i don’t understand when i google it so Whats the difference
In: Technology
“AM” means “amplitude modulation.” It sends sound signals by changing how high up and down the radio waves go. Big waves have high amplitude. Small waves have low amplitude. This is like having a single pure sound that gets louder or quieter, or a single pure color that gets more or less intense.
“FM” means “frequency modulation.” The signal slightly adjusts the frequency by tiny amounts to encode the sounds. The waves get slightly longer (lower frequency) or shorter (higher). This is like starting from the note C and becoming *slightly* sharper or flatter, or starting from green and becoming *slightly* more yellow or blue.
People all answered this from a technical perspective. I’ll answer from a practical and business one
FM is able to offer significantly higher quality audio than AM, coming in at a little under cd quality, this makes FM the best format for music. However this is at a loss of range. AM radio stations offer a longer range, especially at night, but have lower quality. FM is also more susceptible to interference, which could again lower the ability to receive the signal.
For music FM is the best. For talk or sports, AM actually does pretty fine.
For business. Radios popularity is waning but AM is getting it the worst. FM is king of radio and has been a long time. AM has been on the significant decline for a very long time and seems to be dying out sooner than later, and likely sooner than FM. It’s probable the AM frequencies will be repurposed for some other use when it’s finally fed or just, mostly dead.
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