iPod Musings

I had an interesting discussion last night on the van. As you know, I listen to my iPod on the drive, using one of those radio transmitter thingies because the van only has a CD player. We started talking about the interference we get in the device because of the large number of radio stations, and segued from there into transmission distances. We realized the issue is not the distance from the transmitting device to the radio, but to the antenna, which is on the opposite side of the van, outside (anything in the car would be shielded to prevent engine interference). We can’t easily increase the power of the transmitter given the nature of circuits these days (plus you don’t want to overpower the car next to you), so the question is how to move the transmitter closer to the antenna, or extend the antenna closer to the transmitter. We didn’t come up with a good solution (although the discussion was fascinating), so I thought I would see if anyone here has good ideas.