Indonesia Testing Digital Radio in Crowded FM Band

Successful Singapore Straits Demonstration of DRM+
In cooperation with Digital Radio Mondiale the public broadcaster RRI has tested DRM+ in

Indonesian island of Batam close to Singapore. The DRM signal was inserted into the existing and very crowded FM local spectrum in the Strait area. The existing FM was at

105.1 MHz and DRM was placed at 105.25Mhz. The current analogue transmitter had a power of 5kW in analogue. 2.5kW was used for simulcast mode (FM and DRM) and only 0.2KW DRM power was utilised. Excellent coverage area was achieved with only 10% of analogue power.

Both the indoor and mobile reception were excellent and no interference was noted to the neighbouring FM stations at 105.1Mhz and 105.5Mhz.

During the three days of presentations, practical work, the fruitful questions and answers sessions, participants checked the clear benefits of digital radio for local coverage: excellent audio, multimedia features including advanced text and images, good coverage and efficient energy use.

The demos was supported by RRI, Fraunhofer IIs, GatesAir and RFmondial
RRI is adding the Batam DRM for local coverage successful demo to its conclusive demonstrations of DRM in the AM bands (medium wave) for large-area coverage in Bogor (2015) and in Bali (2016).