BBC Radio 1/2 etc

chabsey

Does anyone know how (if it's possible) to get decent reception of BBC Radio 1 etc (the British radio stations) in Ireland?

I don't mean over the internet, I mean is there any way, aside from getting a huge aerial, to get those radio stations through a normal stereo over here?

Bard

Depends on where in Ireland you are. Up around counties Meath, Louth, Monaghan, and the surrounding area (basically anywhere within 50 or so miles of the border), you can get BBC Radio 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Live and Ulster off the air crystal clear.

They're also available in the Radio section on Sky Digital.

chabsey

Bard wrote:

Depends on where in Ireland you are. Up around counties Meath, Louth, Monaghan, and the surrounding area (basically anywhere within 50 or so miles of the border), you can get BBC Radio 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Live and Ulster off the air crystal clear.

They're also available in the Radio section on Sky Digital.

Sorry, should have said...Dublin area and haven't got digital TV service.

Bard

Well there's parts of north County Dublin too where you can pick up BBC radio off the air. Seems to me that the further you go north of Swords, the better it gets. I live in Ardee at the moment and I get all the RTE and BBC stations, local stations and Today FM (etc.) crystal clear as well as a half-decent signal on Dublin stations like FM104, 98FM, Q102, etc. Same goes for RTE 1 & 2, TG4, BBC, UTV and Channel 4 off the air. Handy spot this

I'm sure you could probably get some sort of high-powered system to pick up stations from further away and enhance the signal/sound but I'd imagine you'd pay quite a pretty penny for it too.

Alternatively, you could get a set top box from someone like www.satellite.ie which would give you all the freeview digital radio and television channels, including the BBC ones.

ShiverinEskimo

then unfortunately no. We only get them here in dundalk because of how close we are to the border. I normally lose Radio 1 crossing the boyne bridge if i'm going to dublin. SO drogheda is about the limit. DAB (Digital Radio) has an even shorter range. I use a freeview tv set that i purchased in england and i get them digitally perfectly, but as far as i know not even drogheda can pick up a digital signal.
If your desperate - move to dundalk. but you would want to really really really love chris moyles.

pork99

I can get BBC FM stations fairly well off the NTL cable. You need a radio with a cable jack though.

Kêrmêttê

My stereo has a connection for a cable like a tv cable (is it co-axial??).
Maybe yours is the same and you could try plugging in one of those "bunny ears" tv arials to catch the signal??

chabsey

pork99 wrote:

I can get BBC FM stations fairly well off the NTL cable. You need a radio with a cable jack though.

My stereo has a coax (i think) connection at the back and the people who were living in the place before me had NTL digital so there's a dish on the roof. However, I have plugged the cable in to the back of the stereo and the radio reception improves noticeably but I still can't get anything other than the basic stations.

It's a pity that I can't just activate the radio part of NTL digital as I've no interest in the TV channels.

chabsey

chabsey wrote:

the people who were living in the place before me had NTL digital so there's a dish on the roof.

They had ntl digital via mmds so, which is no good for what you want.
All those channels and more are broadcast in stereo on NTL cable on the fm band.
If you lived in an NTL cabled area it's merely a matter of hooking into that cable when you subscribe.

Kêrmêttê

chabsey wrote:

My stereo has a coax (i think) connection at the back and the people who were living in the place before me had NTL digital so there's a dish on the roof. However, I have plugged the cable in to the back of the stereo and the radio reception improves noticeably but I still can't get anything other than the basic stations.

It's a pity that I can't just activate the radio part of NTL digital as I've no interest in the TV channels.

I was talking about a regular tv arial that sits on the top of your tv and picks up the analogue signals from the air, NOT a digital satalite dish.

steveland?

You can just listen to them on the interweb. Realplayer and Media Player all have radio settings and theres millions of other freeware radio reciever programs available

ShiverinEskimo

the only way you will be able to get the radio channels is to subscribe. You can have the biggest aerial in the world but its only as good as the range of the signal from the transmitter which is atop the mountains just south east of newry. This booster transmitter is the reason we in dundalk get everything bbc (inclduing digital freeview channels, analogue tv and radio, and DAB).
Without a sub I serverly doubt your chances of ever getting BBC radio signals.

Lump

The best way is to listen online, not only can you listen to live programmes, but you can listen to programmes from the past week.


John

pork99

chabsey wrote:

My stereo has a coax (i think) connection at the back and the people who were living in the place before me had NTL digital so there's a dish on the roof. However, I have plugged the cable in to the back of the stereo and the radio reception improves noticeably but I still can't get anything other than the basic stations.

You might need a digital radio receiver in those circumstances?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/digitalradio/listen/index.shtml#digitalradio

steveland?

Oops... sorry didnt notice that bit where you said not over the internet...


Apologies

klong

living near drogheda (southside of said kip) means i can pick up all the bbc stations but reception is weird in my house, reception grand upstairs but variable downstairs

Wertz

ShiverinEskimo wrote:

then unfortunately no. We only get them here in dundalk because of how close we are to the border. I normally lose Radio 1 crossing the boyne bridge if i'm going to dublin. SO drogheda is about the limit. DAB (Digital Radio) has an even shorter range. I use a freeview tv set that i purchased in england and i get them digitally perfectly, but as far as i know not even drogheda can pick up a digital signal.
If your desperate - move to dundalk. but you would want to really really really love chris moyles.

If it weren't for Chris Moyles in the morning I don't know what I'd do. Between that w4nk3r Tubridy, and Demo on the other side, we really are spolit for choice when it comes to s*** morning show hosts.
I don't like to bash Irish stations but the selection of stuff on national radio, especially in the "youth" market is dire. [edit] not to mention the playlists and favouritsm toward oldies or out and out pop.

On the subject of actually receiving it: R1 comes in at 98.3Mhz FM or there's the welsh transmitter wich comes in at 99.7Mhz. As for R2, I'm not sure off hand but try 88.7Mhz FM.

I always believed the Dublin stations were partly to blame for the lack of BBC FM signals S of Drogheda. There's a hill between Collon and Slane; when you drive over it and down the farside, you loose 1FM on 98.3 and get Dublin 98.1 in it's place, unless you have one hell of an aerial on your car...

byte

I think if you dont wanna pay a subscription, then get a Free To Air (FTA) digital satellite receiver and dish, and connect the receiver to your hifi via the phono outputs. Then you'll have digital quality BBC Radio, and many many more radio channels too, like Capital FM, etc. Lidl a few times had a digital receiver for €99 which wasn't bad but God only knows when they'll stock more.

ShiverinEskimo

Wertz wrote:

If it weren't for Chris Moyles in the morning I don't know what I'd do. Between that w4nk3r Tubridy, and Demo on the other side, we really are spolit for choice when it comes to s*** morning show hosts.

Amen to that. Chris and comedy dave are simply leagues ahead of the entire range of serious talk shows available in the republic.
i mean look at RTE in the mornings - RTE 1 has a phone in show where they bitch about political issues all morning and RTE 2 (2fm) has a phone in show where they bitch about Social Issues all morning. I mean come on, they wonder why listenership is down! one radio station per age group is enough!

nlgbbbblth

what I've did for the last 13 or 14 years

connect a lead from my tuner to the ntl/cablelink connection box (the regular bog-standard box - nothing to do with digital tv)

crystal clear FM reception

best bet is to use a separate tuner/radio (As opposed to midi system or 3 in 1 or 4 in 1) as that's more likely to have the necessary connection for you to plug the cable into

John R

I used to get ok reception of BBC R1 in south Dublin on 99.7. Haven't tried it in years, there may be a local interfering with it now.

Bard

Here's the FM frequencies I get the BBC radio stations on here in Ardee:

Radio 1 : 98.25Mhz (also on a weaker signal on 99.70Mhz)
Radio 2 : 88.70Mhz
Radio 3 : 90.90Mhz
Radio 4 : 104.60Mhz
Radio 5 Live : 103.10Mhz
Radio Ulster : 93.10Mhz

My reception on Radio 4 and 5 Live is crap at the moment though. All the rest are crystal clear.

/me goes back to listening to Carpark Catchphrase on the Chris Moyles show

Mossy Monk

5 live on FM?