response 151 of 210:

Jul 2 14:54 UTC 2000

There are now some 2500 stations listed on real.com's "Radio Tuner" website,
and quality is very good (for broadcast radio with a reasonable-quality tuner;
it isn't up there with my rooftop antenna and Linn Kudos tuner) most of the
time in experience.  Sometimes "Net Congestion" interferes with a specific
station at a specific time, so I just go to another one.

(I'm using a PowerMac 8600/300 and single-channel ISDN, for comparison
purposes.)

(Should we move the Internet radio part of this discussion to its own item?)

response 153 of 210:

Jul 9 21:31 UTC 2000

Hey, move it to the 'radio' .cf

response 155 of 210:

Aug 9 17:35 UTC 2000

http://www.inside.com today offers a nice story on the two competing 
satellite radio systems, Sirius and XM, which are rapidly moving towards
market.  These will be subscription services for about $10/month,
intended for car drivers.   They plan to distinguish themselves
through the personalities of their DJs.  Sirius plans to recruit
serious and knowledgable people; XM plans to recruit wacky lunatics.
 
XM's plans are driven by Lee Abrams, "a radio legend credited with 
inventing every calcified format in existence -- album and classic
rock, urban contemporary, smooth jazz, Howard Stern."
 
No mention of classical music -- sorry Sindi -- but each service is 
supposed to have 50 channels so maybe a classical service will be 
tossed in.
 
http://www.inside.com/story/Story_Cached/0,2770,7859_9,00.html

response 157 of 210:

Nov 8 21:14 UTC 2000

What is streaming MP3?  Is it the same as RealAudio?  If not, is anyone
broadcasting it and how would one listen to it?  What minimum modem speed
would be needed?  At 33K, it took me a lot longer to download a 1M MP3 file
than to listen to it, but I don't recall the ratio.

response 159 of 210:

Nov 9 01:04 UTC 2000

Streaming MP3s are, I believe, Shoutcast streams
http://www.shoutcast.com
(although M$ is doing something similiar in another format)
It is different from RealAudio in several ways, from what I understand. I
admit to being self-taught in computer audio. RealAudio is another proprietary
format, and although popular, still requires specialized encoding and server
software. Shoutcast and streaming mp3s are making this quite a bit easier.
I've been listening to several different "homegrown" streams lately. I do this
by pointing WinAMP (not sure about cross-platform availability) to the URL
for the stream. Granted, for full, deep, stereo sound a broadband connection
is a definite must, but, as with mp3s themselves, the encoding parameters of
the music determines the bandwidth required. For example, at work where I am
stuck with a 56K dialup connection, I can listen to my favourite Celtic music
stream, but only because the "D.J." encoded his music at a low bitrate
suitable for dialup streaming. Most decent mp3s are encoded at a bitrate of
128 or 160 Kbps, with theoretically would require at least ISDN for decent
streaming.

I hope that helps. Again, I'm no expert; YMMV

response 161 of 210:

Nov 9 16:02 UTC 2000

Looked at that site.  They offer a choice of players for Windows (Winamp),
Mac, or Linux/X.  Any chance that a DOS MP3 player could be made to work (QV,
DOSAMP)?  I looked up classical broadcasts, of which there are 18 (most are
mixed with jazz or other things), and the bitrates are listed as 128 (very
few), 56, 32, 24, 20 (Moscow) and even 18.  Presumably a 33K modem could
handle up to 32 (with some gaps).  

response 163 of 210:

Nov 9 16:15 UTC 2000

www.mpeg.org/mpeg/mpeg-audio-player.html  has lots of links to mp3 info,
including one to players for most operating systems - 3 players for DOS, some
for OS/2, BeOS, Solaris, etc.  I might experiment with streaming MP3 and
Win31/Netscape.  Can't be any worse than RealAudio.  Shoutcast seemed to be
implying that only their WinAMP for Win95 would work.

response 165 of 210:

Nov 14 03:04 UTC 2000

How much worse would the best streaming audio sound at 56K than the Toledo
classical station as heard in Ann Arbor, 60 miles away?

response 167 of 210:

Nov 15 22:09 UTC 2000

Since Toledo is at many times of the day and week the only classical station
hearable in Ann Arbor, and at some times there are no classical broadcasts
at all (6-6:30 pm) even a tinny internet broadcast would be welcome.  Toledo
is not as bad in mono - I almost never try to listen to classical music on
the radio in stereo as we have no classical stations close enough.  

response 169 of 210:

Nov 16 13:39 UTC 2000

WKAR is mostly talk these days.  They do pipe in classical at night, I think
around 8pm is when they change from talk to music.

response 171 of 210:

Nov 16 16:42 UTC 2000

WUOM *used* to be classical and is *now* mostly talk.  WKAR is still classical
when I switch to it, which is less often.  I usually listen to WEMU, but
lately I've been tuning W4 Country whenever WEMU is not broadcasting news.
WKAR is the fall back when I can't stand any more jazz or twang.

response 173 of 210:

Nov 16 16:47 UTC 2000

Scott's resp:169 sounds like a description of WUOM, not WKAR, before 
WUOM dumped its remaining classical music to run BBC news overnight.
 
WKAR-FM's web schedule says they run classical music from 8am - 4pm,
with hourly news breaks, 7pm-11pm (except for the Friday jazz show),
and then midnight through 5 am.  That's Monday through Friday, the 
weekend schedule packs in all sorts of non-classical stuff like 
"Prairie Home Companion" and the Sunday night folk music shows.