Thomson Consumer Electronics Inc.

Ford Motor Company Limited

Latha Ravi

Douglas Scott Arrowsmith

Douglas Brian Gillespie

Gordon E Gottfried

Mark C Burek

Peter Llewellyn

When an RDS or RBDS radio is used to listen to prerecorded media, the tuner monitors an RDS station in the background to determine when a traffic announcement is in progress. A search for selecting an appropriate station for background monitoring is provided which selects a station which is most likely to be in accordance with the individual preferences of the driver. The search method can also be used to find traffic capable stations, weather stations, emergency alert information, and news broadcasts.

Selection of traffic capable station by RDS radio while listening to other media

An autoset or auto-store function for a radio receiver selects stations for storing in association with respective presets according to the stored station format of the normal presets which have been manually set by the radio user for their home area. When activating the autoset feature when traveling out-of-town, the invention ensures consistent station formats at the presets according to the scheme adopted by the user. For any presets that have no station content code stored for them or for which no matching broadcast can be found during the autoset scan, a fill is conducted to associate listenable broadcasts with these remaining presets.

Automatic radio station memory programming

A multi-function RDS button and a menu driven interface for accessing RDS features facilitates easy access to RDS functions with minimal demands upon the attention of the user. Large numbers of push buttons with cryptic labels and unintuitive push-button sequences of prior RDS radio receivers are avoided. Due to a long time-out period provided before automatically exiting the menu, the user can alternate attention between the radio and the road without losing their place in the menu or initiating an unwanted action.

RDS radio with multi-function RDS button

A control for an FM receiver reduces multipath distortion by reducing stereo separation and high frequency response in the demultiplexed signal. The receiver includes an FM detector including a noise detector as well as the signal strength meter for introducing control signals to a separation control and a frequency response control. Unlike the direct input from a noise detector output to the separation and frequency response controls in the prior art, the noise detector output is input through a noise detection manager that generates responses to at least one, and preferably two thresholds of noise detector output. In the preferred embodiment, a stereo separation manager responds to a first threshold of noise and a frequency response manager responds to the second threshold. The frequency response control reduces the high frequency output at the stereo decoder or the audio processor. The respective managers introduce hysteresis by requiring a higher number of noise occurrences, above the said thresholds, to implement separation reduction, frequency response reduction, or a combination of the two, than the number of occurrences required to maintain these reductions. Thus, excessive switching between levels of stereo separation and between levels of high frequency attenuation is avoided.

Strategy for controlling FM stereo separation and frequency response in

An FM radiowave receiver includes a diversity antenna system responsive to signal strength and noise levels. The signal strength and noise detectors generate representative signals that are compared with a threshold value for determining the input to a control for the antenna switch alternately connecting two or more antennas to the front end of the FM receiver. The present invention provides an adaptive threshold for each of the signal strength and noise signals so that the switching is limited to significant changes in signal strength and noise levels. In the preferred embodiment, the noise level threshold is adapted as a function of the modulation level of the audio composite signal delivered from the FM detector to the FM stereo decoder of the receiver.

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Farmington Hills, MI, United States of America

Latha Ravi