Weird freeview signal issue

Weird freeview signal issue

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jep

Original Poster:

1,183 posts

209 months

Sunday 1st February 2015
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The O/H has my old Panny TX-32D70LX LCD which gets its freeview signal straight from the aerial. It's developed an issue where certain channels are now blocky as though they are not getting a strong signal and others are not affected.

She's had an engineer round who has replaced her aerial and when it didn't fix the problem, told her it's the inbuilt tuner and she needs an external box / new tele... I've done a bit of a search and can't see anything similar, and anyway, surely if the digital tuner's borked, then she wouldn't get any signal coming through would she?

Any thoughts from the experts, or is it simply a case of stumping up and getting a new digi box?

Emeye

9,773 posts

223 months

Sunday 1st February 2015
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Could this be something to do with 4G interfering with the TV?

http://www.freeview.co.uk/articles/help/4g-rollout...

jep

Original Poster:

1,183 posts

209 months

Sunday 1st February 2015
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Oooohhh, good shout... I'd completely forgotten about this thumbup

I shall check to see if anything's dropped through the post about this... Ta!

megaphone

10,724 posts

251 months

Sunday 1st February 2015
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It could be too much signal, this can overload the tuner and cause issues, you can buy attenuators that go inline. Or if it's a made up cable, take a couple of strands from the braided screen and short to the pin of the connector, this will knock about 15dB off, worth a try.

Or, Do you have a wall socket? Then a fly lead to the TV? If it's a pre-made lead then some can be poor quality, try changing this.

Or 4G could be an issue as above.

VEX

5,256 posts

246 months

Sunday 1st February 2015
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Where abouts are you in the UK.

I carry 4g filters and attenuators in the truck all the time, if local happy to pop round and have a look for you.

V.

marshalla

15,902 posts

201 months

Sunday 1st February 2015
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OP - you can run a quick check and get free filters via : https://at800.tv/

jep

Original Poster:

1,183 posts

209 months

Monday 2nd February 2015
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megaphone said:
It could be too much signal, this can overload the tuner and cause issues, you can buy attenuators that go inline. Or if it's a made up cable, take a couple of strands from the braided screen and short to the pin of the connector, this will knock about 15dB off, worth a try.

Or, Do you have a wall socket? Then a fly lead to the TV? If it's a pre-made lead then some can be poor quality, try changing this.

Or 4G could be an issue as above.
The feed is straight from the aerial, with the cable coming through the wall. This has an extension cable plugged in, taking the feed to the TV which I understand was checked and passed. I'm happy to have a little play with the connectors, and will try your shorting trick when I'm next round there. It can't hurt while we're waiting for a 4G filter to arrive...

There's been some buggering around by the previous owners in that there are further cables exiting the wall and going to other rooms via external cable runs (I'm hoping that the TV engineer has tidied that all up, given he charged her a good £100 and has left her in the same position as before but having shelled out for a new aerial) but this doesn't impact the incoming feed.

VEX said:
Where abouts are you in the UK.

I carry 4g filters and attenuators in the truck all the time, if local happy to pop round and have a look for you.

V.
Thanks Chris, that's very kind of you, however she's in Cheadle (Stockport), which is in my opinion, a little bit too far to ask!

marshalla said:
OP - you can run a quick check and get free filters via : https://at800.tv/
Yes, thanks pal, I spent a few mins on that last night, and it turns out she does live in an area that has apparently had postcards put through letter boxes.

The more I think about this, the more I'm leaning towards the switching on of a 4G mast somewhere around her. The signal loss started after an automatic re-tune was prompted that also saw her getting S4C for a while a few weeks back. Prior to that, everything was hunky-dory with good signal/picture/sound quality. Nothing else hardware wise has been changed, and as I mentioned previously, a number of channels are perfectly fine....all of which I guess is pointing towards interference as a likely cause.

I will keep this thread updated thumbup

furrywoolyhatuk

682 posts

154 months

Monday 2nd February 2015
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Apologies for the slight hijack but this 4g would explain the random loss of my freeview. Going to check for new 4g masts in my area. Had an engineer round and he never mentioned this.

jep

Original Poster:

1,183 posts

209 months

Tuesday 3rd February 2015
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Right then, the good people at at800 were as good as their word and a filter dropped through the post this morning. Having fitted it, it's improved things a little, but, and here's the rub, it has not totally resolved it. There is certainly an improvement in those channels that have been affected, but it's not back to where it was.

I've also tried megaphone's little hack, also with no success.

The next step is to go back to at800 and see what they suggest now.

Emeye

9,773 posts

223 months

Tuesday 3rd February 2015
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I vaguely remember there being something about certian TVs and freeview boxes not being capable of handling the 4G restructuring of the airwaves - there is a list of models somewhere - the only solution was to buy an external freeview box, which these days cost pretty close to nowt and plug that into the scart socket - may even be an opportunity to get a freeview HD box as an upgrade - not that it makes much difference n a 32" TV.

megaphone

10,724 posts

251 months

Tuesday 3rd February 2015
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OP. Put your postcode in this website and click detailed view, it will tell you what transmitter you're on and what channels and % signal you should get

http://www.digitaluk.co.uk

If you want, take a screen shot and post it.

jep

Original Poster:

1,183 posts

209 months

Tuesday 3rd February 2015
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She's off Winter Hill, with Stockport being the nearest alternative.


Eta, Emeye, yeah I know a digi box is buttons these days, but I'm just a bit miffed something's changed and she has to revert to a 2-box solution... (Unless of course the tuner in the tele's borked in which case fair enough!)

Edited by jep on Tuesday 3rd February 18:15

FlossyThePig

4,083 posts

243 months

Tuesday 3rd February 2015
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jep said:
She's off Winter Hill, with Stockport being the nearest alternative.


Eta, Emeye, yeah I know a digi box is buttons these days, but I'm just a bit miffed something's changed and she has to revert to a 2-box solution... (Unless of course the tuner in the tele's borked in which case fair enough!)

Edited by jep on Tuesday 3rd February 18:15
I'm jealous. Top notch signal strength and full access to all the HD channels as well.

Emeye

9,773 posts

223 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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FlossyThePig said:
jep said:
She's off Winter Hill, with Stockport being the nearest alternative.


Eta, Emeye, yeah I know a digi box is buttons these days, but I'm just a bit miffed something's changed and she has to revert to a 2-box solution... (Unless of course the tuner in the tele's borked in which case fair enough!)

Edited by jep on Tuesday 3rd February 18:15
I'm jealous. Top notch signal strength and full access to all the HD channels as well.
I'm off Winter Hill too - despite it being over 25 miles away, I can easily see the transmitter at night thanks to the red lights on the mast and since the increased freeview signal strength, we can get all the channels on the TV in the loftroom without an aerial plugged in!

TheInternet

4,716 posts

163 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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jep said:
certain channels are now blocky
Which ones?

jep

Original Poster:

1,183 posts

209 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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ITV/ITV+1/ITV2/ITV2+1/ITV3/ITV3+1/ITV4/ITV4+1/ITV Be/
C4/C4+1/More4/Film4/4Music/E4 (funnily enough E4+1 is fine)
QVC/Yesterday/Drama/Viva/Ideal TV/Dave ja vu/Quest & +1, and a host of other really crap channels.

All the Beeb channels, Food Network, some of the +1's , and random others such as movie and music channels are fine. Some of these more random channels have come back since adding the filter on, but the Beeb's have always been ok.

megaphone

10,724 posts

251 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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Could well be the stuff up on C58 and C59. These are the closest to the 4G channels which are on C61 and above, however the filter should have fixed this by taking out everything over C59.

Have a read of this https://at800.tv/industry-trade/approved-filters/

Have a look in the TV menu, under manual tuning or similar, there may be a signal level meter, see what you're getting on the good and bad channels.

Emeye

9,773 posts

223 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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Could it be tuned into the wrong transmitter? My old Humax recorder need a firmware update, as after the freeview upgrade it had a habit of not only tuning into the nearest mast, but also tuning into any distant one it could find, and then placing the weak signals as the preferred choice rather than the local ones which it chucked further down the numbering order.

TheInternet

4,716 posts

163 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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megaphone said:
Could well be the stuff up on C58 and C59.
Indeed, and that fact that the 'random channels' on C58 have returned with the introduction of the filter and the C59 ones haven't (ITV/C4) makes this seem even more likely. How good are these filters usually?

bristolracer

5,540 posts

149 months

Wednesday 4th February 2015
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Try this
Unplug aerial
Get tv to run autotune on a panasonic you will get a message saying 'all data will be erased'
allow the tv to retune and not find anything, you have now wiped its channel plan memory
plug the aerial back in
using the data you have from the digital site tune the tv in manually, its relatively easy on a panasonic.
see how these work

if you are still having problems then beg or borrow a freeview box and try that.

You said in a previous post you were getting s4c you are picking up the wrong transmitter.

mux plans are here, so along with the data you have from the digital site you can work out what is struggling
http://www.ukfree.tv/transmitters/multiplexes

The filters can be hit and miss do not use cheap filters they do not work, in theory the at800 should be fine, but having done some training on this its going to be a bit of a mare in some areas.