All posts by Aaron
Below are all of Aaron's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.A
Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireWednesday 16 November 2011 5:45PM
Sudbury
Never mind about the wide-band identification - found out how! Just can't see what colour the bung is in the dark! Pretty sure its black though.
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A
Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireWednesday 16 November 2011 6:45PM
Sudbury
@Mazbar: Thanks. I was trying to avoid taking the Humax out of the TV unit - absolute b@st to get to but much easier to hang another box by the side. Have now pulled it, plugged it into the other aerial and now have a signal strength of 61% and quality of 100%. Will finish the scan and then go plumb it all back in again and hope that it can lock-on to the poorer signals. Can't help but think Arqiva are outputting 63 on a lower strength than they were on ch.50.
@Mark: Thanks for your input. The existing aerial is old but believe it is wideband as was picking up analogue 39-51 and digital 38-68. Can only think the output is now lower hence a lot of peeps having probs. If the Humax can't lock then I'll just get up a ladder and replace the aerial with an identical wideband to the one in the loft. Loft aerial is using PF100 cable and will use that again if I have to replace external aerial. No plastic plugs here but note your comment about using brass ones.
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A
Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireWednesday 16 November 2011 7:55PM
Sudbury
@Dave: Already read that page, thanks anyway. I tried with and without the booster, with multiple devices - max signal quality on 63 is 10% with a strength of 34%. The booster isn't making any difference and is currently not connected so really can't see an attenuator will be useful until I put a new aerial on the chimney. Anyway, signal strength doesn't go over 65% on any fr. which would typically obviate the need for an attenuator AIUI.
@yes: I agree. Just looked at 54 (ArqA), which is only 1.5kW, shows 64% strength with 100% quality. Now if this was really running 1.5kW compared to 63's supposed 2.2kW I'd expect not to be able to receive those either.
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A
Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireWednesday 16 November 2011 8:07PM
Sudbury
@Dave: Tuned using known good aerial and gone back to roof aerial where the Humax cannot tune (no or bad signal).
Given that it was fine until this morning, and ArqA is broadcasting on 1.5kW, then even though I probably have a cr@p aerial on the roof, it was receiving ArqA and B OK until today in their respective low-power outputs, one would think they've lowered the output power even more in this change.
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A
Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireMonday 21 November 2011 2:17AM
Sudbury
@nog: 'some viewers on the edges of the service area for the transmitter will be unable to receive the commercial servics'.
Erm, we're in the middle of Sudbury and can't get anything on ch.63 <3 miles. Not just us but several neighbours, some of whom had new wideband aerials install within the last 3 months! Its disgraceful.
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A
Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireFriday 25 November 2011 1:50PM
Sudbury
A neighbour spoke to Channel 4 this morning complaing about this fiasco - the guy he spoke to was very interested and concerned about the issue. He said that the more people who contact Channel 4 to complain, the better, then they can get something done about it as they don't viewers missing out on Film 4.
The phone number is 0845 076 0191. Select the 'Complain about reception or interference' option to get a human voice - if you select 'Problems with DSO' you'll just get the DigitalUK number. The more this number is propagated and used the better chance we have of getting something resolved.
Furthermore he said that the BBC have a responsibility as well, even though there are no BBC channels on ArqB and suggested also calling them on 03700 100222.
Local TV suppliers and Aerial installers say they have had hundreds of complaints just in the Sudbury area where we are, with some suggesting that a cheap booster is doing the trick for some people.
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Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune requireTuesday 6 December 2011 12:46AM
Sudbury
[Solved] Peeps following this thread will have seen I'm in the middle of Sudbury and lost ArqB at the Tacolneston switchover the same as many thousands of others, on one of my aerials - the outdoor chimney-mounted wideband.
It made no difference using a booster or an attenuator which made me think the signal is just too weak to be useful, the best I could get was 34% signal strength with 10% quality.
The other loft-mounted Maplin 43 element wideband was always fine with it's mast-head amp and 6-way booster.
So, I replaced the chimney aerial with another Maplin 43 element one, also in the loft. Tried with just connecting the new PF100 cable but still had problems. Connected the laptop with TSReaderLite and an Hauppauge HVR-900 USB DVB-T stick in the loft and got excellent signal on channel 63.
The reality of this was that the signal is actually very good at the aerial, but is total carp at 20 yards! Ordered another mast-head amp (variable 15-27dB) from Ebay for £6.59 delivered, attached it to the new aerial, enabled antenna power on the Humax 9200T and all muxes are now 80-90% signal strength and 100% quality. This was with the amp set to mid-strength - its working well so I'm not going back into the loft again to lower or fiddle with it!
So, if you're struggling to get Yesterday, Film4, ITV4, Viva or others on ArqB I'd suggest you try a mast-head amp.
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This is a post I just made to the other Sudbury switch-over thread at Sudbury Arqiva multiplex B changes 16 November - retune required | ukfree.tv - independent free digital TV advice hopefully it will help others with their problems.
[Solved] Peeps following this thread will have seen I'm in the middle of Sudbury and lost ArqB at the Tacolneston switchover the same as many thousands of others, on one of my aerials - the outdoor chimney-mounted wideband.
It made no difference using a booster or an attenuator which made me think the signal is just too weak to be useful, the best I could get was 34% signal strength with 10% quality.
The other loft-mounted Maplin 43 element wideband was always fine with it's mast-head amp and 6-way booster.
So, I replaced the chimney aerial with another Maplin 43 element one, also in the loft. Tried with just connecting the new PF100 cable but still had problems. Connected the laptop with TSReaderLite and an Hauppauge HVR-900 USB DVB-T stick in the loft and got excellent signal on channel 63.
The reality of this was that the signal is actually very good at the aerial, but is total carp at 20 yards! Ordered another mast-head amp (variable 15-27dB) from Ebay for £6.59 delivered, attached it to the new aerial, enabled antenna power on the Humax 9200T and all muxes are now 80-90% signal strength and 100% quality. This was with the amp set to mid-strength - its working well so I'm not going back into the loft again to lower or fiddle with it!
So, if you're struggling to get Yesterday, Film4, ITV4, Viva or others on ArqB I'd suggest you try a mast-head amp.
(CO109PH)
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Dave Lindsay: At which time I'll just disable antenna power. Being 3 miles from the mast, I shouldn't have needed to do it in the first place.
Kevin Hodges: All should be up to 100KW next June, we're just being fobbed off with a paltry 2.2KW for some channels now until June 27th
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Wednesday 16 November 2011 5:11PM
Sudbury
I'm in the middle of Sudbury, 3 miles NNW of the Sudbury mast and have now lost Yesterday etc with the switch to Channel 63 on one of my boxes, so the radiation direction could be less of the issue.
This box is connected to the original aerial (not sure how long its been there but long before we moved in) but has been fine for all channels/frequencies over the last 6 years. Removing the booster makes no difference, nor does replacing the Humax 9200 with a cr@ppy Tesco HD box. Humax shows signal strength at 34% max and quality at 10% max. Tesco box says no signal when attempting to tune to a missing channel.
The other box(es), connected to a wide-band in the loft and through a booster/splitter are fine. So I'm thinking it's now a lower power output and/or maybe the old aerial is no good for ch.63 which wouldn't make much sense as it was fine for ch.68. Is there a simple to way to tell, just by looking at an aerial on the top on a chimney, whether it is wide-band or not??
Hopefully someone will nail this issue soon!