Sunday, December 5, 2010

Satellite Radio Has Never Been So Popular: Why?

By Owen Jones


The current entertainment world is awash with ways of and goods for using up our free time and meanwhile filling our brains with mindless trivia and advertising junk messages. In between the programs and the music, the message is 'buy,buy, buy; from me, me, me'. This is one of the reasons why satellite radio has become so popular, but I will expand on that later.

One of the major reasons why people like satellite radio is because if you drive fairly long distances, you do not keep getting out of range of the station it took you ten minutes to find and look for another one.

Satellite radio stations tend to possess a large to very large footprint. In other words, you ought to be able to keep listening to the same station if you want without continuously retuning.

Not only that, but satellite radio is invariably digital in nature which means that the signal will be better and the ensuing sound quality will be far better as well. This means that the background noise that we have been conventionally used to has practically disappeared.

The sound from a good piece of digital stereo equipment is second to none. In reality an AF /FM radio cannot hold a candle to a satellite radio station.

The cost of satellite radio equipment has fallen dramatically, which has increased its public awareness and uptake, which in turn has improved sales and allowed the price to plummet further. Nowadays, a satellite radio receiver is as cheap as chips.

Not only that, but in the early days, in the Seventies and Eighties, parabolic dishes needed to be extremely directional. They had to be trained on the satellite as a satellite TV dish still has to be now, but a radio system does not have to be so accurate anymore, which allows them to be used in cars and boats.

If you get fed up of the adverts that continuously drone out of terrestrial radio at you, it can be a good idea to find a satellite radio channel that suits you and subscribe to it. For $10-12 a month, you will get the type of programming that you prefer without all the ads!. Isn't that magnificent?

As with all forms of entertainment, at the end of the day it is up to the end user to choose whether the cost of satellite radio is acceptable, but one thing is for sure, satellite radio increases one's choices.

If you are fed up with the present range of radio stations in your area then the thousands of extra, frequently world-wide stations available to you on satellite radio may be just the thing that you are looking for, particularly if you are searching for a station in a foreign language that is not covered in your neighborhood.




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Saturday, December 4, 2010

Getting Into DJing

By Angel Philips


Your DJ mixer is used to control the sound volume that hits the speakers and is placed in the center of your turntables pro CD players.

Also, it will allow you to lay down some pretty sweet effects to make your sound 100% unique. The more unique you are, the more you will stand out from the rest.

If you're using some kind of software for mixing on your personal computer, it would then be plugged into the mixer, just like a turntable.

Playing vinyl is what the old school DJs do. The beginning to DJing was created on turntables and most would never go into the digital DJ world.

Also, you have to lug around heavier equipment that is pricey. Nowadays is does not have to be such a challenge.

There is a lot of people out there who prefer a turntable that uses CDs. instead of starting a vinyl collection, they can simply use the hundreds of CDs they have.

They can also increase or decrease the tempo of one song and mix into another song from a different CD. This keeps the music flowing freely while everyone stays entertained.

Whether a beginner or an expert, a DJ need a decent pair of pro headphones. There's a number of brands that sell Dj headphones and you can simply choose a design that fits you best.

While your current mix is being played, you are secretly setting up the next thing for people to hear. You can always be one step ahead of yourself before anyone hears what you play.

In order to be a great DJ, you need to know all types of music from all genres, not just the top hit songs that play though out radios in the current day.

You also need a personality that people can flow with. And you need to be confident. That does not seem to hard hard, does it?

You just arrived at your gig with a boat load music to mix. But, some times there might only be a certain genre that people are into, or your audience might be very diverse.

Always try your hardest to give your audience what they want so they ask you to come back. This will result i more jobs for the future.




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What Are The Features Of The XM Radio?

By Owen Jones


XM Radio is one of the two largest American satellite radio broadcasters. They broadcast over 150 programmes of all types like sports, traffic, weather, music of all decades and comedy.

The largest area of their broadcasting activities though is music. After all, that is what most people like to listen to while they are driving or working at home or in the back garden.

The music of XM Radio is wide-ranging, catering to the requirements of every music ever recorded. For instance, of the sixty-eight music channels, there are channels that play music from only one decade: from the Forties to the Noughties!

Then, transversing those barriers of time, there are music channels that only play Rock and Roll or only play Bee Bop or only play the Blues. There are also channels that only play new records.

There are others that only play film soundtracks. In fact, XM music radio has most bases covered. There are even channels that play the music that is being played live in nightclubs such as the 'B.B. King Club' in New York City! The 'Blue Note Club' is there too! In fact, the world of music is your oyster.

Then, on a different level, there are the leisure shows hosted by people like Snoop Dog and comedy shows with artists such as Opie and Anthony. There is family comedy too and Playboy Radio for the adult members of the family, although Playboy Radio films do not have to be censored.

Sports fans will get pleasure from the devoted sports channels. XM Radio's sports channels cover such sports as American football, basketball and baseball on a daily basis, although there are international sports featured for the more out-going as well: worldwide, International sports such as soccer, the most popular participation sport in the world.

In fact, there are currently thirty-eight sports channels in XM's stable, although by the time you read this, there will probably be three or four times that amount. Many service providers are flocking to Xm's service in order to achieve nationwide coverage in the United States.

News channels are there as well. Channels like the world-respected BBC World Service, CNBC, Fox, the controversial C-Span, CNN, the Discovery Channel, NASCAR Racing, E-Entertainment and many more.

If you require equipment to receive this interesting new technology, you can easily find it on the Internet or in your local shopping mall. The cost of the equipment will not break the bank, but it is best if you price it up and then wait a week or two because new 'special offers' are coming out all the time.

The best way to get XM Satellite Radio for today's best price is to wait and look which way the wind is blowing, in a short while you will get this illustrious satellite broadcaster for a bargain price.




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Thursday, November 18, 2010

Satellite Radio: What Is It?

By Owen Jones


Satellite radio has actually been around for quite some time, but it was inaccessible to many people because the stations that were broadcasting were fairly obscure, the apparatus was costly and the antennas, normally in the form of dishes were extremely directional, which meant you needed to use expensive, skilled installers.

For proof of this you should look no further than bookmakers and betting shops who had specialized satellite broadcasts beamed to their establishments with the results of the races live.

The difference now is in cost and the power of the satellite radio transmission devices as well as the receivers. In other words, satellite radio technology has advanced a long way since the Eighties. Satellite radio can also be received more easily nowadays, although the reception of satellite TV broadcasts still necessitates a directional receiving dish. This is why satellite TV cannot be received well on a boat or in a car, but you can still get satellite radio and you can still use your mobile phone.

Satellite radio broadcasts are digital so most of the benefits of using it are linked with digital technology. Some of these are: the ability to pick up signals from all around the wold through the satellite network and the lack off interference - that annoying hiss that you often got at night while listening to a distant broadcast. Reception is now consistently crystal clear owing to the uncomplicated rythym that is digital - on and off or high and low.

Digital only makes use of two signals so they are impossible to mix up, whereas analogue had millions of them allowing for mistakes due to bad weather or / and bad equipment. That has been largely eradicated.

The state of affairs in the US is that there is still competition between two contrasting systems: XM and Sirius and it is to be hoped that this situation will soon be resolved as it was thirty years ago between VHS and Betamax, because otherwise it will only be the public who lose out in the end - the clients of the firm that goes bankrupt.

There were initially problems with satellite radio in some areas because natural or man-made structures would block the line of sight from the antenna or dish to the satellite causing a break in transmission. Typical causes for this would be tunnels, mountains and sky scrapers.

However, the satellite radio service providers soon came up with a solution to the problem by bouncing the signal from the airborne satellite off terrestrial dishes, in other words, reflecting them at closer to ground level, thereby providing satellite radio to millions of inner city dwellers.




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Friday, November 12, 2010

Satellite Radio Technology

By Owen Jones

Satellite radio technology is the equivalent of cable or satellite television and it is certainly here to stay. There are several reasons for this: the quality of the broadcasts is higher, the quality of the apparatus's reception is higher and the general coverage of the station, that is to say the so-called satellite's footprint is far greater too.

This has the effect that if you travel long distances, you will be able to stay with the same channel without having to look for a new one every forty or fifty miles as you need to do with AM or FM radio stations.

In order to reach this quality, the recording and playback speed needs to be around the 384 kbps level. The music tracks are catalogued in a similar way to the MP3 system, which uses names called ID3 tags.

Each channel on satellite radio endevours to establish its own identity. A music channel might try this by playing music only of one type or from only one period or decade. This means that you may get a satellite radio station called 1970's Punk music or Twentieth Century Classical Music.

On some stations, the music controller or disc jockey will choose, say, fifty minutes worth of music, will listen to it in order to ascertain that the quality and the order are correct and then let the computer play it over the airwaves. This leaves ten minutes every hour for the news and then the sequence can be repeated automatically.

Satellite transmission uses digital recordings and each channel is encoded on a different frequency. Similarly, each decoder, say, in your car or your home needs to recognize and decode each station separately too. This coding and decoding is done extremely quickly, in fact in what is referred to as 'real time'.

The resulting binary or digital code is then turned into into analogue signals so that your speakers can replay it. This process produces sound which is just about of CD quality.

The broadcasting satellites are in a geo-static orbit at 23,000 miles above the Earth and have a large footprint which is the name given to the region of ground that is capable of receiving their broadcasts.

In America, for example, the two areas concentrated on at first were the densely populated east and west coasts in order to maximize possible income. One satellite would be incapable of covering the whole of the United States in that orbit.

In order to receive satellite broadcasts, you will have to use a special antenna on your decoder. This antenna must be capable of picking up L-band broadcasts for it to be of use.

These new antennas are a big improvement on the satellite dishes (similar to those used for satellite TV) that one used to have to have in order to take advantage of satellite radio technology

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Saturday, October 30, 2010

Iphone 4 Commences In China Despite The Country's Reputation For Imitations

By Jules Blackwell

Right now when we discuss a nation that has a repute of imitating nearly a myriad of brands of items, nobody will even contest that when we point out China to be that country and say that it's just black propaganda and a one-sided declaration.

China has imitated almost all kinds of brands and products that it has been long known to manufacture and market affordable yet mediocre products like DVD players and other electronic gadgets like mobile phones. The country has a big reputation of pirating original brands that when a Chinese person goes inside a Louis Vuitton store in Paris and asks to buy the latest designer bag, there would be a lot questions and information taken to make sure that this person is not buying to they could copy the design and imitate it.

Indeed, China does have its negative reputation but when the new iPhone 4 was realized in the United State, it took only a few months before Apple investors decided to launch the original phone in China. Not like the previous iPhone 3GS that took more that a year to reach China after its official launch in the US, the iPhone 4 was so popular that customers in China have already pre-ordered their iPhone 4s before the official launch.

People have waited in line purchase their very own iPhone 4 smart phone, some of them even waited in line for 2 days in advance so the they can be some of the first people to get a hold of this futuristic iPhone . And although there are a lot of imitation phones in China, for many nothing can still beat the original no matter how expensive it maybe.

The new iPhone 4 costs $600 - $800, not a very small amount for 1 phone. But for those who have used it, I'm sure the money is worth it. Just make sure that you get proper iPhone 4 insurance to protect this valuable investment. IPhone insurance covers the owner if the iphone was damaged or robbed from them and is guaranteed a replacement.

Buying the iPhone and using it without the right insurance for iPhone is risky because of its value. The chances that will be damaged is always there, and now that its part of the phones the Chinese will be using, we can expect plenty of inquiries once the iPhone 4 hits the stores anew in China.

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Tuesday, September 28, 2010

The Basics Connected With Satellite Radio

By Matt Jefferson

Broadcasting digital radio by way of satellite is not something new and concepts of doing this have been with us for a few years. From the beginning of satellite radio, companies like Dish Network have provided electronic digital audio stations in their packages. The breakthrough in popularity of satellite radio, however, happened just recently, when the technology became much more permissive. Satellite radio was unusual on moving locations, such as boats or automobiles, mostly because there was the necessity for some high-priced equipment - a tracking dish. This was a substantial deterrent that kept satellite radio pretty mysterious by the general public. Right now, on the other hand, one can receive digital audio satellite shows by using a small, GPS-like antenna. This tremendously increased the feasibility of the satellite radio systems and increasingly more automobile owners began thinking about satellite radios as a good source of music and news.

The start of satellite radio in America

Once the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) assigned a spectrum in the "S" band (2.3 GHz) for the transmission of digital radio services in 1992 nobody considered the amplitude how the system might take in the foreseeable future. From the original Digital Audio Radio Service (DARS) things advanced until two organizations were given licenses to be able to broadcast digital radio in the late nineties. These two were American Mobile Radio (these days called XM Satellite Radio) and CD Radio (at this time known as Sirius Satellite Radio). The truth that satellite radio is countrywide helps it be an incredibly desirable media channel, both for commercial as well as non-profit organizations. The two companies that started the development of satellite radio observed the enormous potential it had, because it wasn't restricted by the constraints of other terrestrial broadcasters.

Features about utilizing satellite radio

Here are some of the most noteworthy advantages of having a satellite radio system:

* Forget about geographical limitations - since the radio program is transmitted through a satellite it's not necessary to change radio stations every time you exit a particular coverage region.

* The digital quality of the satellite radio features several amazing advantages by itself. There won't be noise disruptions that have been conventional to FM and AM programming. The transmission is crystal clear and satellite radio receives some important points when transmission quality is concerned.

* Analog radio stations simply cannot broadcast the full range of sounds available through digital satellite radio.

* Both XM Radio and Sirius Radio can be picked up in all the US and they're available too in a few areas of Canada and Mexico.

Satellite radio technology

Every one of the major satellite radio services makes use of its own equipment to broadcast the signal to their clients. The competition is tight and clients have to "pick sides" in order to gain from satellite radio broadcasting. You have to decide on your preferred firm and buy satisfactory receivers for that particular company. Both XM Radio and Sirius Radio supply their clients with various ways of receiving their services. The field in which most competition happens is incorporated in the negotiation with the major automobile manufacturers. Both XM Radio and Sirius Radio possess deals with the auto industry giants in order to offer their services and equipment as optional on the car models they produce. Other partnerships were created with audio equipment manufacturers, who now offer satellite radio transceivers and corresponding headphones. The newest jolt inside the satellite radio universe has been brought on by the production of transportable MP3 player-like satellite radio receivers.

The future progression of satellite radio

One of the many troubles of satellite radio ended up being tackled by the primary satellite radio broadcasters. Because you have to be in the line of sight of the satellite for the transmission, different problems came out with mobile satellite radio receivers, particularly when several landscaping objects impeded the direct transmission. To fix this, terrestrial based equipment were set up in order to eradicate the lack of direct satellite transmission. Another interesting facet linked to satellite radios is they contacted their service offers coming from a distinct perspective when compared with standard radio broadcasters. Instead of airing ads it costs a subscription fee. For many people, this is actually the ideal choice, simply because they experience an almost 100% content program (whether or not it's music or talk shows) devoid of the 10-12 minutes each hour of irritating advertisements. In most cases, the monthly membership for satellite radio is about $12.

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