Quote Originally Posted by nightflier
I agree that $7-13 per month is a bit much. If you figure that a receiver and all the equipment is also expensive, the HD radio option should be a whole lot more attractive, especially with the commercial-free simulcasts. But that hasn't been the case; you hardly hear anything about HD radio. Some stations advertise that they broadcast in HD, but how many regular folks have actually heard HD radio?

Personally I'm getting a little impatient. The sales reps at AA and Crutchfield love to talk about the virtues of HD radio, until you ask them: do you own one? They don't. I feel about HD radio about as excited as I feel about HDTV. I bought an HDTV tuner and I now have and extra five channels in HD - big deal and I hardly ever use it. Same sentiment with RDS. If the technology is there and everyone in Europe and Japan is enjoying it, what's the hold-up here?

I can buy a great FM tuner component for $300 ($100 on eBay), but getting an HD tuner is next to impossible, unless I want a table radio - I don't. HD radio is supposed to have a whole lot better sound than FM, so why would I want this from a little speaker in a plastic box on my nightstand? I want to hear this through my tower speakers and my headphone amp! Or at the very least in my car with my 7-speakers & sub....

Isn't anyone else infuriated about this? Is it because it's not profitable enough?
It really does seem that the USA is always the last to receive the fruits of advanced HD tech. Our broadcast TV spec was always behind in resolution compared to the EU & Japanese. My guess, and it's only a guess, is that Sirius & XM are doing all they can to squash this HD Radio evolution.