All posts by MikeB
Below are all of MikeB's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.
E. Allen: Check your signal level - is it very high or low? Lodon Live is a local channel and might be on a low power at your location, but you seemingly have a problem with your system anyway, hence the 'no signal'. Check the aerial system starting from the TV and working back - most likely problem is a loose connection or dodgy cable.
Your freesat is entirely seperate from your freeview - if you getting no signal on freeview, then freesat should be uneffected, unless you are unlucky enough to have a problem on both.
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Richard J Cooper: Could be the tuner (in which case just buy a cheap new one - 25 for Freeview, 37 for Freeview HD), or its locked onto the wrong transmitter. There seems to be loads of mistunes after the retune. Even my Manhattan box has switched transmitters, and will need a manual retune at some point.
You can always test the box by finding out what its tuned into. If its Talcneston and its still playing up, then its the box.
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Drek Springall: Check the DigitalUK and terrain links - Crystal Palace and Sandy Heath are almost on the same bearing as your original transmitter, but would come up first in any scan - so its likely thats what the tuner has found first. Check, and if thats the case, manually retune.
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Steven Seeds: IF BBC4 HD was transmitting to your area, then its logically still doing so. Check your system, because the most logical thing is that your not longer picking it up.
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Christopher Webber:
Actually, MikeB has been on holiday for the last week, and hasn't been able to reply...
Firstly - how exactly has DSO been a con or isn't fit for purpose? You get far more channels, many in HD, even on a light transmitter, then you would have done on analogue. On a main transmitter, you get loads more, and again, often in HD. And all you would need is a digital receiver, which can be had for 20, or even better, and HD one, which is less than forty.
And rather than mobile phone companies getting something for nothing (and if you have a mobile phone, its likely your using those frequencies), they paid big bucks for the spectrum to the government. And Freeview can work perfectly fine without them. And will do so even better once there is a full move to T2 tuners, which could be done in the next three years with no problem.
Steve had explained the situation regarding Com 7 & 8, but its unlikely anyone will lose any actual channels - there will likely be a solution. I certainly cannot see how anyone would be happy with losing HD channels - there would be an outcry.
As for 4K - the format was demoed by NHK as a 'live' transmission only in 2007. There was a test transmission to a conference in Holland from London in 2008, but it was only 2012 that the format really began to come together as a viable consumer technology (that was the year that the minimum number of pixels in a UHD display was agreed , and the BBC showed it off that year for the Olympics. So again, 4K wasn't really a thing when DSO was agreed, or even finished.
Encryption at DSO? Seriously?
A) there were million of DVT tuners out there (which is why they didn't just go to DVB-T2 either) , which was why they could carry out DSO in the first place, which were totally incapable of any encryption.
B) Read Brianist's article about Greg Dyke and the role the BBC played in the rebirth of digital TV after the collapse of ITV's effort. Popular misconceptions 3: looking back at DG Greg Dyke
As Dyke points out -
'Opponents of the licence fee always argue that once everyone can get pay television the licence fee as a means of funding the BBC will be unnecessary... Freeview makes it very hard for any Government to try to make the BBC a pay-television service. The more Freeview boxes out there, the harder it will be to switch the BBC to a subscription service since most of the boxes can't be adapted for pay TV.'
Its not a bug, its a feature.
c) Iplayer was launched in Dec 2007 in beta. Digital switchover didn't start until 2007, and lasted until 2012. Which is when Netflix UK was launched.
In fact TV licence evasion is relatively low, in percentage terms (the vast majority of households have TV's, and the vast majority of those use BBC services, so its fairly simple), and its pretty efficient to collect. Costs can be cut by not even having a paper licence - mines been a PDF for at least 3 years, its paid by DD, and when I moved house, it was really easy to do online.
And when the BBC launched Iplayer (which blazed a trail for everyone else), there really was no online only service, and even by the end of switchover, the bulk of people just watched (and still do) the bulk of viewing via terrestial TV. So encryption was a solution in search of a problem. Its more difficult now, but frankly, the vast majority of people still have TV's, so its fairly clear if people havn't paid, and the bulk of evaders are caught.
The BBC isn't Sky. Sky has its own box to stop people stealing its content, etc. If you want live football from them, you have to pay for it. And if your a pub, if you dare to use a Euro box (cheaper), if they find out, they will seek not just to get cash off you, they will get your licence taken away. Thats why they have a Sky box (like BT as well), and that costs - Brianist reckoned in an article as much as 25% of revenue - costs that ultimately are paid by the subscriber.
Look for Brianists articles on the future of the BBC, etc - he covers the logical of the 'Beebbox'. And there isn't one. We've seen all the arguments, and they are technologically, economically and socially insane. And try encyption with radio - how is that even going to work?
That does not mean that the BBC cannot police its content - its doing just that. Its already started with the app for BBC radio (you have to sign in and have an account), and there is no reason why you ultimately couldn't do that for Iplayer generally.
I think you've decided that DSO was a 'con', and see everything in that light. In reality, I dont think your aware of the technical and economic realities that DSO faced, and how they've been overcome. And you've become obsessed with licence evasion, looking for a technical solution that wasn't and still isn't really needed. You need to look at the archive.
DSO worked, and did so because people liked what it did before switchover. The people who complain about how much better it was in the old days forget that they probably only had 4 channels, all in SD, and if they get a rubbish signal now, then they probably had a rubbish signal before - they have just forgotten that. But now they have a lot more options to deal with that.
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M
Madingley (Cambridge) (Cambridgeshire, England) DAB transmitterTuesday 22 August 2017 10:42PM
Peterborough
grorge reynolds: A postcode would be a help...
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Francis: Whats your postcode, and are you tuned to the welsh transmitter? If you are, then you should get it if you have an HD tuner. But a postcode would be a help.
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M
My Freeview box has no EPG, is blank on FIVE, ITV3, ITV4, ITV2+Wednesday 23 August 2017 5:42PM
Peterborough
Andrew Sanders: If they are all pixilating, then logically its a common problem. Wimborne is fine for Rowridge, so check that a) you havn't got too much signal (is there a booster in the system) or b) that you havn't accidently tuned to another transmitter.
If the signal is very low, then its your system - there is no point changing the flyleads - its common to all five TV's. The common point is probably a booster in the roof, and could be the cable from the aerial to the booster/distributor, or then perhaps the box itself, possibly a power supply.
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Sunday 6 August 2017 10:22PM
Peterborough
Sandee: Have you tuned to the right transmitter?