Signal levels in Wellington

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antoniosk

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#105675 7-Jul-2012 13:57

What's a usable signal level for free view?

Ive noticed since the changeover in Wellington a few weeks ago, that tv1 and tv2 are artifacting a lot, but tv3 and tv4 are still just fine, with the occasional burst of pixels.

According to my Samsung, tv1 and 2 have signal strength in the region of 9-20, while the others range from 50-55. That's not the most useful measure, but i do get the sense they are struggling....

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Antoniosk

B1GGLZ

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#652258 7-Jul-2012 14:17

antoniosk: What's a usable signal level for free view?

Ive noticed since the changeover in Wellington a few weeks ago, that tv1 and tv2 are artifacting a lot, but tv3 and tv4 are still just fine, with the occasional burst of pixels.

According to my Samsung, tv1 and 2 have signal strength in the region of 9-20, while the others range from 50-55. That's not the most useful measure, but i do get the sense they are struggling....

IMO 9-20 is marginal and needs improving. 50-55 is OK.
Make sure you have a UHF only antenna and good RG6 coax it tip top condition direct to the TV.
Any VHF source such as a combined/mixed VHF antenna and/or Sky modulator in the system can also cause problems.
Just realigning the antenn slightly can often help.
Make sure all Muxes are tuned to the same Transmitter site. There's more than one in WN, some vertical and some horizontal.
If all else fails you probably need a masthead amp.

knoydart

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#652259 7-Jul-2012 14:19

40dbuV is generally the level that your domestic decoder should start working.
I know the major aerial installers look for 50dbuV at the wall socket when they install.
The test gear at work, from my limited use will start working at around 37dbuV.

stevenz

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#653072 9-Jul-2012 17:31

I never had a problem before they changed things around a couple of weeks ago, now I often get the odd burst of garbage, and the TV in the bedroom which was previously tuned in just fine using rabbit ears can't be tuned in at all now. I've tried doing full rescans and it doesn't help.

Have they somehow "diluted" the signal with the extra couple of channels?

@KnightNZ

knoydart

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#653084 9-Jul-2012 17:38

The only thing that was changed was the transmit frequencies of the 3 muxes. The power amplifiers were not changed, nor were the antenna on the 4 transmitter sites.

I've seen some reports of UHF aerials having a slightly worse gain towards the lower end of the UHF spectrum but nothing huge.