Have Big L given up? I posted on the "Technical" section on Tuesday 30/7 that the Pure Lounge listening platform was showing "Station Not Available" and no one from the station has bothered to respond. In fact FOBLis pretty lifeless these days and has been for sometime. Having manually added the URL to my Pure One Flow I then tuned in at 4pm on Tuesday and again the playout system is in full swing with no Roger Davis and no presenter for Drivetime. I honestly can't remember the last time I heard RD on air. It seems odd to me that shows are live in the evenings yet part of the daytime is playout. Now I can appreciate that many Big L staff have full time jobs but surely Drive should at the least be covered by a pre-recorded show?

Generally, many of the staff are under a great deal of pressure from other things in life and fully committed. They put in as much time and effort as humanly possible, but there is a limit. Personally, I wish I could commit more time, but with more important commitments, I'm already stretched to the limit. Others are in a similar situation. That doesn't mean we don't care, although I apreciate that may be the way it seems at times. The fact that Big L has survived over 8 yrs of pretty troubled times and continues to provide a service to many, with a fair quantity of live programming, proves that there's plenty who do care.

Most of the daytime output is live, and for us, the evening slot is peak, due to transatlantic listening.

As for your technical question, I suspect that if anyone knew the answer offhand you would have had a quick answer. Both my Internet radios are fine, but as I don't have a Pure model and know of no reason why it might not work, I can't comment.

So, in summary, Big L is not falling apart, but there is a limit to what can be achieved within resources. Simple as that.

Thanks Ian I think you have hit the nail on the head maybe many Big L presenters are overstretched including Roger. Clearly there is a limit to how much anyone can take on after all you can't live on "voluntary work"" we all need an income. I was between jobs a few years back & even then with a family and other commitments I struggled at times to produce a 2 hour weekly show. I have absolutely no idea how many on Big L including yourself manage so many hours. Also I hadn't appreciated the transatlantic effect in the evenings sorry.

Perhaps more use of overnight repeats could be used especially to cover drive?

All that aside I suppose the only one who can solve the "Pure" problem is RD and that isn't likely to happen until he re-appears. As said I have manually opened a 128k feed from the Big L website onto iTunes and then copied the URL manually as a custom station onto the Pure One Flow I just hope anyone with a similar problem can do something like this or you will have lost quite a few listeners.

Yes and I am sure that is what will happen. I used to listen to Roger on the way home in the car but if its just the playout I tune elsewhere where there is a "voice". If I want continuous music there are many other options available including my trusty ipod that doesn't drop out!!!

That'll be good, as SW reception is completely wiped out here.

I usually get good sw on Saturdays .. My works vw caddy has a blaupunkt with sw and kbc is pretty good all day :-)

Kevin has replied by the way.

Owning three Pure Avanti Flows, I can say that is just Pure being Pure. Their radio's may sound great and look pretty smart but the firmware is awful and their web portal abysmal. I have exactly the same message on my screen at least 80% of the time when I power the unit back up after listening to a station. This need not just be Big L either. I host my own server for my studio and all three of my Avanti radios will give the same message after being switched off / put in to standby even though I know my URL is not different and my server not restarted or off.
This issue with Pure started when they introduced the power saving feature in it's firmware a few years back and has been rubbish since.
Having said that, we did have an issue with some of our streams on a server around a couple of weeks ago which was fixed on Friday 26th July.

One side note for owners of Avanti Flows. Two of the three units I own have exploded internally. The built in power supplies were to blame on each occasion - I carefully took each apart to find out! The units were around three years old when they went bang but a well worded complaint via Pure's support site got both radios replaced with B grade units with me only needing to pay for the postage to return to base. Whilst I would have rather had my own radio's repaired and returned, the units were well out of warranty so I could not complain too loudly. What did surprise me though, when I booted up the replacement radios, they both still had the previous owners subscription details in their memories.

Sorry it has taken so long to reply to this post. FOBL is not exactly very high on my list of priorities these days so I don't read every post when I do log in. Rog does not own a Pure radio either so I'm guessing short of saying we have not changed URL's, he would not be able to offer any additional information either. The quickest way to get an answer to any technical stuff is to email me direct kev@biglradio.co.uk - if I don't know the answer I can ask the boss!