Inovonics 651 Blends Two Antennas, or Two StationsIt brings the 656’s maximum ratio combining to FM-only translator sitesTranslator operators have lived with a bad choice for years. Put up one antenna and accept whatever the signal does at that site, or put up two and let a switcher pick between them, which swaps one compromised signal for another every time it flips.The AARON 651, now shipping from Inovonics, takes a third approach. Its dual tuners use maximum ratio combining, evaluating both antenna inputs continuously and deciding whether antenna 1, antenna 2 or a weighted blend of the two gives the cleanest result. It calculates the ratio rather than picking a winner, so a site might run 70 percent from one antenna and 30 percent from the other, then shift as conditions move. The 651 is the FM-only version of the company’s 656, which adds HD Radio reception and took a Radio World Best of Show Award at the 2026 NAB Show. Inovonics says the combining approach helps most in difficult reception areas, particularly around bodies of water and in weather or inversion-layer conditions.New in the 651 is a feature the company calls Unlink Tuners. Rather than feeding both tuners from separate antennas aimed at the same station, an operator can tune tuner 1 to one frequency and tuner 2 to a second. Both are monitored constantly, and the receiver takes whichever is delivering the better RSSI at that moment. For a translator relaying programming available from two sources, that is a failover path with no dead air on the handoff. The two signals do need to be closely synchronized in time for the transition to be clean, so it is worth confirming that before a site depends on it.Standard operation still puts two antennas on one station, with the receiver combining or selecting to hold the best signal available.The rest carries over from the 656: a five-band audio processor with a four-band parametric equalizer, AGC, stereo enhancement and dual limiters; progressive failover options covering everything from a noisy carrier to total signal loss; and Inovonics’ noise-reduction tools for making a marginal signal usable rather than merely present.