FM/AM versus Analog versus Digital

FM is also bandwidth limited, I think, so it won't give you the full frequency range you can get from your other front-end components (although those with limited frequency response from their speakers may not care about this). And among Newbee's excellent points is the kicker, an UNCOMPRESSED signal--sadly, very few radio stations send this out. Very noticeable on large scale orchestral works, where the loud parts are usually mercilessly squashed in order to be broadcast over the airwaves. With pop stations, which routinely overmodulate anyway and most of the recordings have a compressed dynamic range to begin with, this is less noticeable. Despite all that, if you can get a live broadcast over a good tuner, it is frighteningly good.

Two very good replies, nothing to add except to wonder why the poster places so little thought for digital.

The Stereo FM signal is transmitted, not as Left and Right, but as Sum and Difference. The Sum signal is the Mono signal that can be received by an old FM set that is not stereo. The difference signal is carried above a 19KHz marker tone that activates the stereo capabilities of the receiver (and lights up that little indicator that says "STEREO"). The difference signal goes 20KHz to 40KHz, but is processed down to represent the usual audio range. Then the sum and the difference signals are mixed, so as to get Left and Right. Unfortunately, the signal to noise ratio of the difference signal is lousy unless the RF signal is very strong, and that corupts the Left and Right signal that we listen to.

You might recognize this system as the four channel LP that was tried about 30 years ago. The only good thing about that was that the phono pickup had to be good to 40KHz, and the resulting advances in phono pickup technology have benefited conventional stereo.

All of the above answers are very accurate. I have a very old Fisher AM/FM tuner that has been recently refurbished and I do enjoy listening to it. While I really do like the sound coming from it, I do know the limitations. Still, it is fun to listen to.

There are other sources of music that I do enjoy, especially when it is commercial-free. I often set my Dishnet Satallite on the CDs and the variety of music is quite pleasing, especially The Blues. Also, sometimes PBS will broadcast something worth listening to and I pull this in using my High Definition Receiver and I have an excellant DAC and the sound is really good.

I went to my brother's house recently and listened to his old Pioneer tube tuner from the 70s and I thought it sounded really good and last night, during my drive home, I listened to some fine jazz on one of the stations and I thought that it might be great to have a tuner to hear music that I might not otherwise buy or hear.

Also, thinking that radio stations might use vinyl, I wondered what the quality might be. I was thinking that it had to be above digital considering that there was no digital to analog coversion, but I never thought of bandwidth and all of the other things that you good folks have mentioned.

Still, I think I am going to find a tuner to use as an alternative to digital or vinyl.

BTW, Brianmgrarcom, I don't think I ever wrote that I had little thought for digital. It is widely thought that digital is inferior to analog, but you must differ. You seem to have been offended. Did you invent it?