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FM better than cd?

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Old 01-25-2004, 10:53 PM
  #1  
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Why does the radio always have better quality than whatever i play on cd? I have a deh-7400mp pioneer deck and i noticed that the same song played on radio is better than when i play it on cd...
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Old 01-26-2004, 03:55 AM
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As Dereck has said there is absolutely, positively no way radio will have better fidelity to the recorded music than a properly operating CD player.
FM can not transmit frequencies above 16K and the stations themselves roll off the 50 - 20 Hz range (most not all). Now radio stations also have 'mixing boards and gain controls' so they edit the sound to suit their format, or the engineers taste, so whatever you hear on the radio is usually different than what you hear from a CD. A little fuller usually, sometimes more mid-bass. We have one station that changes its sound as it changes DJ's.
Now why would you prefer the sound of radio? You like the way they edit the music! They put a little boost at 12K and boost up the 500- 100 Hz range and the music will have sparkle (no harsh highs since it is rolled off) the mid-bass bump will make the music sound rich and full. When you buy the CD of your favorite music it will not have all the extras and will disappoint a little.
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Old 01-26-2004, 12:16 PM
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I agree..

Unless there is something terribly wrong with your cd player (I've never heard of a problem like that before), it is almost certainly your recorded media. If you have a store bought CD somewhere, give it a try. I'd be curious to see i the problem persists..
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Old 02-01-2004, 12:30 PM
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Hey
I have had similar problems. The CD's were recorded differently (same track different album) and the engineer recording it used a different set up. One song I have on 5 different discs and each sounds different - from recorded at a lower level to have a greater dynamic range to an over-range recoding that clips at least once every couple of seconds.
I agree as well with what JohnVroom and lemonlime said, the band width is greatly reduced for FM broadcast (eventhough it is supposed to be 20kHz). Tuners are also different, some sound better than others. I personally like factory tuners, they seems to be better than aftermarket units as far as reception but not fidelity.
I had a Pioneer deck (DEH-P825) a few years ago that had a decent tuner but the CD sound wasn't great?
Good luck J
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Old 02-02-2004, 09:23 AM
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If radio could sound one QUARTER as good as any of my CD players could play, Id be a happy man. No way radio can even compare. At least in my experiences with 3 different decks.

Either media format issues
or one ****ed up deck

[ February 02, 2004, 01:50 PM: Message edited by: AAAAAAA ]
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Old 02-02-2004, 07:32 PM
  #8  
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FM can not transmit frequencies above 16K and the stations themselves roll off the 50 - 20 Hz range (most not all).
What a moron... don’t you know that FM is capable of a max theoretical 20 - 17K Hz??? Sheez what a simpleton! And he probable doesn’t know that S/N is about 80Db max too. Where in the heck is that guy from… Montréal?
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Old 02-22-2004, 06:43 PM
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Originally posted by JohnVroom:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> FM can not transmit frequencies above 16K and the stations themselves roll off the 50 - 20 Hz range (most not all).
What a moron... don’t you know that FM is capable of a max theoretical 20 - 17K Hz??? Sheez what a simpleton! And he probable doesn’t know that S/N is about 80Db max too. Where in the heck is that guy from… Montréal? </font>[/QUOTE]haha
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