Communal Sky Dish / New Flat

[magnus911]

So, i've just moved into a new flat and it's set up weirdly. There is a communal dish on the roof which terminates to a box in the under stairs cupboard. There is one Sky Digital feed, one hotbird feed and a freeview aerial.

These all plug into a dual amplifier which then gets fed to a standard aerial socket in each room.

So, I understand the basics are you put your sky dish in the cupboard, set it to single feed mode. Then you feed from the RF socket on the Sky box into the 'TV' socket on the amplifier. So far so good. This then gets picked up as an analogue signal by each tv. Now, that's bad enough, as it means no recording whilst watching TV and no HD. Oh well. The real turd in the waterpipe however is that the signal is so fuzzy / snowy / generally ste.

I've done some research and a lot of people suggest removing the incoming aerial feed to the sky box. No joy. Also suggestions include changing the RF output channel. Again, no joy. Some won't even get picked up by the TV's there must be such bad interference. So I'm thinking maybe the amp is putting out too much power. But there are no controls to turn it down. So what do you guys suggest?

[cjs]

Bypass the amp and see if that fixes it.

[magnus911]

I can't. There are two boxes. A white box with 5 ports and an amplifier with an input and two outputs.

The white box ports are : Sky 1 > Sky 2 > Sky > TV > Radio

The 'Sky 2' socket is directed to the input of the amplifier. The two outputs on the amp go to the bedroom and living room.

Apparently the 'Sky' socket on the white box is for hotbird. So I plug the 'Sky 1' socket into the sky receiver and it seems to work. Then I plug an aerial cable between the RF output on the Sky receiver and the 'TV' input on the white box.

That must be correct as the signal does go to the TV's in both bedroom and living room, it's just the signal is ste.

If i power off the amplifier no signal arrives at the TV. So there's not much else i can do.

Maybe a picture would help....

[cjs]

Take the feed to the lounge and plug that straight into the RF out on the Sky box, bypassing the amp. A pic of the headend will help.

[magnus911]

OK here's a picture of what I'm talking about



So as you can see from the picture, it's all sealed so I can't really isolate the amp.

[magnus911]

Just to reiterate what's going on - the SAT1 goes to the Sky HD box. If I check a TV on the box directly, it's working fine albeit on single feed mode.

The SAT2 goes to the input on the amp. The two amp outputs go the rooms. The SAT feed is apparently for a hotbird box.

So I'm plugging the RF out of the SKY box to the TV input on the white panel. I'm getting a signal, it's just really crap.

[VEX]

That white plate is your incoming services from the communal system.

The sat1 & sat2 feeds should be your two sky feeds and the tv is an out not an in, which carries the filtered freeview channels.

So.

Sat1 to sky box
Sat2 to sky box
Tv to sky rf or tv in

Then the white cable that was in Sat2 that feeds the amp should plug into the Rf2 output of the sky box.

That should sort yo out.

V.

[VEX]

Correction it is a black cable from Sat2 to the amp.

[VEX]

If it is wired like that there must be other ways for getting HD to the tv's

Any cat5 data cable in there? Or you could send HD down the coax using a converter.

V.

[magnus911]

VEX said:

If it is wired like that there must be other ways for getting HD to the tv's

Any cat5 data cable in there? Or you could send HD down the coax using a converter.

V.

Thanks for your reply. So because the current black cable running into the input of the amp is a screw in coax type, I guess I'll need an adapter to connect that to the RF out of the sky box?

Also, you're correct about HD> in each room in the house there is CAT 5 next to the coax aerial which is apparently there for HDMI over CAT5. But the ports are ethernet style and there doesn't seem to be any way of feeding them from the boxes i've pictured above? Also I can't seem to find ethernet to HDMI adapters.

[magnus911]

Great well thanks a lot = with the changes you suggested it is up and running as it should be, but obviously it's not HD so looks crap on a 46 screen.

My wall plates are like this:



And in the home manual it says that the CAT5e is for sending HDMI over ethernet. But there's nowhere to plug it in where the SKY feeds are and i can't seem to find HDMI to ethernet adapters anywhere so I'm not sure what they're talking about.

[cjs]

You need HDMI-Cat 5 send and receive boxes, something like this.

http://cpc.farnell.com/unbranded/av18496/hdmi-over...

You'll also need 4x cat 5 patch cables to connect to the wall plates and 2 x short HDMI cables. You'll also need a Magic Eye so you can change channels from the lounge.

[VEX]

magnus911 said:

Thanks for your reply. So because the current black cable running into the input of the amp is a screw in coax type, I guess I'll need an adapter to connect that to the RF out of the sky box?

Also, you're correct about HD> in each room in the house there is CAT 5 next to the coax aerial which is apparently there for HDMI over CAT5. But the ports are ethernet style and there doesn't seem to be any way of feeding them from the boxes i've pictured above? Also I can't seem to find ethernet to HDMI adapters.

Try the CPC's ones, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't.

As an installer I need reliability, so tend to use WyreStorm as a first choice.

Cable run for this is

Sky - HDMI - WyreStorm Transmitter - 2 x CAT5 - Wall Plate - Wall Plate - 2 x CAT5 - Receiver - HDMI - Screen.

If you can get a Transmit / Receive Pair with IR then you will have control of teh Sky box as well, although I tend to use the RF2 and coax network for more reliability.

Interestingly a friend is just trying out an HD encoder that will allow you to transmit your own Freeview HD channel around the house. Not cheap, but cheaper than a HD Splitter and point to point links.

V.

[magnus911]

Thanks for your comments, my problem with the HD sending however is that there is no CAT 5 wired into the cupboard where the Skybox is. It's almost as though the living room and bedroom are connected and that's it.

[VEX]

It may well be hidden in an un-marked box in the same cabinet.

This is quite common if the installer wants the follow on work or needed to save money on the job.

Where abouts are you? There may be one of us installers working or living near by who can pop in and have a look for you.

V.

[magnus911]

VEX said:

It may well be hidden in an un-marked box in the same cabinet.

This is quite common if the installer wants the follow on work or needed to save money on the job.

Where abouts are you? There may be one of us installers working or living near by who can pop in and have a look for you.

V.

Thanks - I'm in Chelsea on the Fulham Road if you have anyone nearby!

[Jammo321]

I am moving in to a flat were there is a dish on the roof 2 sockets on the wall will my sky+ plus hd box work thanks

[VEX]

Should do, depends on the type of outlets.

V.

[Jammo321]

Thanks