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BBC radio streams

M

miamijim

macrumors 6502
Original poster
May 26, 2010
359
2
I live in Finland and I stream BBC radio on my iMac at home.

I have my iPad now but I am unable to stream BBC radio on the device even in the same room as my iamc which does the job fine.

What would be the reason for this, is it just the lack of flash, and if so is there going to be a BBC radio app we can use outsid of the UK.
 
miamijim said:
I live in Finland and I stream BBC radio on my iMac at home.

I have my iPad now but I am unable to stream BBC radio on the device even in the same room as my iamc which does the job fine.

What would be the reason for this, is it just the lack of flash, and if so is there going to be a BBC radio app we can use outsid of the UK.
Click to expand...

I am using the VisuaRadio App in France and can listen to BBC stations with no problems. I have just synched it to the iPad and tested it this morning. I know from previous experience with the iPhone and VisuaRadio, that you need to have a good wireless signal for it to work. If you are on a public wireless network, you may not have enough bandwidth. I don't know about on 3G but I assume it would work. I don't have 3G up in the Haut Var.

Wilson
 
I can not find the Visuaradio app on the UK, US or the Finnish app store.


Am I missing something...

Jim
 
It appears by the screen shots to be in arabic but i will give it a go...

Thanks
 
RadioBox app works great for listening to the BBC on my iPhone, even over cellular. I haven't installed it on my iPad, but it should work the same on that.
 
Thank you all for your help.

I used the tutorials for Fstream and BBC radio now works like a dream, although it only comes through at 48kbps would there be anyway to up this or is that the broadcast quality it is coming out at.

Thanks again

Jim
 
miamijim said:
Thank you all for your help.

I used the tutorials for Fstream and BBC radio now works like a dream, although it only comes through at 48kbps would there be anyway to up this or is that the broadcast quality it is coming out at.

Thanks again

Jim
Click to expand...

BBC must be the meanest major broadcaster on bandwidth. I listen every morning before I get up, to BBC R3 via iPlayer, with my Macbook connected to a small audio system. In France the bitrate can drop as far as 12 kbps sometimes. It then sounds like it is being played from a railway station loudspeaker through 50 meters of iron drain pipe. I sometimes have to switch to the older method of Real Player but even there, it is far from good all the time. I have played around with transport settings (Multicast, UDP, TCP and HTTP) with very limited success. I get Radioio Classical at a steady 160+kbps all the time, so the poor bit rate is down to the BBC not me (or you).

Slightly off topic but for decent quality BBC sound during the day in France, I use Freesat with a big dish (140cm) and high quality LNB (Invacom). That way you get 192kbps consistently. The sound quality of the Humax HD Satellite box's audio DAC is not nice but you can get the signal before this stage at the Optical SPDI/F socket and use a good external DAC. I use a Russ Andrews designed Firestone Audio Spitfire 24 bit/192 kHz, which is OK but not stellar. For anyone who wants to do this on any satellite box, where the audio systems are made down to a very low price, I would recommend the Beresford Caiman DAC, which is about the same price as the Spitfire but I think, has a much smoother sound. That is what I use in the UK to improve the audio sound from my Sky HD box, as I am in a DAB/FM radio dead zone.

Wilson
 
miamijim said:
I used the tutorials for Fstream and BBC radio now works like a dream, although it only comes through at 48kbps would there be anyway to up this or is that the broadcast quality it is coming out at.
Click to expand...

The BBC degrade their streaming for non-UK IP addresses, so you'll get decent quality in the UK and worse quality elsewhere. The only way around this is to use a VPN service with a UK IP address. This is do-able on iPhone/iPad and handy if you want iPlayer access but usually involves paying someone...

Wunder Radio and TuneIn Radio (iTunes links) are both very good apps that can handle BBC radio streams. Wunder, which I used for a long time on the iPhone, has gone universal so now has a native iPad interface. Though it was never pretty on the iPhone and certainly isn't on the iPad. TuneIn, on the other hand, has a much better UI and some extra features but there isn't an iPad version and I don't know if the dev is planning one.

Finally, the free BBC News app (not available in the UK because it's made by their commercial arm, so there's at least one BBC service ironically better for those of us outside the UK) has a button that streams World Service news while you browse news stories.
 
We do pay for the BBC in the UK, so you Johnny foreigner types get left with the poorer streams.

p.s. - VPN iplayer?

Just an idea.
 
Johnny Foreigner??

Shoesy said:
We do pay for the BBC in the UK, so you Johnny foreigner types get left with the poorer streams.

p.s. - VPN iplayer?

Just an idea.
Click to expand...

Perhaps BBC licence payers like me, should have a facility to sign in when listening from overseas. This is what I have on Radioio, where I pay an annual subscription for advertisement free and higher quality streams. I can therefore get this anywhere in the world, where I have an internet connection. I am afraid this is typical of BBC's parochial attitudes.

I must get round to setting up a VPN via our UK based PowerMac server, which runs 24/7.

Wilson
 
Pocket tunes app works well. Has been updated for iPad.

Play Sirius from USA too (need a subscription)

Tom
 
BBC Real Player Streams Stopped

This morning I had my usual problem with iPlayer (it's about once every 2 weeks) with BBC R3 sounding horribly garbled and unplayable. My speed meter is showing its usual 2.10 mbps, so it is not me. I switched to my usual back-up which is Real Player, only to hear half of a message saying "as from the end of May......" and then nothing. I assume the message is supposed to say that as from the end of May, Real Player streams are no more - arghhhhh!

The solution was surprisingly simple. 1) Ensure you have an up to date copy of the free Flip for Mac Windows Media Player Plug in. 2) Find the url for the WMA stream of the programme you want to listen to - for R3 it is: www.bbc.co.uk/radio/listen/live/r3.asx and copy that to the address bar in Safari. Then you will find it plays perfectly well. The sound is not as good as iPlayer when it is working properly but a lot better than iPlayer when it is mis-behaving, as it is today.
 
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