Does anybody else find their radio is a bit crap at picking up AM frequencies (5Live basically)?

Mine's not too bad (though not great) on FM but the AM is almost unlistenable.

It's got a nice arial on the roof that looks the part(!), but has anybody experimented with non-OEM replacements?

Ta,

IIRC from electronics at school, the AM aerial will be a coil wrapped round a magnet buried inside the body of the HU - the aerial on the roof is for FM only...

is there anything worthwhile on AM anyway?

is there anything worthwhile on AM anyway?

Yes 5live.

And the reception on my Elegance is dreadful. Fine for FM but AM its absolute ****, especially when compared to my old Fabias which always provided very good reception.

I find the reception in general is poorer than it was on my Furby vRS, even for FM radio. Even stations that should have a strong signal on FM seem to drop out sometimes for no reason.

Don't listen to AM personally as I find the quality so poor when compared to FM stations!

Yes 5live.

And the reception on my Elegance is dreadful. Fine for FM but AM its absolute ****, especially when compared to my old Fabias which always provided very good reception.

I have a Kenwood HU - no AM at all :thumbdwn::thumbdwn:

Totally agree; the AM reception on my Stream mp3 was absolutely cack. Sounded like the 5live programmes were being done from the inside of a biscuit tin, not a radio studio.

I got my Alpine unit transferred in from my Fabia and it makes a world of difference.

There is a 'double-din' fitting kit available from Skoda for £50 that provides ALL the bits you need to fit an aftermarket head unit and £150 - £180 should see you to a reasonable spec Alpine unit. You loose connectivity to the CD multichanger in the boot and mp3 socket in the jumbo though, unless you go to the additional effort to fit a CANBUS adaptor (needed if you want SatNav).

PS> If you do a search, there are several threads about fitting aftermarket head units.

The octavia, both old and new use the same aerial on the roof for both AM and FM. If you have fitted an aftermarket HU without fitting an aerial booster, you will have zero AM reception and poor FM reception. The reason being that an aftermarket HU cannot power the OEM booster in the base of the antenna.

FWIW, I dont listen to AM at all. What I would do, is get an afermarket DAB unit, then you can listen to the Digital version of 5 live with much better sound.

The octavia, both old and new use the same aerial on the roof for both AM and FM. If you have fitted an aftermarket HU without fitting an aerial booster, you will have zero AM reception and poor FM reception. The reason being that an aftermarket HU cannot power the OEM booster in the base of the antenna.

Point appreciated but I think we are talking about poor AM reception of the OEM setup

FWIW, I dont listen to AM at all. What I would do, is get an afermarket DAB unit, then you can listen to the Digital version of 5 live with much better sound.

DAB in a car is not viable as signal reception is not consistent enough when on the move.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy listening to 5live and its generally on my way to and from work (about 20 minutes), so its not like I listen to it all the time. I do find it annoying though when I am travelling on motorways trying to listen to the football, its even worse usually.

Thankfully, I love my music too much so wouldn't sacrifice anything for my cds or the AUX input.

DAB in a car is not viable as signal reception is not consistent enough when on the move.

I had a DAB setup in my MK1 octavia, and never had any reception problems on DAB. The only place it didint work was kent, but back then there was no coverage there.

I had a DAB setup in my MK1 octavia, and never had any reception problems on DAB. The only place it didn't work was kent, but back then there was no coverage there.

Hmm ... I can't even get decent DAB reception at home and I'm only 3 miles down the road from you. :(