What is the best Radio app for Iphone with poor Signal

Question

hi folks
i live in rural shropshire, UK and where there is a poor signal reception and no 3G so i was hoping if someone could tell me what is the best radio app with about 2-3 bars of signal on O2 please can someone help thx

Answer 1

Well, 2(.(7)5)G (GPRS/EDGE) is still sufficient for a lot of (mostly HE-AACv2) streams - they're between 24 and 40 kbps, . That is, first, check out whether there are favorite stations in the station directory of the HE-AACv2-specific radio app "Tuner2 Hi-Fi Radio". Note that there are other HE-AACv2-capable clients but this one is the best.
Below is an excerpt from the dedicated section of my all-in-one iPhone radio article, just discussing these questions. Sorry, there are no links or not any kind of formatting in the text - I just couldn't paste it by keeping them.
2.1 3G vs. 2.(7)5G vs. Wi-Fi
Whenever possible, deactivate 3G (if you have a second- or third-generation iPhone used in a compatible 3G network, that is). Why? It’s easy: I’ve made some very thorough experiments with power consumption when streaming over cellular (mobile phone) connections. For this, I’ve listened to a 31 kbps VBR HE-AACv2 stream in Pocket Tunes. I’ve measured the battery life decrease of 0.6%/minute when streaming in 3G and 0.3%/minute when doing the same in 2.75G (EDGE) and 2.5G (GPRS). This means streaming 3G consumes two times more battery than in 2.75G with a stream that, when streamed over Wi-Fi, consumes 0.18% power a minute.
This also means that, even if you have an unlimited Internet data plan, try using Wi-Fi whenever possible because it’s almost two times more battery-friendly than even 2.75G (EDGE) / 2.5G (GPRS) – and 3.3 (that is, 60/18) times more so compared to 3G.
Having to rely on pre-3G stream speeds means the following:
- If you only have GPRS connection (but not EDGE), select a station broadcasting at less than 35-40 kbps to avoid pauses and stuttering. You can easily see if your phone is in GPRS only: then, to the right of the name of your network, there is a circle and not the capital letter ‘E’ (it’s '3G' when in 3G mode and it’s here that the Wi-Fi signal is shown when operating over Wi-Fi.)
Note that, with some networks (for example, Vodafone in some? all? countries) there’s no EDGE at all. There, you either use 3G or GPRS. The latter rules out all stations with speeds over 40 kbps. If this is the case, you will most probably have to rely on HE-AACv2 (also known as AAC+) streams, should you want good audio quality and stereo sound. The other formats, MP3, AAC-LC (the two formats natively supported by the built-in QuickTime player) and WMA are completely unable to deliver good, stereo audio quality under 40 kbps; OGG is able, but around 36-38 kbps, which may result in stuttering over lower-quality GPRS connections or congested network.
You can find a lot of AAC+ streams at http://dir.xiph.org/by_format/AAC+ and http://yp.shoutcast.com/. Note that, with the latter, you will want to click radio stations with AAC+ type (see the last column). Unfortunately, unlike with collecting with MP3 stations only, you will not want to tap the header of the last, “Type” column, to order them to collect all AAC+ stations at the end of the list because it’s not possible to easily jump to the end of this list. (Tapping will only order the stations in a way that the list starts with MP3 ones; that is, stations well above 40 kbps - and the few that broadcast under 40kbps, do so with awful audio quality.)
Note that moodio.fm (which, as with the former two, stream directories, that is, xiph.org and shoutcast.com, has been introduced in section 1. Built-in capabilities: QuickTime), by default, also uses AAC+. As with the former two stations, in order to play back these AAC+ streams in an AAC+-capable radio player (the built-in QuickTime isn’t one of them) like Pocket Tunes Radio or FStream, you’ll want to copy these links to the clipboard and, then, paste them into a custom, user-defined station in these apps (as long as you don’t find a station of your liking in the built-in station directories of these radio clients). To do so,
1. in Safari, long-tap the link and, then, select “Copy” from the context menu
2. Switch to the radio station, go to its dedicated custom station entry dialog (with FStream, Favorites / Edit / Add new webradio at the bottom; with Pocket Tunes, Favorites / Edit / +) and tap the URL field a bit longer after cleaning it entirely (if there’s a http:// in it; with FStream, there isn’t). You’ll see a Paste flag (icon) as in this screenshot
3. Just tap it; the station URL will be pasted to the field
4. You can also give your station a name
(Note that you can also manipulate the favorite list of FStream via Wi-Fi, from a desktop Web browser. It offers a far faster way of adding and deleting favorites.)
Note that Pocket Tunes Radio also has a built-in Web browser. If you navigate from it to, say, m.moodio.fm or yp.shoutcast.com, you won’t need to do any copy / pasting like explained in the previous section. FStream (my other pick for HE-AACv2 playback) doesn’t have a Web browser. Note that several other (except for ooTunes, not that recommended) players also have a built-in browsers. You can do exactly the same in all of them except for eingrad’s RadioBOX, which, currently, has bugs in its Web browser: when you tap a link, the playback (if the built-in QuickTime is compatible with it) will start in QuickTime and not in the built-in player. (The developers stated they would fix this bug some time.)