Lets list out some of pro's of having an FM radio.
1) During the event of an emergency, such as tornado or whatnot, internet services and cell-phone towers are down, yet broadcasters continue to broadcast. Good luck getting an internet connection when your town has been devastated, and you're looking for a relief center.
2) Motorcycles. Yes, most, if not all cars have FM radios. Motorcycles do not. When I'm out and about riding my bike, I like to receive live traffic alerts.
3) You may have FM already. Most phones already contain FM radios within a 4-in-1 chip. Broadcom and TI pushed out the majority mobile chips found in phones, and the most common chip is a 4-in-1 that has WiFi, GPS, Bluetooth and FM Radio on a single wafer. So if your phone already has the hardware, why wouldn't you want it enabled?
4) Battery life. The FM radio barely uses any battery whatsoever because it doesn't have to tax the CPU to decode bitstreams. So a benefit of using the FM radio is extended battery life.
5) Phone stays cooler, reference point #4. Less CPU usages means less heat. Meaning you don't have a pocket warmer.
6) Sporting events and broadcasting licensing. Yep, not everything can be streamed (legally) due to license regulations.
7) Smart phones should have everything. You're a nerd/geek/techie and you want everything. Why have limits? Even a laser and ultrasound sensor would be great for measuring distance, temperature and other possibilities.
8) New music exposure
9) Cost of production - Reference point #3, they're already on most chips. And you can buy FM module chips at retail for $1.00, very inexpensive feature for carriers to implement.
10) When your phone becomes so obsolete that not even the WiFi is secure anymore because of weak encryption, well at least your phone has a usable radio!
11) You don't have to use it. You hate anyone else that uses it because you're better than them, so you can exercise your superiority by not using the radio feature. It's always better to over-saturate data providers anyways right? Only the cool kids buffer
---------- Post added at 06:40 AM ---------- Previous post was at 05:51 AM ----------
Oh, and the S5 does NOT have FM Radio available:
"Our studies show a trend shift of interest to digital broadcasting, specifically – focus on listening to music content in social networks or on the channel YouTube. The flagship model of our products are focused on customers who use digital content, which use modern formats and channels of information consumption. "
They want you to spend more money on data usage.
So on that note, just because DTH, cable & IP televisions are wide spread, should Samsung produce its future TV’s without a tuner for Terrestrial reception? Sounds like a great idea, what could possibly go wrong; especially in a disaster situation.
