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Brian Butterworth published on UK Free TV For the last six years, I have answered many thousands of personal emails that you have sent to UK Free TV.
Sadly, I am unable to offer this personal service at the moment.
Until I can restore this service, please can you leave any questions you have on an appropriate page, where they will be answered as soon as possible, or below, if you can't figure out where to ask.
I look forward to your questions!
Help with TV/radio stations?
In this section
Friday, 21 February 2014
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Steve P8:02 PM
Wrexham
AJ Rich - you have not been cheated. It is only recently that those in charge set the standard for HDTV.
You need to think of your TV as being 2 things in one box
1) A display system of a specified quality - like your computer monitor
2) One or more tuners; (things that SELECT a channel and CONVERT it to a format your monitor can show) typically from
a)Analogue TV
b)Digital SD Terrestrial TV - FREEVIEW
c) Ditto HD - FREEVIEW HD
d)Satellite TV - FREESAT
e)Internet TV
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Steve's: mapS's Freeview map terrainS's terrain plot wavesS's frequency data S's Freeview Detailed Coverage
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Steve P8:06 PM
Wrexham
oops - forgot to say that all those tuners can be internal or external feeding into your monitor with SCART; HDMI; YPrPg; or other connections.
Obviously a lot of TVs are now ONLY monitors as they had only analogue.
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Steve's: mapS's Freeview map terrainS's terrain plot wavesS's frequency data S's Freeview Detailed Coverage
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michael8:39 PM
There are a lot of notices of brief service cuts for engineering works, but without any indication of the purpose of such works. It would be most interesting to know!
A few days ago I overheard people on the local bus complaining that they still could not get a consistently reliable television picture in Ilfracombe. It comes, breaks up then disappears for a while and so on. They were not happy as they had no problems when it was still analog. I don't know whether they understood that the cause was co-channel interference from Carmel "bouncing off" the rising and falling Bristol Channel. I am sure they would be more understanding if they knew that they endure an unacceptable service so that 3G and 4G companies can beef up their future profit margins...
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Saturday, 22 February 2014
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Pat10:31 AM
Do I still have to use a box with my new free view tv or is it built in and can I convert the sky dish lead to fit in the back of the tv
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MikeB12:29 PM
Pat: Look at the manual. If you've got a freeview TV, its called that because it has a Freview/Freeview HD tuner built into it. Have a look at the FAQ's - the most popular is about connecting TV's to dishes. You cant - you need an aerial.
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MikeB12:37 PM
AJ Rich: To follow up on earlier advice - most TV's from major brands should now be HD ready or Full HD panels, and now with a Freeview HD tuner. If its really cheap, then it will probably just have a Freeview tuner. HD ready TV's can have HD tuners in them, but I keep noticing that places like Argos big up the 'HD' part, but not really making it clear that that tends to refer to the panel, not the tuner.
You might not 'have not been cheated', but you might have been misled (HD has been largely standard for three years). If its a new TV, then I'd change it for one with a Freeview HD tuner - the extra cost is not huge, but if you dont, your going to need another box to get HD on the TV. Having said that, a recorder with Freeview HD will allow you get those HD channels
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michael: I've answered this point elsewhere, but I will reiterate it.
There are two types of "engineering work". The first is planned months in advance and are pre-notified. If you have £10k a year you can even get them sent to you in detail, by email before they happen. All you need is Joining the DTG
The second type of work is "faults". All of the transmitters have redundant systems - multiple power supplies, transmission equipment and so forth. Most have the ability to take a signal from Intelsat 907 27.5°W if they need to.
However, sometimes the transmitter won't be able to switch to an automatic (or sometimes remote activated) backup.
When this happens the services will come off air.
When this happens they appear on the R+T Investigation site and - eventually - on here.
These are "genuine faults". I did used to call them faults, but as the pre-notified work also appear in the list, I was don't use the word "fault".
The smaller a transmitter is, and the remoteness of it from the network, the longer a fault will take to sort out. Arqiva have offices in Crawley and London ... there isn't anyone based in your part of the world - as might have happened in the distant past - waiting for things to go wrong, as, generally speaking, they don't.
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Anthony4:30 PM
Pat: With a freeview or freeview hd television you cannot connect a dish whatsoever. You need a freesat hd or generic free to air (non freesat) hd satellite receiver connected to your minidish cable and this can be connectrd via Scart or hdmi cable to your tv. Freesat hd and non freesat hd satellite receivers are better as you get clear sharp hd channels for free along with lovely crystal clear dolby digital stereo and surround sound thru a suitable dvd or bluray home cinema system connected via SPDIF or coaxial digital connections.
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Pat: If the "box" you are asking about is a Freeview one then no you don't need it to watch Freeview.
For Sky you need the Sky box and you cannot connect the dish to the TV unless it has a satellite receiver in-built, this usually being for Freesat. Most TVs don't have Freesat capability and those that do are more expensive because they contain Freeview and Freesat tuners.
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Your comments do not solve my problem,but thanks for trying to help.I can record
off-air programmes with external tuners as you suggest,but with Smart tv signals
off my broadband I can see them on the tv but cannot record them e.g BBC iPlayer,
Eurosport (for which I subscribe):and various other apps which are only
available to me.through my tv.
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