So no FM Radio? Now what?
- Thread starter eyeinthesky
- Start date
As far as I know, you can download TuneIn apps for free so that you can listen the radio all over the world. Right now I am listening country music from a US radio station while in travelling an Asia country. I am using a lumia 610. L920 and L820 should be much better I believe.
hasasimo
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- Apr 8, 2012
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That's totally useless if you don't want to use data, or if you're somewhere without a data connection, or in an emergency. Many of us want legit FM radio.
wamsille
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- Aug 30, 2012
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There is a benefit to having FM radio on a phone. My Lumia 900 is completely capable of playing a clear broadcast of the local stations here without much (if any) interference. I know when I pick up the L920 from FedEx this afternoon I won't have my own music loaded into the device. This is where streaming music comes in though, right? I have a rather generous data allowance on my Family Share plan, and I know in the months I've been with AT&T that I have not gone over the 15GB I have for two lines. But, why should I have to fork over a portion of my data allocation for FM radio?
TuneIn is an exceellent application. I used it on my numerous Android devices and I bought the pro version to support the developer. Unfortunately, it isn't an actual FM radio. I've had smartphones in the past with the FM radio built in, including two devices made by HTC. I wasn't in a favorable location at the time to get clear reception so I never took advantage of it. That being said, I find the capabilities on the Lumia 900 to be far superior to that of the HTC Incredible I attempted to use the built in raido app on. TuneIn isn't a real radio. It's an application that taps into the streams of FM stations online and there is a delay on top of the broadcast delay. If you are just going from an a to z vantage point, yes it ultimately does the trick and gets you the FM feed. It isn't 'live', subject to data coverage versus actual FM reception and cuts into your data allowance.
No smartphone is perfect. There are compromises people will choose to make with the Lumia 920 coming from the Android and iOS family of devices. Shoot, there are compromises coming from Windows Phone 7.x devices. The point is one little thing - this is little - shouldn't prevent you from getting the device. If you want to make the argument FM radio could be life saving, like when the networks were down in the northeast due to Sandy, its pretty valid. Then again, I don't know how much I'd be relying on my smartphone during that time other than making phone calls - using the radio or internet would be disabled by choice so I could focus on calls and text messages. I personally own a weather radio for that reason.
HTC's soon to be former flagship Android device the HTC One X has an active FM radio, but AT&T had this disabled. If you manage to root the phone and install a stock ROM with the missing apps included you could listen to radio through headphones. I wouldn't say that FM radio is dying, it's just that it isn't something the carriers can monetize and use as a legitimate selling point of the device. Now if they began building phones with SiriusXM pre-installed with a receiver then subsidies could be netted from that and SiriusXM could be billed on your wireless account.
Carriers are reaching a fiscal cliff of their own - as modern smartphones continue to improve there are less services that have to be paid for or that can be sourced from outside content providers. There is less to monetize on by the carriers directly compared to several years ago. The last refuge for them is billing for the data consumption and controlling how much data you consume. Yes, go ahead and stream Spiderman - that will cost you x out of your data package. Once you hit 2GB, 3GB or 5GB you'll be dinged for additional data. And more after that.
TuneIn is an exceellent application. I used it on my numerous Android devices and I bought the pro version to support the developer. Unfortunately, it isn't an actual FM radio. I've had smartphones in the past with the FM radio built in, including two devices made by HTC. I wasn't in a favorable location at the time to get clear reception so I never took advantage of it. That being said, I find the capabilities on the Lumia 900 to be far superior to that of the HTC Incredible I attempted to use the built in raido app on. TuneIn isn't a real radio. It's an application that taps into the streams of FM stations online and there is a delay on top of the broadcast delay. If you are just going from an a to z vantage point, yes it ultimately does the trick and gets you the FM feed. It isn't 'live', subject to data coverage versus actual FM reception and cuts into your data allowance.
No smartphone is perfect. There are compromises people will choose to make with the Lumia 920 coming from the Android and iOS family of devices. Shoot, there are compromises coming from Windows Phone 7.x devices. The point is one little thing - this is little - shouldn't prevent you from getting the device. If you want to make the argument FM radio could be life saving, like when the networks were down in the northeast due to Sandy, its pretty valid. Then again, I don't know how much I'd be relying on my smartphone during that time other than making phone calls - using the radio or internet would be disabled by choice so I could focus on calls and text messages. I personally own a weather radio for that reason.
HTC's soon to be former flagship Android device the HTC One X has an active FM radio, but AT&T had this disabled. If you manage to root the phone and install a stock ROM with the missing apps included you could listen to radio through headphones. I wouldn't say that FM radio is dying, it's just that it isn't something the carriers can monetize and use as a legitimate selling point of the device. Now if they began building phones with SiriusXM pre-installed with a receiver then subsidies could be netted from that and SiriusXM could be billed on your wireless account.
Carriers are reaching a fiscal cliff of their own - as modern smartphones continue to improve there are less services that have to be paid for or that can be sourced from outside content providers. There is less to monetize on by the carriers directly compared to several years ago. The last refuge for them is billing for the data consumption and controlling how much data you consume. Yes, go ahead and stream Spiderman - that will cost you x out of your data package. Once you hit 2GB, 3GB or 5GB you'll be dinged for additional data. And more after that.
I have had my phone for two days. If there is a radio I cannot find it. It used to be an option within Zune. It is not an option within xbox music. The only options within xbox music are:
1. Music
2. Video
3. Podcasts
4. Store
sdreamer
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Looks like its a Windows Phone 8 thing. The hardware is there, but the software is not. If you look at the 8x it doesn't have an FM radio either. If we had unlimited data this would not be a problem, but some people don't use that much data often and choose to have cheaper data plans. They could get away with this by using an FM radio to get free streaming music. Now they have to get higher tiered plans to achieve this. Maybe carriers had influence on this, take out the radio, make people who use FM radio get more expensive plans....
I never understood why people want FM tuning on their phone or MP3 players... Almost every radio station on the planet now streams via web or app their live radio feed. I like listening to AM radio but don't complain that my phone doesn't have an AM tuner.
Just stream it.
Just stream it.
hasasimo
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I did and there is a reason I have an FM Radio in most places I feel the need to listen to FM. Absolutely 0 desire to use my phone to tune in FM Radio. I use, ya know, a radio for that.
sdreamer
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From Microsoft's dev boards: No more radio FM on WP8 devices?
Code:
elGeekalpha
Know sombody if radio fm would be available on this "next gen" of windows phone devices? I'm trying to develop a little radio fm inside my app and it doesn't works. Also ther's no refrence on Lumia 920 or Music+Video app...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
elGeekalpha Every day we know more, and understand less...
Mark Chamberlain - MSFT
Hi,
FM Radio was an optional feature in WP7.x. WP8 does not have an FM Radio.
-Mark
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Chamberlain Sr. Escalation Engineer | Microsoft Developer Support | Windows Phone 7
Marked As Answer by Mark Chamberlain - MSFTMicrosoft Employee, Moderator 19 hours 58 minutes agohasasimo
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And for our MP3s we used to use a, ya know, MP3 player. And to take pictures we used to use a, ya know, digital camera. An FM radio is an extremely easy, useful feature to include on a smart phone. Somebody just posted how their L900 FM radio helped them during Sandy.
I have an HTC 8X (Windows Phone 8) and it does not have an FM tuner. My old HTC HD7 did have one. I like to listen to FM radio, especially KCRW and KLOS (both LA stations). While both stations offer live streaming through the internet, WP8 still doesn't support Flash so I can't stream through Internet Explorer. The only solution is to use IHeartRadio.
Note to the dumba$$ who asked if people still listen to FM radio, yes plenty of people do. BTW, radio is extremely useful in disasters, when your cellular network may go down. I listened to news updates once when a wildfire knocked out a ton of services in my area (FM was still broadcasting).
Note to the dumba$$ who asked if people still listen to FM radio, yes plenty of people do. BTW, radio is extremely useful in disasters, when your cellular network may go down. I listened to news updates once when a wildfire knocked out a ton of services in my area (FM was still broadcasting).
Mystictrust
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- May 26, 2011
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Let's not forget that iHeartRadio is a stinking power hog right now on WP8 devices. In an emergency, don't go anywhere near that app for any kind of news - unless you have a good method to recharge your phone. Best to have a portable radio or use an old phone/device with radio.
Exactly. The only thing I have worth listening to here is NPR, and I have an NPR streaming app and I can download podcasts of all my favorite NPR programs, which is a far more pleasurable and simple solution for me.
FM radio seems to be phasing out. It was never a very popular feature on smartphones in the U.S. market, Nokia was one of the few who included it because it is popular in some other countries, particularly 2nd and 3rd world countries where data is spotty, slow and expensive. If you live in the United States and you have a halfway decent data plan with 3 GB or so, you should never really have an issue with streaming. AT&T will sell you another GB for $10 or you can go to a 5 GB for not much more if your appetite is really that voracious and you don't have regular access to Wi-Fi.
I had FM on my 900 and I used it maybe twice, just to play with it. I don't miss listening to idiot disc jockeys talking all over the beginning of a good song. I can get far better content without commercials from NPR streaming and downloads, Nokia Music and now Spotify.
If satellite radio were available on the phone, that might be worth having, but broadcast radio? Come on...
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