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Digital TV
austin man - 19/12/11 at 10:25 PM

Not sure whether its me or is anyone else suffering, my channels seem to be dropping off like a dead cat up a tree. I have a booster fitted yet I am still only seeing a 30 % signal.

Anone have any ideas how to improve this and get channels back, signal was definitely better with analogue

matt_gsxr - 19/12/11 at 10:31 PM

This site is useful

http://www.ukfree.tv/

geoff shep - 19/12/11 at 10:37 PM

Some boxes/TVs have been screwed up by recent free view changes. Try this site and do a manual re-tune, this should restore any scrambled channels and reset regional settings.

http://www.digitaluk.co.uk/postcodechecker/manual_retuning

wilkingj - 20/12/11 at 12:24 AM

quote:
Originally posted by geoff shep
Some boxes/TVs have been screwed up by recent free view changes. Try this site and do a manual re-tune, this should restore any scrambled channels and reset regional settings.

http://www.digitaluk.co.uk/postcodechecker/manual_retuning


Yes there were a few changes a few days ago.
Didnt affect me... BUT...
Try a re-scan of the channels first before doing anything else.
It wil cost you nowt, and wont make things worse.

Is your Aerial a Wide band aerial (They call them Digital aerials) or did you keep the one you had for analogue TV?
There is a fair bit of difference. It also ought to be located outside the house with a clear view to the transmitter, ie not looking through trees and other peoples roofs or walls.
Also if changing your aerial, change the downlead as I bet its been up there 30 years (mine was)!

DONT buy from Maplins or the like unless you are rich or desperate (or both). Find your local TV aerial rigger and buy from him.
My aerial cost me £15, and it works a treat. You dont need a HUGE aerial, but you do need one that is adequate. Your local man should advise you better than the box shifting non techies in most shops.
I watched a customer pay out over £90 for an aerial and 25metres of cable and a handfull opf cable clips.. What a rip off.
cable 40p a metre, clips £5 ofr a box of 100, and a £15-25 aerial from my local dealer.

Ah.. I'm a Locoster at heart!

David Jenkins - 20/12/11 at 08:05 AM

quote:
Originally posted by wilkingj
Ah.. I'm a Locoster at heart!



But you do have just a *little bit* of experience with radio stuff!

Peteff - 20/12/11 at 09:33 AM

When you fit a new aerial make sure you have shielded coax as well. It helps keep the stray signals from electrical equipment and traffic from breaking up your signal. You can't put tight radius bends in it so plan your cable route.

jossey - 20/12/11 at 10:39 AM

get a signal tester
check aerial is in correct position
upgrade aerial if required.
use better co ax cable
upgrade fireware on box if out of date.
update channels as required

we have just bought a new aerial from screw fix reduced from £50 to £20 and we get 89% on most channels but took a long time to get setup.

Then a booster fitted.

new cabling

and 1 new box as old one was sh*t.

David Jenkins - 20/12/11 at 11:34 AM

What pees me off is that before the last digital "upgrade" I got all the available channels at near-enough 100% as far as the TV was concerned, even though I've only got a largish loft aerial (I'm only 15 or so miles line-of-sight from the transmitter). Then they mucked everything about leaving one set of channels at vastly reduced power meaning that now I can't get 3 or 4 channels I do watch occasionally. All the remainder are still knocking on 100%.

However, all the cr@p channels I never watch are still working fine (the 'adult porn' channels, shopping channels, etc) but the ones I do watch occasionally with real programmes won't even attempt to show a picture. Shows what their priorities are, doesn't it!

Allegedly they'll restore the power of the missing set of channels sometime in July 2012...

[Edited on 20/12/11 by David Jenkins]

geoff shep - 20/12/11 at 02:07 PM

David, do try the link I gave above. I just did a factory re-set and auto search and half the channels were rubbish. After the sequence of actions in that link they are all fine. Only thing it doesn't specify is that when you get to the HD group (if you have a HD free view tuner) you need to set DVB-T to DVB-T2.

David Jenkins - 20/12/11 at 03:18 PM

I fixed it!

It was the word "wideband" uttered by Mr Wilkin, plus a bit of research about the Sudbury transmitter. It seems that they've shoved the group of channels up to 63 to avoid interference with Dover (of all places). Once Dover is completely digital next June then they'll move the channels back & up the power again.

As 63 is a long way from the high 40s & low 50s of the rest of them, and my aerial is not wideband, I thought I'd try a wideband high-gain Labgear one courtesy of Screwfix (they had a cut-price deal on). Spent a little while fiddling around, retuned the TVs, and all my channels have been restored.

All I want now are some decent programmes to watch...