Freeview Light on the Marlow Bottom (Buckinghamshire, England) transmitter
 | Google map |  | Bing map |  | Google Earth |  | 51.589,-0.787 or 51°35'21"N 0°47'15"W |  | SL7 3YA |
The symbol shows the location of the Marlow Bottom (Buckinghamshire, England) transmitter which serves 1,700 homes. The bright green areas shown where the signal from this transmitter is strong, dark green areas are poorer signals. Those parts shown in yellow may have interference on the same frequency from other masts.
This transmitter has no current reported problems
The BBC and Digital UK report there are no faults or engineering work on the Marlow Bottom (Buckinghamshire, England) transmitter._______
Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)
The Marlow Bottom (Buckinghamshire, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: U&Yesterday, 4seven, 5Action, 5STAR, 5USA, Al Jazeera Eng, Al Jazeera English, Blaze, Blaze +1, Challenge, Channel 5 +1, DMAX, E4 Extra, YAAAS!, Film4 +1, Food Network, FRANCE 24 (in English), GREAT! action, GREAT! christmas, GREAT! movies, GREAT! romance mix, HGTV, HobbyMaker, ITV2 +1, ITV3 +1, ITV4 +1, ITVBe +1, Legend, PBS America, Quest +1, Quest Red, Really, Sky Mix, Sky News, Talking Pictures TV, That's 90s, That's TV 2, Together TV, TRUE CRIME, TRUE CRIME XTRA, U&Dave, U&Dave ja vu, U&Drama +1, U&W.
If you want to watch these channels, your aerial must point to one of the 80 Full service Freeview transmitters. For more information see the will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? page.
Which Freeview channels does the Marlow Bottom transmitter broadcast?
If you have any kind of Freeview fault, follow this Freeview reset procedure first.Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.
| Mux | H/V | Frequency | Height | Mode | Watts |
| PSB1 BBCA | V max | C49 (698.0MHz) | 120m | DTG- | 11W |
 1 BBC One (SD) London, 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 16 others | |||||
| PSB2 D3+4 | V max | C58 (770.0MHz) | 120m | DTG- | 11W |
 3 ITV 1 (SD) (London), 4 Channel 4 (SD) London ads, 5 Channel 5, 6 ITV 2, 10 ITV3, 13 E4, 14 Film4, 15 Channel 4 +1 London ads, 18 More4, 26 ITV4, 28 ITVBe, 30 E4 +1, 35 ITV1 +1 (London), 71 That’s 60s, | |||||
| PSB3 BBCB | V max | C54 (738.0MHz) | 120m | DTG- | 11W |
 46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD London, 102 BBC Two HD England, 103 ITV 1 HD (ITV London), 104 Channel 4 HD London ads, 105 Channel 5 HD, 106 BBC Four HD, 107 BBC Three HD, 204 CBBC HD, 205 CBeebies HD, plus 1 others | |||||
Are you trying to watch these 44 Freeview channels?
The Marlow Bottom (Buckinghamshire, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: U&Yesterday, 4seven, 5Action, 5STAR, 5USA, Al Jazeera Eng, Al Jazeera English, Blaze, Blaze +1, Challenge, Channel 5 +1, DMAX, E4 Extra, YAAAS!, Film4 +1, Food Network, FRANCE 24 (in English), GREAT! action, GREAT! christmas, GREAT! movies, GREAT! romance mix, HGTV, HobbyMaker, ITV2 +1, ITV3 +1, ITV4 +1, ITVBe +1, Legend, PBS America, Quest +1, Quest Red, Really, Sky Mix, Sky News, Talking Pictures TV, That's 90s, That's TV 2, Together TV, TRUE CRIME, TRUE CRIME XTRA, U&Dave, U&Dave ja vu, U&Drama +1, U&W.
If you want to watch these channels, your aerial must point to one of the 80 Full service Freeview transmitters. For more information see the will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? page.
Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Marlow Bottom transmitter?
ITV London News 4.9m homes 18.4%
from London WC1X 8XZ, 47km east (97°)
to ITV London region - 55 masts.
How will the Marlow Bottom (Buckinghamshire, England) transmission frequencies change over time?
| 1984-97 | 1997-98 | 1998-2012 | 2012-13 | 30 Mar 2018 | |||||
| C/D E | C/D E | C/D E | C/D E T | C/D E T | |||||
| C49tv_off | BBCA | BBCA | |||||||
| C54tv_off | C4waves | C4waves | C4waves | BBCB | BBCB | ||||
| C58tv_off | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | D3+4 | D3+4 | ||||
| C61 | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | ||||||
| C64 | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBC2waves |
tv_off Being removed from Freeview (for 5G use) after November 2020 / June 2022 - more
Table shows multiplexes names see this article;
green background for transmission frequencies
Notes: + and - denote 166kHz offset; aerial group are shown as A B C/D E K W T
waves denotes analogue; digital switchover was 4 Apr 12 and 18 Apr 12.
How do the old analogue and currrent digital signal levels compare?
| Analogue 1-4 | 13W | |
| BBCA, D3+4, BBCB | (-0.7dB) 11W |
Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Crystal Palace transmitter area
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Saturday, 14 April 2012
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Chris Burmajster1:59 PM
We live in Marlow Bottom and are concerned by that we won't get the full 50 Freeview channels advertised on the Freeview website after switchover, presumably due to our transmitter being a relay. Will our transmitter ever be upgraded so that we can receive all 50 Freeview channels?
Thank you.
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Chris Burmajster: It is right that Marlow Bottom transmitter will not provide the full range of Freeview channels as it will only carry Public Service Broadcaster (PSB) channels.
The Commercial broadcasters (the "COMs") transmit from 80 of the largest (by viewer population) stations and achieve a 90% reach. For them to transmit from nearly 1,100 relays like Marlow Bottom would roughly double their cost of transmission. If they did this, that outlay would give them an additional 8.5% of the population. They were invited to increase their coverage and declined. For a more in-depth explanation, see Will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? | ukfree.tv - independent free digital TV advice
In some cases there are ways of getting the Commercial channels. These usually entail additional cost as new aerials will be required.
I had a look and have come up with the following shortlist of permutations. Not all may be possible as what can be received can only really be determined by an installer on site.
I went to the Digital UK (DUK) Tradeview predictor and put in post code in Marlow Bottom. This was to give an idea of what may be receivable.
1. Receive all services from Crystal Palace. At the test post code, DUK suggests PSBs are "good" but COMs "variable". The point being that there is a difference and the COMs aren't as good.
As Marlow Bottom is a relay of Crystal Palace, regional programming is the same.
2. The predictor considers all services (PSBs and COMs) from Hannington to be "good" at the test location. One option is to receive all services from Hannington, but this would mean changing to BBC South and ITV Meridian.
3. Use Freesat in combination with a terrestrial aerial on Hannington. You can watch BBC and ITV London programming via Freesat. Your Hannington aerial will allow you to watch terrestrial Commercial services that are not on Freesat such as Dave and Pick TV.
4. You may be able to combine ("diplex") into one downlead, your current aerial on Marlow Bottom with one on Hannington. In order to do this a diplexer must be used so that only one of the aerials supplies the signal on each channel. See here Online TV Splitters, Amps & Diplexers sales
Marlow Bottom uses C49 to C58 and Hannington's highest COM is on C47. So you would need a diplexer that splits at C48 (if such a thing is available - I'm not an aerial installer so I don't know).
This is probably a last ditch possibility where all others have been eliminated.
I should point out that some receivers (recorders/PVRs) don't function well when receiving services from different transmitters with regards to recording programmed programmes. You could use your Hannington aerial as your main one, so the services from that transmitter will be in the "proper" logical channel numbers, i.e. 1=BBC One from Hannington 2=BBC Two from Hannington. The only use your Marlow Bottom aerial will have is for BBC One London and ITV London which you could put on 800 and 801, for example.
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As I say, what's actually possible will have to be tested on-site. The village is surrounded by trees and these can affect reception. They will probably not be taken into account by the DUK predictor.
At the test location, the road is not flat and the houses on one side are higher than on the other. It's a fair assumption that chances of reception are likely to be greater the higher up the aerial is. The size of aerials and tall masts tells the story!
I did spot a couple of houses on the low side of the road with large aerials on Crystal Palace. These are in the direction of the other side of the road, so the higher houses will probably be causing a shadow. However, what I would say is that if those lower houses can get a signal from CP, then the chance will probably be greater if you live in one of those higher houses!
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Chris Burmajster4:30 PM
Thank you, Dave Lindsay, for your prompt and detailed reply.
So it seems that we are not worth the money as far as the commercial broadcasters are concerned! It's not too much of a problem as we don't watch that much telly and the only channels we want that we can't get are Film 4 and Dave. Instead we get Gay Rabbit and 301, two channels we will never watch. It's a shame that we can't swap!
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Tuesday, 10 December 2013
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Chris Burmajster8:04 PM
Having just heard about the new HD channels, I re-tuned my Humax Freeview HD box but only got 3 extra channels: Film 4 (SD) BBC3 HD and CBBC HD. What happened to BBC4 HD and BBC News 24 HD? We really want the latter two.
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Chris Burmajster: Film4 standard definition has been available from the Marlow Bottom transmitter for several months now.
The HD streams of BBC Three and CBBC are now available from all transmitters, alongside HD streams of BBC One, BBC Two, ITV and Channel 4.
The new HD channels BBC Four and BBC News are only available from 30 transmitters on lower power than the other channels. This means that their coverage is less than those of the existing Commercial (COM) channels.
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Wednesday, 11 December 2013
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Chris Burmajster10:52 AM
Dave: thank you for your response.
Does this mean that we will never get BBC Four HD and BBC News 24 HD from this transmitter? I read somewhere that more BBC HD channels will be available next year, could that be the 2 that we want?
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Chris Burmajster: I don't believe that is likely. I can only imagine that you read about the new quasi-national multiplex and that it has started a earlier than expected.
Film4 fitted in where text services such as Gay Rabbit used to be. There has always been room for a fifth HD service on the HD multiplex. Channel 5 didn't want it so it fell to the BBC.
Changes "may" come after 2018. I say this because the licence for the new BBC HD services was granted subject to possible revocation no sooner than the end of 2018. This would allow replanning of the frequencies used for TV, but who knows whether it will result in more services from PSB-only relays like Marlow Bottom. The point is that there isn't likely to be any more for at least five years.
Satellite (Freesat) looks to be your only sure-fire way to get these services. Even if you could receive from Crystal Palace, the power of the new HD mux is much lower than the rest, so you aren't likely to pick it up.
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Paul Gilbert 3:07 PM
Dave Lindsay: hi Dave since the new bbc hd channels came out Tuesday this week we can only get cbbc and bbc hd 3 but that just a notice it will soon becoming. On the guild there is no bbc hd news or bbc4 hd . I have two free view Tvs both same but different antenna .any advice please
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Paul Gilbert : BBC Three and CBBC timeshare, so when one is on the other isn't. The same applies to the HD variants of these services.
BBC Three HD and CBBC HD are available to everyone who can receive Freeview.
BBC Four HD and BBC News HD are not available to everyone who has Freeview, although more transmitters are to come on air next year. If you receive your TV from Marlow Bottom transmitter, or from one of the many other PSB-only transmitters, then you won't get these services, unless you can receive from another transmitter which carries them.
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Michael3:23 PM
Paul Gilbert : I suggest you read the previous comments to avoid everyone repeating themselves.
Chris Burmajster: I think the only time you will see more channels on a relay transmitter is when they are all switched to DVB-T2, allowing higher bitrates and thus more SD/HD channels. However that would require everyone to have a Freeview HD receiver, so to drive the uptake these, new HD channels are being launched.
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