Non-Freeview Analogue TV1 reception in Christchurch

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steve98

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#23289 24-Jun-2008 18:59

Hi there

I live in Christchurch (just north of the CBD) and we have near-perfect pictures on all analogue channels except TV1. Sometimes it is fine, but often (particularly in the mornings), the picture is extremely poor - sometimes completely unwatchable. We've been watching a few times where the picture has been fine and then it suddenly goes bad (so bad my TV gives me its very own BSOD!).

Just wondering if anyone out there has any experience of this - the fact that all other channels are great suggests to me it's not a problem at our end, but I could be wrong.

Any suggestions / insights welcome!

Thanks

Steve

Goosey

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#140254 24-Jun-2008 19:04

First questions:

What kind of aerial are you using? Indoor, Outdoor? VHF, UHF or a combo of both?

What is near by? i.e. any major interfering devices e.g. large factories? Transmitting stations?

What time of the morning specifically does it happen, what are the weather conditions?

cyril7

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#140261 24-Jun-2008 19:16

TV1 off Sugarloaf is on Ch3 (BandI) where as all other channels TV2,3,4 are BandIII which is 3.5-4x the frequency of Ch3, and all others are UHF 8-10x the frequency. So what antenna do you have, maybe its BandI performance has gone bad or fallen off. There is a big difference in propagation characteristics and local condition effects, as well as antenna requirements between those three sets of frequencies.

Cyril

steve98

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#140269 24-Jun-2008 19:27

cyril7: TV1 off Sugarloaf is on Ch3 (BandI) where as all other channels TV2,3,4 are BandIII which is 3.5-4x the frequency of Ch3, and all others are UHF 8-10x the frequency. So what antenna do you have, maybe its BandI performance has gone bad or fallen off. There is a big difference in propagation characteristics and local condition effects, as well as antenna requirements between those three sets of frequencies.

Cyril

To be honest, I don't know much about the aerial itself - I didn't put it up, it was on the house when we bought it. It is external and must be a combo one because there is definitely only one. From the sounds of it, it may need a technician to take a look but to be honest I'm not sure it would be worth the outlay at this stage.

As an aside, would poor reception of Ch3 (BandI) hinder reception of terrestrial Freeview (SD or HD) if we ever looked at that in the future?

Thanks a lot - really appreciate your help - and yours Gooseybhai.

Steve

amphibem

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#140271 24-Jun-2008 19:30

steve98: Hi there

I live in Christchurch (just north of the CBD) and we have near-perfect pictures on all analogue channels except TV1. Sometimes it is fine, but often (particularly in the mornings), the picture is extremely poor - sometimes completely unwatchable. We've been watching a few times where the picture has been fine and then it suddenly goes bad (so bad my TV gives me its very own BSOD!).

Just wondering if anyone out there has any experience of this - the fact that all other channels are great suggests to me it's not a problem at our end, but I could be wrong.

Any suggestions / insights welcome!

Thanks

Steve

I live in Ilam (West of the CBD) and have exactly the same problem. Well we don't bother with analogue for the Freeview channels now, but TV1 was basically unwatchable before. We have a UHF roof-mounted ariel and basically perfect reception on the other channels.

Not that it is any help, but you are not alone!

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cyril7

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#140273 24-Jun-2008 19:32

Whats your reception of MaoriTV (ch46) and Prime (ch63), if they are good then your DTT reception should be fine, honestly just front up the cash and do it, especially if you have a 16:9 LCD or Plasma panel TV, do yourself a favour.

Cyril

steve98

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#140370 25-Jun-2008 08:02

cyril7: Whats your reception of MaoriTV (ch46) and Prime (ch63), if they are good then your DTT reception should be fine, honestly just front up the cash and do it, especially if you have a 16:9 LCD or Plasma panel TV, do yourself a favour.

Cyril

Reception of MaoriTV and Prime are excellent so that's good to know. This is mainly for the second TV in our bedroom which is a 26" Samsung LCD. It would be nice to have Freeview HD but in reality I know that the benefits of HD would be mainly lost on a 26" TV. We have Sky in the lounge and we feed an RF signal off that through to the bedroom so we *can* get a decent TV1 picture off that, as long as the sky decoder is tuned into it. We have a 50" Sony rear-pro LCD in the lounge which we bought in 2005 and doesn't have HDMI, do you know whether Freeview HD outputs HD over component or is it locked-down to HDMI only?

Cheers!

Steve

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cyril7

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#140372 25-Jun-2008 08:30

Hi, all certfied FreeViewHD boxs are locked down to not allow full resolution out the analog component output. However you can get non certfied ones that do allow full HD res out the analog component output.

You could of course just get a FreeView Satellite box as you have a dish, this would give you superiour 16:9 pics at a much less cost. The feed from the lounge to the bedroom could be diplexed, so the RF out of the sky box and the Lband sat signal go down the one cable to the bedroom where they are seperated out again, the RF from the Sky box and Lband to the FreeView sat box giving more flexibility. FreeView sat boxs can be found for not much over $100 these days.

Cyril

pjamieson

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#141071 28-Jun-2008 17:48

To clarify how to work out what aerial(s) you have:

VHF Band I = TV 1 - Elements are about 1-1.5 metres long.
VHF Band III = TV 2, 3 & 4 - Elements are about 30-40 cm long.
UHF = Prime, Maori TV, Trackside, local channels and everything else - Also used for Freeview HD Terrestial.

These can be 3 separate aerials or a combination of 2 or all 3. You may not have a VHF Band I aerial at all, or it's elements might have started to fall apart (they are the most open to winds etc obviously). It's not worth spending much money on VHF aerials as they will be completely obsolete in another 5 or so years when analog is switched off.

I'd suggest along similar lines to the others unless it is a simple fix, continue with Sky or invest in Freeview Terrestial or Satellite.

Paul.

fraseyboy

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#141290 29-Jun-2008 18:34

I live in Upper Riccarton and have a similar problem. TV One is most of the time fine, but sometimes it goes all snowy.

We have a UHF/VHF rooftop antenna and I remember a while ago (like 3 years or so) one of the rods fell off, so maybe that has something to do with it? It still receives fine most of the time though so its ok.