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April 18th - retune at Rowridge, Oxford, Stockland Hill and Hannington

The London region retune today allows four transmitters that have been waiting for the Crystal Palace transmitter to release its analogue frequencies. In particular, Rowridge (Southampton and Portsmouth) users need to retune and those as far away as Devon (Stockland Hill), Oxfordshire and Hannington (Hampshire, Berkshire and Surrey) may have more channels today.

The London region retune today allows four transmitters that ha
published on UK Free TV

If you use the Rowridge transmitter, you will need to retune today as the commercial multiplexes have changed frequencies today to their final allocation.

SDN is now on C25 (506.0MHz), ArqA on C22+ (482.2MHz) and C28 (530.0MHz).

In addition, the commercial multiplex are now being broadcast at full power (200kW) with vertical polarization (the elements on the receiving aerial going up and down) and at 50kW with horizontal polarization. This means that for some viewers, it may be possible to improve their Freeview signal quality by rotating their aerial.



It is necessary, once again, to perform a "first time install" on your Freeview equipment if you use Rowridge.



At Stockland Hill, the commercial multiplex increase in power from 10kW to 25kW today. If you could not receive the SDN, ArqA and ArqB multiplexes from the transmitter before today, you should retune your Freeview equipment to see if you now can receive the services.

At the Oxford transmitter, the commercial multiplex increase in power from 12.5kW to their final level of 50kW today. Again, if you could not receive the SDN, ArqA and ArqB multiplexes from the transmitter before today, you should retune your Freeview equipment to see if you now can receive the services.

And the same applies for the Hannington transmitter, where the levels increase to 25kW today. So, if you could not receive the SDN, ArqA and ArqB multiplexes from the transmitter before today, you should retune your Freeview equipment to see if you now can receive the services.



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Comments
Wednesday, 18 April 2012
J
John Winch
9:38 AM
Southampton

I purchased on Wednesday 11th April 2012, at John Lewis Southampton, a HUMAX HDR - FOX T2 Freeview + HD 500GB HD Digital Recorder.
I have, I believe, made all the necessary connections as per the diagram in the manual, using a HDMI lead to my Sony BRAVIA HD Ready TV and have performed the stated requirements on the installation Wizard.
I then located 24 Radio channels and 87 SD channels, the resulting picture display being very good.
Unfortunately I did not located any HD Channels.
I have tried re tuning using the procedure given in the manual and have even tried going back to the factory settings and starting again. Still no HD.
My home is in the south of England, Southampton , and my aerial points towards the transmitter at Rowridge. In fact I can see the mast from my bedroom window.
I have contacted Humax who suggested that a manual installation was necessary and provided full details as to how it should be done.
This was duly followed but sad to say still no HD.
Contacting Humax once again they could offer no explanation other than the Rowridge mast was obviously not transmitting HD.
My aerial is a wideband type with horizontal elements and a small rectangular reflector at the rear. I believe it is referred to as a YAGI type. It is not new, probably more than 10 years old, but I have checked its alignment and I am sure it is pointing directly at the Rowridge transmitter.

I have retuned today 18th April)but still no HD

I would therefore be obliged if you would advise what I should do to receive HD, otherwise my £250 investment is of no use, as the whole purpose of purchasing your unit was to upgrade to HD .

Regards
John Winch



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John Winch's 1 post GB flag
John's: mapJ's Freeview map terrainJ's terrain plot wavesJ's frequency data J's Freeview Detailed Coverage
S
Sally
10:50 AM

Re-tuned at ~10am today: all Freeview SD channels OK. (Sorry John, I don't have any HD equipment, so can't help you there).

All the PSB mux's at 95-100% strength; all Com mux's between 50-70% strength.

Rotated my wideband loft aerial to vertical (thanks to advice given here by Brian, and others): all channels now 95-100%.

So, so far, so good. Thanks again.

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Sally's 7 posts GB flag
Briantist
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

10:54 AM

John Winch: I am sorry to hear you are having problems. I can confirm that I can receive Freeview HD from the Rowridge transmitter over here in Hove.

You have the right equipment and the service is being provided, so I would next check for Single frequency interference | ukfree.tv - independent free digital TV advice .

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Briantist's 38,915 posts GB flag
R
Russ Dring
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

12:38 PM
Spalding

John Winch,
Just a thought, I have the same Humax and very good it is too!
Go to menu,settings,installation (put in your pincode)manual search.Where it asks channel, put in 21 (Rowridge HD multiplex) scroll down to "Transmission" it needs to say DVB-T2, if it says DVB-T change it. If there is a signal present, the orange and green bars will show (mine says signal 84% quality 100%. Good luck!

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Russ Dring's 48 posts GB flag
Russ's: mapR's Freeview map terrainR's terrain plot wavesR's frequency data R's Freeview Detailed Coverage
C
Chris B
12:40 PM
Bracknell

Anyone in Bracknell now picking up Freeview for the first time? I did a retune this morning, still nothing.

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Chris B's 2 posts GB flag
Chris's: mapC's Freeview map terrainC's terrain plot wavesC's frequency data C's Freeview Detailed Coverage
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:55 PM

John Winch: You should also be aware that if the signal being received is on the verges of being excessively powerful then this usually shows up on HD reception first even although that in many cases SD appears to be OK, and although you have not said as such, but if you have any type of booster in line then try by-passing it.

Another test you could also try is by using a set top aerial then manually tuning in Ch21.

By the way Rowridge is indicated as being only located 14 miles away, and at that distance its easy to receive an excessively high level of signal from a transmitter with an ERP of 200Kw such as Rowridge.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

3:34 PM

John Winch: Just to clarify as I see I omitted to say, that an excessively strong signal can block reception by overloading the tuners input circuitry, and this overload block usually showing up first on the HD channels.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
J
John V
4:22 PM

Confirming what Russ Dring says in his earlier post. I have had the HDR-Fox T2 for nearly two years, whenever it needs a retune I do it manually. I find it best to delete all channels first... start an automatic tune then cancel it immediately - so much easier than Humax's advice to reset the box. Then do your manual tune. Choose the correct HD channel number, and select the DVB-T2 option to find the HD channels. If you leave it on DVB-T it won't find them. What you shouldn't do is add channels from different transmitters. This PVR often fails to record channels where you save the same programme from two different transmitter regions. (In my case BBC HD from Crystal Palace, BBC SD from Hannington.)It shows a "failed to track program" against the recording.

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John V's 2 posts GB flag
Briantist
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

4:39 PM

John V: Thanks for posting that information, that is very useful to know.

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Briantist's 38,915 posts GB flag
A
Andy
5:18 PM

I'm just south of Winchester.

A Sony Bravia has been here almost a month, bought as refurbished and newly set up from its previous Welsh tuning. All TV channels were available here yesterday

I've just retuned and now I have SDN and ARQA missing, same as a person near Poole on another thread here.

The channels do actually appear in the guide, with no event info, and selecting them it says no signal

It seems a bit odd that increasing power and moving channels would have caused a problem.

I note that the vertical polarisation has more power, so I could try a trip to the roof when it stops raining, but these used to be receivable here for the last few years even with much lower power, though the occasional glitch.

I wonder if there is still work happening and the presence of the channel number is like a placeholder for when these multiplexes resume later on

Does this sound like it makes sense, and does anyone else have issues with those 2 multiplexes at Rowridge? Is there still work in progress?

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Andy's 5 posts GB flag
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