, the RDS clock might appear once in a while, with a high probablility that it will display an incorrect time.
|