All posts by MikeB
Below are all of MikeB's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.
HC: Blackhill seems to be working fine Which Freeview channels does the Black Hill transmitter broadcast? , although you could ask your neighbours.
If your not getting a signal, then the most likely problem is with your own system. Yes, you checked some of the connections, but the signal has to travel from the aerial to your TV - thata lot of potential breaks, faults and lose connections, so its best to check again.
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Peter D. Bain: Does the TV have a seperate digibox or is it built in?
And do other TV's in the house get a good signal?
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Douglas Powell: If the problem is common to all outlets, the logical place to start is where they split or above. Could be a loose cable or water getting in. Or the power supply on the amp is going.
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Paul McDonnell: Have you checked the strength/quality of the various muxes?
The machine is telling you that its not getting enough of a signal, so you need to check if you are getting the correct transmitter. My old Sony PVR, which had, like Panasonics, a pretty sensitive tuner, would bring in other transmitters just enough to fool the PVR, but not enough to actually record anything.
If its locked into another transmitter, you can kill the signal a bit. or retune if it s just a one off.
The second possibility is that the transmitter is spot on, but your system is not. If your losing muxes, thats a classic sign of a system problem, perhaps via lose connections, dodgy cable, etc.
Since you have 3 Panasonics (I assume the 7/8 series), it sounds like the latter problem - so I'd start looking at the point where the signal splits.
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Simon: We have no idea where you are in relation to the transmitter, but check signal strength - if its too high, that can lead to breakups on screen, etc.
If you have the possibility of 4G interference, then At800 will normally send you a filter, etc. Boosters near to a mast with a weak signal can make the chances of 4G interference worse, so you nedd to check if you are actually getting 4G problems at all. In reality, very few people have had a problem.
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S.Rowe: At the top of the page is says there are no reported problems, so its likely to be your system. Start by checking all connections and cables.
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ian polke: You havn't imputted a postcode into the site, so we have no idea where you are in relation to the transmitter.
Also you've simply described a picture breakup - but you need to find out if:
a) The transmitter your tuned into is the one you are supposed to
b) What the signal strength/quality is of the signals your getting, and on what muxes. You have Sony and a Panasonic - too high a signal (90-95%) is as bad as too little, and you need to check which one. If it is too low, then you will get breakup, and then you need to find out why.
Biggest single reason is that your system has a problem - perhaps a lose connection or broken cable. Does that problem come and go?
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D Jones: I almost have no idea where to start....
'Signal's are pretty much the same power, from exactly the same transmitters, often received on the same aerials that people used for analogue.
'on weather/no-one building between you and the transmitter/trees growing/someone thinking too much in between you and the transmitter.' - None of these have changed one iota from analogue - if a tree/hill/mountain was in the way when you only had five channels, its exactly the same for digital.
Actually its better - we regularly used to get French TV during high pressure on the south coast when I was a kid - thanks to digital thats far less likely.
You certainly dont have to buy a new aerial - if it picks up a signal fine, then thats it - there is no such thing as a digital aerial. And if you do have to but a new aerial, the biggest reason probably isn't a long term change in certain frequencies, but simply that the old one has been battered by the weather to the point its about to fall apart. And a good rigger will put a new one up which does cope with any group change.
I've got over 70 channels right now, and thats all year - if you getting just 4 channels during the summer, then thats not digital, thats your system or position. And that would have been exactly the same as during analogue - but instead of the signal pixelating, it just would have gone snowy before just vanishing into static.
In short - what your saying doesn't add up.
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Bill: Check the channel that the machine is trying to lock onto. My old Sony PVR had a sensitive tuner as well - and it would accidently pull in 801 (Talcneston) rather than Waltham (1). Of course 801 was far too weak to allow it to actually properly record, but just strong enough to confuse it.
Might be an entirely different problem, but Panasonics also have very sensitive tuners, and thus you might have a similar problem. I mostly solved the problem by getting rid of those extra channels and killing the signal a bit.
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Friday 15 December 2017 10:22PM
C Jones: getting a proper survey sounds like a good idea - there could be various reasons for that change (single source interference?), but without a systematic check, you can't narrow it down.
The change in frequencies Upcoming Freeview transmitter changes 2017 to 2019 should not make any difference ultimately to your services - I suspect that since the bulk of people's equipment self tunes and updates anyway, most wont notice any difference at all. And its very unlikely that the powers that be are likely to think reducing the services people get is a good idea, so things will probably just get shuffled around.
The frequency selloff isn't a big deal to consumers - T2 tuners are much more efficient, so you can get more channels (in HD as well) on less 'space'. And since we all have mobiles, we all want to use that extra space.
The only people who will have problems will be those that need a new aerial, but realistically, older aerials will gradually be replaced naturally anyway, and those that are left over can get a replacement free of charge.