Arqiva statement on West Central England switchovers
Brian Butterworth published on UK Free TV Arqiva confirms that the Digital Switch Over process for the Ridge Hill, The Wrekin, Lark Stoke and Bromsgrove transmitter groups has been completed successfully. The four key stations and 21 relay sites serve Herefordshire, parts of Gloucestershire, Shropshire, south Cheshire, and the Stratford-upon-Avon and Bromsgrove areas in the Central TV region.
All digital multiplexes are now being transmitted at high power from the main station at Ridge Hill, with its 17 dependent relays carrying the three public-service multiplexes for the first time: Andoversford, Eardiston, Ewyas Harold, Garth Hill HP/VP, Knucklas, Hazler Hill, Hereford, Hope under Dinmore, Kington, Ludlow, New Radnor, Oakeley Mynd, Peterchurch, Presteigne, Ross On Wye, St Briavels and Upper Soudley.
The three public-service multiplexes are now being transmitted at high power from the main station at The Wrekin and, for the first time, from four dependent relays at Bucknell, Clun, Coalbrookdale and Halesowen. The Commercial multiplexes at The Wrekin will move to their final post-DSO transmission parameters in September 2011.
The three public-service multiplexes are also now being transmitted at high power from Lark Stoke and Bromsgrove, and similarly their Commercial multiplexes will be able to adopt their final post-DSO transmission parameters in September 2011.
Following switch-off of the BBC Two analogue signal on 6 April, the remaining analogue signals for BBC One, ITV1, Channel 4 and Channel 5 ceased by 00:03 on Wednesday 20 April. The new digital signals entered official service at Ridge Hill at 05:45, The Wrekin at 06:00, Lark Stoke at 05:50 and Bromsgrove at 05:59, with the relays completed by 16:00
9:38 PM
Tewkesbury
since retuning my digital reception is much worse, especially ITV and related chanels. Most annoying ,the programme guides for these stations do not appear at all. Why? we used to recieve good reception from Ridgehill but now it is awful. We live GL20 7EP. Help please.
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John's: mapJ's Freeview map terrainJ's terrain plot wavesJ's frequency data J's Freeview Detailed Coverage
10:49 PM
Very good signals from The Wrekin DTT now that analogue has been turned off. (I am in Cannock). It is a pleasant surprise that I can now receive S4C Circlun, BBC 1 & 2 Wales, and quite a few duplicate BBC channels. So, are the Welsh channels being transmitted from The Wrekin or am I picking up Moel-y-Parc, which used to give a fair analogue picture before the DTT transmitters came on? I have not found a good channel & frequency listing online.
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Dave Buchanan: Please see Digital Region Overlap | ukfree.tv - independent free digital TV advice .
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John Woodcock: If you have any boosters or amplifiers, remove them from your system.
If you don't, you may have to fit an attenuator.
Also please see Single frequency interference | ukfree.tv - independent free digital TV advice .
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11:25 PM
Tewkesbury
Help! Since the April 20th upgrade(?) we have lost Freeview channels from the A,C & D groups. I live in GL20 area and get BBC West Midlands but don't know which transmitter we use, I have tried rescanning repeatedly, clearing channels, unplug/rescan to no avail...are there any options apart from Sky?
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ALLIE's: mapA's Freeview map terrainA's terrain plot wavesA's frequency data A's Freeview Detailed Coverage
ALLIE: If you are using the Malvern transmitter, then you will have to wait for September to get the commercial multiplexes.
Or you can move your aerial to point at Ridge Hill transmitter from which you can receive all the services today.
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11:01 PM
Hereford
the new itv-1 west from ridge hill at 5kw [until oct when it goes to 20kw] is excellent on some tvs and dvdrecs but most tvs etc reject it . Any comments on this odd situation ?
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bernard's: mapB's Freeview map terrainB's terrain plot wavesB's frequency data B's Freeview Detailed Coverage
11:58 PM
Bernard Hunt: It really depends on how the receivers handle more than one version of the same channel. Some will indeed utterly ignore it and might not even allow it to be manually added. Others will put the first version found at 3 and the other up in the 800s (or the first space they find) - the Central version has the lower frequency. Still more will pick the best quality or strongest version - Central will be stronger at the moment as it's higher power, and it's probable that the lower frequency version will still have a higher received signal strength anyway.
If there's a clash of channels, the newest receivers should ask which region you want to store, although again some of them are then not storing the alternative at all, and some don't allow the alternative to be manually added after that. This is a problem when there are minor differences in the region name coming from one transmitter!
If you currently have the Central version at 3 (and 33) and your box doesn't have a way to change that, the easiest way is to delete them and manually tune C29.
I presume that the ITV1 +1 version on the Ridge Hill West mini-mux is Wales?
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2:34 PM
Since a strong easterly wind affected my aerial, on royal weddiing day, I have been unable to get any audio or video on any BBC Channel, even though the receiver never fails to install these, and 100 more, channels after numerous retunes and aerial adjustments.
The only reliably good signal I now receive is ITV1 on 538.0MHz C29.
All main channels were perfectly o.k. after switchover for ten days
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