Digital Switchover - UTV Region (DigitalUK)

formerly scottish paddy

kazoo106 wrote: »

What is going on with the NI Mux and the aspect ratios - picked up a Bush (bush branded vestel T7650PVR) in Argos Newry last night (which I had to exchange in Dundalk because of a faulty HDMI - but thats another matter)
Firstly the NIMUX is booming into Dundalk
BUT - whats witht the odd aspect ratios - TG4 seems to be in 4:3 and RTE2 is stretched with the DOG not even appearing properly on the screen. Audio is also crap compared to the saorview MUX - has anyone mentioned this to RTE, or do they have no input to the output?
Oh - and if anyone has a firmware for this box which allows me to re-arrange channels would be much appreciated !

I would love to know how it is being fed?............. It's not of a bl**dy SKY box is it?

watty

Solution is simple
Close the 3 x NIMM, save OUR money and let them use aerials or Dishes for the Real Saorview or Saorsat.

Add 3 more DTT sites in Republic in areas shadowed for Saorsat instead. The 3xNIMM are a crazy bit of Politics as they are even blocked on some programmes.

MarkK

watty wrote: »

Solution is simple
Close the 3 x NIMM, save OUR money and let them use aerials or Dishes for the Real Saorview or Saorsat.

Add 3 more DTT sites in Republic in areas shadowed for Saorsat instead. The 3xNIMM are a crazy bit of Politics as they are even blocked on some programmes.

The NIMUX is part funded by the British Government.

RTE is about half funded by advertising, I don't imagine the NI transmitters will be loss making for them in the medium-long term.

When Donegal alone has more than ten transmitters, it's hardly over provision to provide three in NI.

They types of programmes blocked on the NIMUX tend to be imports like Home and Away and foreign football, not Irish programming.

The government should have used the money they will get from the 'digital dividend' to fund Saorview boxes for the elderly and help for those out of range of Saorview and Saorsat, that's the crazy politics, not the NIMUX.

Sam Russell

MarkK wrote: »

The NIMUX is part funded by the British Government.

RTE is about half funded by advertising, I don't imagine the NI transmitters will be loss making for them in the medium-long term.

When Donegal alone has more than ten transmitters, it's hardly over provision to provide three in NI.

They types of programmes blocked on the NIMUX tend to be imports like Home and Away and foreign football, not Irish programming.

The government should have used the money they will get from the 'digital dividend' to fund Saorview boxes for the elderly and help for those out of range of Saorview and Saorsat, that's the crazy politics, not the NIMUX.

Most of the transmitters on or near the border are there to part-serve NI. The NI MM is probably not necessary, but we will see how much coverage it gets.

Digifriendly

Interesting that when you switch between Saorview and NIMM there doesn't seem to be a time delay in NIMM. Wonder how the signal is being fed? Regarding it not being necessary I think the original intention was to transmit just TG4 (this AFAIK was in Good Friday Agreement) but government memorandums agreed on RTE1/2 being added. I know there are parts of Belfast that cannot pick up Clermont Carn Saorview signal especially parts of West Belfast in shadow of Divis so positioning of NIMM on Black Mountain as well as Carnmoney Hill was strategic. Advantage for someone like me of NIMM is that I can now timer record from these channels along with other Freeview ones as my Sony Freeview HD PVR couldn't timer record from both Freeview and Saorview although you could manually record from both. So i hope they keep the NIMM.

Peter Rhea

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

Ahh, the old beam tilt again. You don't have access to any information about the radiation patterns of UK main transmitter sites . . .

You can find the specs. for a lot of the original main station UHF aerials in BBC R & D reports from the 1960s.

This is Divis (with 1 degree beam-tilt present & correct ) http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/reports/1967-33.pdf

kazoo106

Digifriendly wrote: »

Interesting that when you switch between Saorview and NIMM there doesn't seem to be a time delay in NIMM. Wonder how the signal is being fed? Regarding it not being necessary I think the original intention was to transmit just TG4 (this AFAIK was in Good Friday Agreement) but government memorandums agreed on RTE1/2 being added. I know there are parts of Belfast that cannot pick up Clermont Carn Saorview signal especially parts of West Belfast in shadow of Divis so positioning of NIMM on Black Mountain as well as Carnmoney Hill was strategic. Advantage for someone like me of NIMM is that I can now timer record from these channels along with other Freeview ones as my Sony Freeview HD PVR couldn't timer record from both Freeview and Saorview although you could manually record from both. So i hope they keep the NIMM.

But what about the bits of the picture which are chopped off?
It's an engineering disgrace and should be switched off until someone who's been to spec savers gets it right

sligotrain

Are the RTE NL engineers monitoring the NIMM in their technical centre at Montrose? They now have at least four spare screens to check it out

tvman2

tvman2 wrote: »

Just in and had a quick check: ch 23 from Divis - fluctuating signal quality and level 0% a lot of the time (picture freezing etc) all other channels showing around 85% signal quality, up to 100% signal level. Grid aerial in the attic with standard group A amp. 10km SW of Dundalk.

Ch23 fine this morning I assume with the change in weather, no fluctuations in signal strength/quality.

Ronnie Raygun

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

Just check any manufacturers figures for beamwidth of a v. pol. grid & a Yagi (probably won't specify H or V) of the same gain.

This Hirschmann catalogue specifies acceptance angle (offnungswinkel) for horizontal & vertical polarisation. Check the figures for the FESA 805 (grid) & FESA 243 (Yagi), which are contained in one table.

Ronnie Raygun

Peter Rhea wrote: »

You can find the specs. for a lot of the original main station UHF aerials in BBC R & D reports from the 1960s.

Think there are links to detailed tender documents for RTENL kit somewhere in this forum.

This thread? Has attachments, haven't time to look at it now.

jeltz

The problem of interference from Mount Leinster on E23 and eventually on E26 is bound to affect a significant amount of people, some because it is strong enough to break through at the back, no matter what the claimed :rolleyes: f/b ratio is, and some due to the angle the aerial is at because the rear side lobe on most high gain yagis would be pointing directly at Mount Leinster. Many people will suffer from both due to having badly designed cheap aerials.

And with the Mount Leinster transmitter height of 906 meters it is hard to imagine that simply realigning the aerial a bit right or left on Divis would make any difference. Even on an aerial with a proven good design. I think that is why the engineers were keen to use the Group B channels.

So I think for a certain amount of people the cure is going to be the old fashioned one of a phased array in the form of horizontal stacking.

Now that log periodics are cheap, if the existing signal is strong a pair of band IV or 'Group A' log periodics should give maximum rejection due to the clean polar response. Plus having intrinsically the lowest noise of any antenna due to their design they would give a very clean signal to the amplifier despite a lower gain. And two would have about the same wind loading as one 18 element yagi. I mean the long log periodics, about a meter long not the tiddlers.

Otherwise the tried and tested twin Antiference TCX18 or Blake SR18 or Triax SG18 should do the job. The TCX18 is the update of the TC18 with an X dipole. SG18 have the lowest wind loading but it seems Triax has discontinued the Group A according to their catalogue, not a good move I think as it has a decent reputation in some coastal areas where reflector loss and damaged lashings are common enough.

Some people on higher ground might get away with lowering their existing aerial and getting it below the roof level with the roof and the junk and water tank inside the roof space in the way of Mount Leinster. Likewise they might use any trees in that direction to dampen the signal in summer. But I imagine very few houses would be able to do that as Divis is so distant and the height and power of Mount Leinster transmissions would give enough reflections from ground surfaces underneath the aerial to still cause interference in many cases. With the low field strength required and the diversity gain via multipath of the latest high sensitivity digital tuners, it shouldn't take much to cause interference.

On top of that I bet there are huge numbers of Fringe Electronics masthead amplifiers, diplexers and combiners out there. They are just pcb boards in an unlined plastic box and must be replaced with modern metal box versions with f connectors. Variable gain amplifiers are a must with digital signals and using RFI chokes on the mains to the amp is a good precaution.

Richard

watty wrote: »

Solution is simple
Close the 3 x NIMM, save OUR money and let them use aerials or Dishes for the Real Saorview or Saorsat.
.

There were similar issues surrounding the money RTE spent on modifying the Whitehead relay in County Antrim so that It would allow them to increase the analogue signal from Clermont Carn for Northern viewers. I remember as I was a taxpayer in the South at the time.

I suppose it is partly commercial and largely political. Not living on the island of Ireland I don't really care, but it is a shame for those in the South who receive no TV compared to people in Northern Ireland who are benefitting from a seventh multiplex.

TG4 is a different issue, of course, as it is being funded by the UK government.

tvman2

jeltz wrote: »

On top of that I bet there are huge numbers of Fringe Electronics masthead amplifiers, diplexers and combiners out there. They are just pcb boards in an unlined plastic box and must be replaced with modern metal box versions with f connectors. Variable gain amplifiers are a must with digital signals and using RFI chokes on the mains to the amp is a good precaution.

That's exactly what I'm using - leftovers from analogue. What do you recommend as replacements for the amp and diplexer?

FREETV

tvman2 wrote: »

That's exactly what I'm using - leftovers from analogue. What do you recommend as replacements for the amp and diplexer?

FTE Maximal, Triax, Johansson, Global, Labgear etc all good products.

jeltz

Plus PROception by Blake, now becoming very popular with installers as Blake have a good reputation for aerials and their amps etc are just as good.

Labgear tend to be a bit cheaper than most and still popular with installers, Triax a bit more expensive. All are high quality though.

Of aerials, Antiference are about the most popular with installers, e.g. there are huge numbers of the short rear mount x beams, the DX series, they are on virtually every street in London, take a look if you go there. There are a huge amount of Antiference TC series around, I have 3 here plus a Blake DMX10. Though they have been replaced by the TCX installers have used the cheaper RX to replace the TC as digital is less demanding than analogue when close to the transmitter. Blake and Triax are the other popular quality aerials. These are all highly durable aerials, excellent value for money when you consider how bad the weather can be.

Of course by far the most popular arial is the contract, there are loads which have been up for 30+ years through all sorts of storms but still provide good service with digital. Recently the Antiference RX range has been used instead of contracts by many installers.

Televes and imitators are total carp. I have seen quite a number of recent installs round these parts with the reflectors blown off. They could not have been up for a year or two. The plastic comes off the grids quite rapidly. The tribeams are a disaster waiting to happen, they should be on two chimney brackets but never are. Hence they are beloved by cowboys!

jeltz

Fracarro aerials are also good but they have had many difficulties in securing consistent distribution in the UK and Ireland. Over the last few decades they have been highly variable in their availability and tended to be expensive which has put the professional installers off.

One thing I have noticed is that many companies appear to have discontinued their lines of really big aerials. I think this is due to the lower field strength required by DVB-T and the improvements on that by DVB-T2. Also that people can often use satellite instead though this is often less than satisfactory in many countries due to carriage costs and rights issues, Saorshat :rolleyes: and Freesat being just two examples.

The Triax Unix 100 seems to be unavailable and unorderable. But still in the catalogue and with F connectors so they can be used as 'active' aerials with the special mini amplifier, so they are the very latest designs.

Antiference seems only to do a big XG in group EW which means a group E that can be used as Wideband but most gain is over group E.

Blake have the big 2+ meter Jaybeam x beams from when they bought over the Jaybeam company. They are very expensive but quality is of course top class. When I say expensive, don't look. :eek:

lawhec

Continuing the story from a couple of weeks ago, I was worried that from Wednesday last week my grandparents would lose a good lock of Freeview channels due to co-channel with Divis. I needn't have worried, all five SD multiplexes, including the three commercial ones, are coming in great. The two PSBs have 3/7 bars while the three commercial are 2/7 bars compared to 1/7 for the pre-DSO multiplexes on their Philips TV. A Freeview HD set-top-box I took up with me was plugged in and true to form the BBC B multiplex was displaying great pictures and the NIMM was also coming in as well. Discussion followed about the apparently faulty Clermont Carn aerial with still no signal for digital now coming through - made the point that with the new transmission aerial and power in place, and that before failure occurred that without climbing up to the roof to check to be certain that the masthead amp had failed, that removing the amp and connecting the two leads together may well work, we're going to carry out a bit of remedial work to do that next weekend when we've gathered all appropriate equipment needed and safety precautions taken. I'm about 90% confident that removing the amp and connecting the down lead together with a waterproofed F-joiner should do the trick.

On to my uncle's farm and it was a slightly different story. The two PSB muxes from Brougher were coming in fine after a retune, but no sign of the three commercial multiplexes. Adding the HD STB brought in the NIMM fine (it's getting out as good as the DVB-T PSBs) but reception of the HD mux was a little iffy and could occasionally break up. Tuning in the frequencies for the commercial multiplexes seemed to indicate no signal or quality. So I decided, against good practice, of fitting a set-back amp between the downlead and the box. Predicted gain of 12db and a noise figure of <4db, so nothing special. I was not expecting this to work like magic to bring in everything, just under the rule that RF can work like a black art and sure enough it actually made problems worse! The BBC B HD mux's quality had decreased right down to the point where pictures were a broken up mess! Let that be a lesson that adding more noise into the signal regardless of amplifying at the same stage can cause problems. The NIMM and the two PSB muxs were unchanged. Still no sign of any activity on the SDN and Arqiva A muxs but tuning to E27 started seeing some activity of the signal strength and quality bars flicking between both being good, down to zero, then back again giving an unsteady signal.

When I did the retune for the BBC A Mux a fortnight previously, it was found that pre-DSO mux B on E26 was also coming in steady (though no other pre-DSO muxs). Without being able to determine more about what is actually happening without getting more involved, I suspect that the three PSB muxs from Divis are interfering with an already marginal signal for the SDN & Arqiva multiplexes from Brougher, and that the sporadic signal on E27 was down to the path of interference waxing and waning to a point that when interference was just below the threshold, a "signal" could be read. There was a similar problem with the TV in the mobile home - all bar the SDN and Arqiva muxs from Brougher were OK. Looking at the terrain mapping, the houses on the farm lie about halfway up from a valley where nearby mountains from nearly all sides play havoc in disrupting UHF signals and VHF to a lesser extent. However the terrestrial path to Divis appear to be slightly less torturous compared to that for Brougher. Perhaps a test needs to be made having a look at how DVB-T reception from Divis is in future visits. In saying that last Friday night/Saturday morning seen the first frost of winter, and a sharp enough one at that. If it keeps getting frequently cold roads up around there can be dangerous/impassible. But it's worth a go - the uncle's house give no terrestrial reception predicted so to get a steady signal for three of the Brougher signals isn't too bad on its own.

Mr. Rabbit

Sounds like a "Freesat would be best" situalion, in my opinion Lawhec. Sometimes faffing around with terrestrial aerials just isn't worth the hassle in the long run.

Has anyone noticed dreadful lip sync on UTV HD ?

It's been like this ever since it started last Wednesday. Both the Humax boxes and Sony PVR display the problem.

Very annoying.

lawhec

Mr. Rabbit wrote: »

Sounds like a "Freesat would be best" situalion, in my opinion Lawhec. Sometimes faffing around with terrestrial aerials just isn't worth the hassle in the long run.

They already have Sky. And I like a challenge

Mr. Rabbit

lawhec wrote: »

They already have Sky. And I like a challenge

Yep, I know what you mean Lawhec.

Have you noticed the lip sync on UTV HD ?

kazoo106

UTV HD Lipsync same here - sometimes half a second out - but only on HD stuff, upscaled stuff seems OK

excollier

No problem here

lawhec

Mr. Rabbit wrote: »

Yep, I know what you mean Lawhec.

Have you noticed the lip sync on UTV HD ?

No problems here. Maybe it's a fault within the Divis transmission group?

Mr. Rabbit

kazoo106 wrote: »

UTV HD Lipsync same here - sometimes half a second out - but only on HD stuff, upscaled stuff seems OK

Yep, that's what I've noticed. Pretty bad at times.

It could be just Divis related.

It's on Carnmoney Hill as well.

mrdtv2010

Mr. Rabbit wrote: »

Yep, that's what I've noticed. Pretty bad at times.

It could be just Divis related.

It's on Carnmoney Hill as well.

That means it is a Divis Group fault as Carnmoney Hill is a Divis daughter relay, if there are no problems on other NI transmitter groups. I am sure Arqiva will get round to fixing it as well as the NIMM aspect ratio problems reported.

mrdtv2010

jeltz wrote: »

Fracarro aerials are also good but they have had many difficulties in securing consistent distribution in the UK and Ireland. Over the last few decades they have been highly variable in their availability and tended to be expensive which has put the professional installers off.

One thing I have noticed is that many companies appear to have discontinued their lines of really big aerials. I think this is due to the lower field strength required by DVB-T and the improvements on that by DVB-T2. Also that people can often use satellite instead though this is often less than satisfactory in many countries due to carriage costs and rights issues, Saorshat :rolleyes: and Freesat being just two examples.

The Triax Unix 100 seems to be unavailable and unorderable. But still in the catalogue and with F connectors so they can be used as 'active' aerials with the special mini amplifier, so they are the very latest designs.

Antiference seems only to do a big XG in group EW which means a group E that can be used as Wideband but most gain is over group E.

Blake have the big 2+ meter Jaybeam x beams from when they bought over the Jaybeam company. They are very expensive but quality is of course top class. When I say expensive, don't look. :eek:

Agreed re Fracarro especially the Sigma aerial. You can get them in the UK but they are hard to source: they are not cheap but they are good. I suspect its because of their Italian origin where RF is very congested and I have seen them a lot on Italian rooftops.

Rick_

Forget lip-sync issues... have you see UTV HD's DOG?! It's far too bright, bold and it's in the 4:3 safe zone... Seriously?!

formerly scottish paddy

Paddy C wrote: »

Forget lip-sync issues... have you see UTV HD's DOG?! It's far too bright, bold and it's in the 4:3 safe zone... Seriously?!

They are so excited about being in HD (where people can now actually see it) they want everyone to know about it........I am surprised they haven't put it in the middle of the screen! :rolleyes:

watty

Death to all DOGS. Esp now there is only Digital. One button press tells you the channel. Sheer mindless egotism by the channels.

Write and complain (more effective than email).