Uniqute: How to find Radio 3 broadcast via iRadio at 320kbps?

I've been looking for this myself, google found this:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffi...ember/13/r3_hd.shtml

Unfortunately I think that you need the iPlayer to remove the flash encapsulation. If you do use the iPlayer, it might work quite well if you have a PC with an S/PDIF connection to your Naim kit.

I think that Asset UPnP has a "Playback Stream Capture" option, which should present whatever is playing on your pc or laptop as a track that a UPnP renderer like the Qute can play.

quote:

Or do we need Naim to update the internet radio station list ( would have thought this was unlikely but...)

You can add this yourself via the Naim Radio Guide - you'll need the MAC address of your Uniti or NDX, which can be found in Setup -> Factory Settings -> System Status, if I recall correctly.

To add a station to the unit's list of Favorites, you'll need the URL, media type (MP3 / WMA / AAC) and you should be off and running.

This works as follows: every time the Uniti or NDX initiates the iRadio player, it authenticates (licensed via MAC address) with vTuner, retrieving a complete, up-to-date listing of stations, including user Favorites.

Favorites can be individually managed per unit via the Naim Radio Guide.

David - I maybe wrong, or have misunderstood things, but afaik the BBC Radio 3 HD stream is only currently available when you listen live from the website. Here is the press release, and here is the Radio 3 homepage, with the HD broadcast on it.

I don't think there's a URL for it yet.

Likesmusic

I am afraid you are correct. It is good old mother BBC trying to keep control of when and how you listen, frustrating but typically. I am not sure they plan to open things out any time soon either.

.. but the Asset UPnP Playback Stream capture thing should work - and is handy for other things too. Or you could use a USB Dac, or a USB-s/pdif converter ..

I suspect there are some BBC politics at play too; they are hyping up DAB bigtime, yet according to the Head of Technology for BBC Audio and Music: "You could make a strong case to say that of all the digital platforms used by BBC Radio, the internet delivers the best quality.". See here.

Another good thing about the Radio 3 HD stream is that it would seem to avoid all the Optimod compression stuff that is used for the FM broadcast.

The compression applied to the dynamics of Radio Three's live VHF broadcasting has been horrible since about 1990, when automation took over from real engineers opperating attenuators manually and with great skill.

Anything that gets away from the rotten quality of automated compression on live relays is to be welcomed.

In terms of quality, the BBC engineers said that the minimum quality required of DAB to equal the quality of VHF at its best would be 320 KBS, so perhaps we do have the future arriving at last! And something that should ecclipse VHF in time ...

ATB from George

Thanks David, I now know how to add stations to the Naim Radio Guide and then add them to my Qute.

I have even managed to get Radio 3 HD to play on my Mac using the Naim Radio Guide URL (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/hd-sound/) and selecting to stream it as WMA ( that is how the other BBC Radio stations are streamed, according to the naim station list).

This is, of course, completely self-defeating as you are playing 320kbps HD on tinny pathetic computer speakers, unless as likesmusic suggests you can get the Qute to stream from the Mac/PC.

Does the BBC seriously think many people are going to bother with such a complex set-up routine?

What is even more puzzling is that one of the BBC R3HD press releases I have read, says that " they are "not going to add HD output to iPlayer but only stream HD output live".

I suppose nobody from the BBC technical side would care to explain why they are going to such lengths to improve the output quality of Radio 3 but not making it a realistic solution?

Unless, it is just a sop to say that the BBC has improved the quality of the output of digital Radio 3 and the Government should relax the threshold level for the switch-off of Radio 3 on FM ??

Geoff, all you need is a decent soundcard for your pc or Mac which you would connect to your Qute, or use Asset UPnP as a Server and stream whatever your pc is playing via UPnP using playback stream capture. It's your pcs fault that it sounds crap not the BBCs! And all radio was live once!

The BBC iPlayer plug-in for SqueezeCenter has been updated to pick up and stream the Radio 3 HD stream - I'm listening to it right now streamed through my hi-fi. So it is possible .. at least if you have a Squeezebox! I'd post a link to the guy that did it (over a weekend), but such things get deleted by the moderators here.

Likesmusic, thanks.

I appreciate that I can directly connect the Qute to my Mac, my practical issue is that our computers are in the office and the Qute is in the kitchen/dining area of our house-although both are connected to the same hard wired data network.

I was trying to find a live Radio 3 HD broadcast solution that did not involve having a Mac/PC in the kitchen area.

I will check out Asset UPnP. Thanks.