The Sydney retiree, who built and in the 1980s sold a chain of hi-fi shops, is a classic early adopter, someone who takes instantly to new technology most of us cotton on to several years later. He was using an FM radio, colour television and VCR before they were commercially available, was one of the first to get pay TV (he sourced and installed his own satellite dish) and owns a couple of DVD recorders.
Life on the cutting edge comes at a cost. "I paid $2000 for a digital camera that would now cost $299," he says. "I had one of the first Sony PlayStations. It cost $800. Now they're $200." But the expense of having the latest and best is worth it. "I've only got another 30 years at most," says Dewar, 66. "Impatient? I suppose that's a pretty good way of putting it. I'm impatient to try new technology that I think might make me happier."
When it comes to one technology, however, Dewar has had patience forced on him. He first heard about digital radio a decade ago, yet acquired his first set only two months ago. To date only a couple of hundred people in Australia have regular access to a digital radio - although by now Dewar, naturally, has two.
"The quality of sound is quite superior to what I had before ... It's an absolutely incredible difference for AM," he says. On the downside, the digital receiver in his car required a new aerial and he isn't sure he likes the text screen. "It can be distracting while driving."
Aside from the scarily savvy, such as Dewar, digital radio is only barely on the consumer radar here. Most of us have (probably) heard of it, but suspect it's technical and confusing, and think it's something we won't bother about for a while.
But there is nothing new about the technology, which has been around for the best part of 15 years. In Britain, where the BBC began digital transmissions in the mid-1990s, sales of digital radios outpaced those of analogue for the first time last Christmas and the price of the cheapest set has plummeted from pound stg. 500-plus to about pound stg. 50 ($127).
Meanwhile, Australia still lacks any formal policy on its introduction. The federal Government has been criticised for abnegating leadership on the issue to industry group Commercial Radio Australia, which has been accused of going slow to protect its members, the 32 commercial radio owners, who have invested hundreds of millions in analogue licences.
CRA chief executive Joan Warner rejects that "tired old line" and says the industry merely has been cautious, waiting and seeing which digital protocol would emerge as the best. Now that one has, called Eureka 147, the industry is ready to go. "We can't be the only medium that doesn't move with the times," she says. "We now see it is a key strategic issue and we have to move our industry forward." Which means that, after a decade of not a lot happening, suddenly digital radio may be just around the corner for all of us.
Dewar is one of several hundred people in Sydney and Melbourne participating in two digital radio trials, one run by CRA, the other by companies WorldAudio Group and Broadcast Australia. Both are gathering listener, advertiser and technical feedback on the technology ahead of an impending national roll-out.
WorldAudio chief Andrew Thompson believes that in just a few years the main state capitals and possibly some of the larger regional centres will have a permanent digital service operating alongside the existing analogue one.
"People say, 'Oh, digital radio, that's five years away.' Well, it's not," he insists. "We could have digital broadcasting in Sydney and Melbourne by the end of next year. We are fully prepared and ready, technically and programming-wise, to do that."
In the Sydney trial, 60 consumer panellists using about 10 types of receivers are listening to test digital broadcasts from 13 stations, including 2UE, 2GB, Nova 969, 2DAYFM and ABC Classic FM. By the end of next year CRA aims to have 200 panellists trialling 15 types of receivers. In the Melbourne study, run by market research agency Millward Brown, 200 panellists are listening to digital services provided by the ABC, SBS, Sport 927 and some community stations.
The panellists are being asked what features they like and dislike about their radio set, what differences they observe from analogue radio, how interested they would be in buying a digital radio and whether they would recommend it to friends.
At the moment, digital's main advantage is its CD-quality sound, free of the hiss and crackle that can mar the analogue signal, especially on the AM band. But few consumers are likely to trade in expensive audio equipment just for crisper reception. Broadcasters are relying on other features to get us excited.
Digital radios have screens and stations are experimenting with transmitting text information, such as the title of the last song played and weather and traffic updates. More advanced models, with bigger screens, will be able to receive still and streaming pictures, which ought to please advertisers. Sexiest of all are features such as record, pause and rewind radio, which will enable listeners to pause a program and later pick up where they left off.
Once digital radios with those and even more advanced capabilities come on to the market, "it will really make it interesting, for us, for listeners and for advertisers", says CRA chief Warner.
Broadcast Australia product development director Clive Morton, who this week is travelling in Britain, says digital radio is the second fastest growing technology in that country after MP3. The number of sets in use there leapt from 35,000 at the end of 2000 to 75,000 by the end of 2001, 135,000 in 2002 and 435,000 in 2003. By the end of this year, penetration is forecast to reach about 1.2 million sets, including tabletop radios, personal portables, boom-boxes, hi-fi systems and car receivers.
"The Australian demographic is different from the UK and Europe, and it would be wrong to assume that what works well overseas would automatically be right for Australia," he cautions.
Warner believes it will "take a couple of years to see what [Australian] consumers want from their digital radios", but once that happens we will see the same exponential growth as the UK.
"Australians are early adopters and ... you will see a pretty quick uptake of it once we've got the product right." Even in a worst-case scenario, she predicts we will all have migrated to digital radio within 15 years, including updating our car and clock radios.
In the late '70s and early '80s, broadcasters prodded people to switch from AM to FM by handing out free radios, and "you'll see broadcasters doing all sorts of things like that to get their listeners switched on to digital", Warner says. The commercial radio broadcasters "are the ones that will drive the roll-out. And we'll be driving this pretty hard."
In return, they want free access to the new digital spectrum, a bar on any new entrants for at least 10 years and an "appropriate and lengthy" simulcast period before analogue radio is completely phased out, possibly lasting as long as 20 years. Warner says CRA has discussed this wish list with the Government and the Opposition and received a "very positive" response.
Also to be sorted is whether WorldAudio, which doesn't operate its stations under the same licence as other owners, should still be considered an incumbent and therefore get the same treatment, such as free access to the digital spectrum, if it's granted. CRA says it shouldn't; Thompson says it should.
However, these technical issues and inter-industry squabbles are of less concern to consumers than the expensive prospect of having to upgrade audio equipment. So why bother?
Warner compares the move from analogue to digital radio to the move from black and white TV to colour. Thompson uses the analogy of going from a rotary to a push-button phone. "At the moment, consumers have no idea how digital radio will change their lives," he says. "It will open up a whole new world of audiovisual experience."
Dewar, though, is already looking ahead to something even newer. "I'm interested in things with memory chips," he says.