Why Worry About Your Air Chain?

Broadcast Engineering and IT Conference , Core Education Collection , Core Education Collection: Connect Series

Originally Aired - Sunday, April 14 | 3:40 PM - 4:00 PM PT

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Over the past several years, I have reviewed AM and FM air chains, in large and small markets, and have found a plethora of problems. Not only do these problems negatively impact audio quality, they can affect Nielsen PPM encodability!

Air chains inevitably degrade over time, and there are many reasons. Equipment, formats and other conditions change. Analog to digital conversions (or digital to analog) happen. “Stuff” may have been added to the air chain over the years, and you might not even be aware of its existence. PPM encoding and EAS may have been inserted in less-than-ideal locations… and there’s also the issue of mic processing, mic selection and, of course, board operators.

“But,” you say, “the air chain is working, so why should I worry about it? After all, I have other things to worry about.” Well, what if your station’s audio sounds bad? Have you listened to it carefully?

I’ve found some interesting problems over the years, and many are quite humorous. This talk will address: