Switchover starts in the East Midlands
Brian Butterworth published on UK Free TV This week sees the first stage of the digital television switchover for 813,298 homes in the East Midlands.
From 6am Wednesday 17 August 2011, you must to a perform a "first time installation" retune (sometimes "Factory Reset" or "Shipping Condition") on your Freeview box or television set if you use the Waltham full service Freeview transmitters. This is because the old "multiplex 1" BBC service will be replaced by the BBCA multiplex on the old analogue ITV-1 frequency, C61. Analogue ITV-1 moves to to C64 for two weeks.
If you use the Ambergate, Ashbourne, Ashford in the Water, Belper, Birchover, Bolehill, Darley Dale, Eastwood, Leicester, Little Eaton, Matlock, Parwich, Stamford, or Stanton Moor relay transmitters from mid-morning on Wednesday 17th August 2011 you will be able to receive the BBC Freeview services (with the exception of HD) for the first time, and you will no longer be able to view BBC TWO on analogue.
You MAY find that old equipment will no longer work - see TVs and boxes that do not support the 8k-mode
On Wednesday 31th August 2011 will see the second stage of switchover, which provides the final Freeview configuration, including Freeview HD for all transmitters in this region.
On this date, you will need, once again, to do a "first time installation" as indicated above.
If you are over 75, you should aleady have been supplied new equipment by the Switchover Help Scheme.
7:20 PM
Hi Mike.
Thank you so much for the info. - It really has been a 'minefield' of informatio tryng to piece everything together, so thank you for making things a lot clearer.
What I cannot understand, is Mux A not moving again, as I understood in October it would have to move to it's final resting place, accompanied by the power increase (currently kept at present levels through DSO this August).
I also take it, BBC2 Analogue doesn't disappear from Waltham until 31st, which is different from a while back when it was thought to go on 17th.
Thank you once again. Regards,
Tim.
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timonthenet: Just to say, BBC TWO analogue always gets removed at the first stage of switchover, even if the transmitter is already broadcasting Freeview.
This is because in almost all cases the BBCA multiplex is assigned to the old BBC TWO analogue frequency.
From the Waltham page:
"Muliplex A (SDN) will move from C26 to C29 (at 8kW) in advance of switchover during March 2011, and will adopt its final power level during October 2011."
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11:35 PM
Thanks Brian, that is what I thought from reading the above entry - it somehow then didn't impinge upon my mind that although the power levels increased, it doesn't say it will move again - ie it will indeed remain in the same spot.
What comes of not reading properly - sorry!
Thanks both Brian and Mike again for their ceaseless work to help get people like me through the changes successfully.
Tim.
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1:39 AM
timonthenet: In this particular case, BBC A has been allocated ITV1 analogue's old frequency. It was felt that removing the one of the most-watched channels was too much of a shock, so instead, BBC Two closes and ITV1 moves to BBC Two's location for the period between stage one and stage two of switchover.
BBC Two's old frequency couldn't be used because it's being released for 4G phones in the initial batch of frequencies. BBC A will now have to move from C61, as this is being released too, but this was decided too late to get the necessary international co-ordination for high-power transmitters, so it's starting up on a doomed frequency for now. There will be another retune later to sort this out, but we don't yet know when.
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11:32 AM
BBC1, BBC2, BBC News 24 and BBC Parliament are breaking up making wierd noises and screen is in layers.
Waltham - Castle Donington
Re-tuned 6 times today altogether each one as new box setup.
Every other channel working fine
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1:36 PM
Dave Hunter: It's probable that your BBC channels are coming from another region. A common problem due to lack of foresight when the receivers software was written.
You may find your proper BBC channels in the 800s You may just have to put up with that for now because the popular trick of removing the aerial during during the scan will not be that useful at the moment due to the spread of the other multiplexes for the next 2 weeks.
Instead, if you can, delete all the BBC channels from the channel list then manually scan UHF channel 61.
If someone knows where the problematic BBC channels are coming from, it may help
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Dave Hunter: You have not provided a postcode, so it hard to be sure, but you may have too much signal from the transmitter. If you have a booster or amplifier, remove it from your system and rescan.
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1:44 PM
Good point Brian. I'll leave it to the expert :)
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3:26 PM
Retuned this morning and everthing OK except I am now receiving Look North and not East Midlands Today. I live in Nottingham
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3:50 PM
Paul Mapp: See Digital Region Overlap for thoughts on how to fix this.
The most likely explanation is that the box simply stores the first version of the channels that it finds. It could also be that the new BBC digital signal from Waltham is too loud and therefore gets distorted, making it impossible to decode. If you have a booster, you could try removing or turning it down.
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