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Full Freeview on the Midhurst (West Sussex, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps51.017,-0.701 or 51°1'2"N 0°42'4"Wsa_postcodeGU28 9EA

 

The symbol shows the location of the Midhurst (West Sussex, England) transmitter which serves 94,000 homes. The bright green areas shown where the signal from this transmitter is strong, dark green areas are poorer signals. Those parts shown in yellow may have interference on the same frequency from other masts.

Are there any planned engineering works or unexpected transmitter faults on the Midhurst (West Sussex, England) mast?

Midhurst transmitter - Midhurst transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 25/03/2024 Pixelation or flickering on some or all channels Digital tick


Choose from three options: ■ List by multiplex ■ List by channel number ■ List by channel name
_______

Which Freeview channels does the Midhurst transmitter broadcast?

If you have any kind of Freeview fault, follow this Freeview reset procedure first.

Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.

MuxH/VFrequencyHeightModeWatts
PSB1
BBCA
 H max
C48 (690.0MHz)299mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) South, 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 17 others

PSB2
D3+4
 H max
C35 (586.0MHz)299mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
3 ITV 1 (SD) (Meridian (West micro region)), 4 Channel 4 (SD) South ads, 5 Channel 5, 6 ITV 2, 10 ITV3, 13 E4, 14 Film4, 15 Channel 4 +1 South ads, 18 More4, 26 ITV4, 28 ITVBe, 30 E4 +1, 35 ITV1 +1 (Meridian south coast),

PSB3
BBCB
 H max
C36 (594.0MHz)299mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD South, 102 BBC Two HD England, 103 ITV 1 HD (ITV Meridian Southampton), 104 Channel 4 HD South ads, 105 Channel 5 HD, 106 BBC Four HD, 107 BBC Three HD, 204 CBBC HD, 205 CBeebies HD, plus 1 others

COM4
SDN
 H -3dB
C29 (538.0MHz)299mDTG-810,000W
Channel icons
20 Drama, 21 5USA, 29 ITV2 +1, 32 5STAR, 33 5Action, 38 Channel 5 +1, 41 Legend, 42 GREAT! action, 57 Dave ja vu, 58 ITVBe +1, 59 ITV3 +1, 64 Blaze, 67 TRUE CRIME, 68 TRUE CRIME XTRA, 78 TCC, 81 Blaze +1, 83 Together TV, 89 ITV4 +1, 91 WildEarth, 209 Ketchup TV, 210 Ketchup Too, 211 YAAAS!, 267 Al Jazeera English, plus 30 others

COM5
ArqA
 H -3dB
C34 (578.0MHz)300mDTG-810,000W
Channel icons
11 Sky Mix, 17 Really, 19 Dave, 31 E4 Extra, 36 Sky Arts, 40 Quest Red, 43 Food Network, 47 Film4 +1, 48 Challenge, 49 4seven, 60 Drama +1, 65 That's TV 2, 70 Quest +1, 74 Yesterday +1, 75 That's 90s, 233 Sky News, plus 11 others

COM6
ArqB
 H -3dB
C33 (570.0MHz)300mDTG-810,000W
Channel icons
12 Quest, 25 W, 27 Yesterday, 34 GREAT! movies, 39 DMAX, 44 HGTV, 52 GREAT! romance, 56 That's TV (UK), 61 GREAT! movies extra, 63 GREAT! romance mix, 71 That’s 60s, 73 HobbyMaker, 82 Talking Pictures TV, 84 PBS America, 235 Al Jazeera Eng, plus 18 others

DTG-8 64QAM 8K 3/4 27.1Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)

The Midhurst (West Sussex, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: .

If you want to watch these channels, your aerial must point to one of the 80 Full service Freeview transmitters. For more information see the will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? page.

Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Midhurst transmitter?

regional news image
BBC South Today 1.3m homes 4.9%
from Southampton SO14 7PU, 51km west-southwest (256°)
to BBC South region - 39 masts.
regional news image
ITV Meridian News 0.9m homes 3.6%
from Whiteley PO15 7AD, 41km west-southwest (248°)
to ITV Meridian (South Coast) region - 39 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 50% evening news is shared with all of Meridian plus Oxford

How will the Midhurst (West Sussex, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

1984-971997-981998-20122012-132013-182013-1716 Oct 2019
C/D EC/D EC/D EC/D EC/D E TC/D E TK T
C29SDN
C33ArqB
C34ArqA
C35D3+4
C36BBCB
C48BBCA
C50tv_offArqBArqBArqB
C54tv_off SDNSDN
C55tv_offBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBCABBCABBCA
C56tv_off D3+4D3+4
C58tv_offITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesBBCBBBCBBBCB
C59tv_offArqAArqAArqA
C61BBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1wavesD3+4
C62SDN
C68C4wavesC4wavesC4waves

tv_off Being removed from Freeview (for 5G use) after November 2020 / June 2022 - more
Table shows multiplexes names see this article;
green background for transmission frequencies
Notes: + and - denote 166kHz offset; aerial group are shown as A B C/D E K W T
waves denotes analogue; digital switchover was 29 Feb 12 and 14 Mar 12.

How do the old analogue and currrent digital signal levels compare?

Analogue 1-4 100kW
BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-7dB) 20kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB(-10dB) 10kW
Mux C*(-16dB) 2.5kW
Mux 1*, Mux 2*, Mux A*, Mux B*(-17dB) 2kW
Mux D*(-20dB) 1000W

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Midhurst transmitter area

Aug 1958-Jan 1992Southern Television
Jan 1982-Dec 1992Television South (TVS)
Jan 1993-Feb 2004Meridian
Feb 2004-Dec 2014ITV plc
Feb 1983-Dec 1992TV-am•
Jan 1993-Sep 2010GMTV•
Sep 2010-Dec 2014ITV Daybreak•
• Breakfast ◊ Weekends ♦ Friday night and weekends † Weekdays only. Midhurst was not an original Channel 3 VHF 405-line mast: the historical information shown is the details of the company responsible for the transmitter when it began transmitting Channel 3.

Comments
Friday, 9 March 2012
D
Darren Ellis
5:54 PM
Liphook

Hi all,
We have contacted Humax (re: loss of BBC channels on PVR 8000T) and all they keep saying is do a manual tune. We have tried this, along with the factory reset, tuning with no aerial etc. etc, but all to no-avail. Not sure what else we can do, will things return to normal after 14th March or will the BBC Mux still be on far more power than the others (which has been hinted could be our problem, but how too much power affects only one device we don't understand)
Are we going to be forced to throw the Humax away and buy another one?
Any suggestions gratefully received.

link to this comment
Darren Ellis's 6 posts GB flag
Darren's: mapD's Freeview map terrainD's terrain plot wavesD's frequency data D's Freeview Detailed Coverage
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

9:27 PM

Darren Ellis: Purely out of interest can you actually receive the low powered (2Kw) ITV1 & ITV3 muxes? as you are not predicted as being able to do so until March 14th.

However the point of this being, that if you can receive the aforementioned channels then unlike what the predictor suggests you are likely to be located in a lucky spot for reception, the downside of this being that the much higher powered BBC (20Kw) mux at only 6 miles away could well be causing your PVR to suffer from signal overloading problems, as the tuner fitted in that model (albeit of older design) is more sensitive than some found around, but because of this otherwise plus point is likewise more sensitive to be overloaded.

To eliminate the possibility of an excessive signal applying, if you have access to a set top aerial then just for a test plug that in and carry out another manual tune on Mux Ch55 and see if anything comes up, if it does it doesn't really matter what like it might be (severe glitching on picture etc) as the main point of the exercise is whether or not you get anything.

Should this procedure bring results, then you will require to fit an attenuator of at least about 10dB or so in line with the aerial socket of the Humax to slightly kill the signal level, as come switchover ITV is also likely to vanish "if" the problem is caused by signal overloading.

On the other hand though, if nothing you do signal reduction wise results in the BBC being received then even although the 8000T is seen listed as being 8k compatible it might not be quite so stable as Humax maintains, the proof if this being if ITV1 also vanishes on the 14th.

link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Saturday, 10 March 2012
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

4:30 AM

MIDHURST transmitter - Analogue BBC ONE Weak Signal; DSO related from 02:07 on 29 Feb BBC ONE Off Air from 16:22 on 08 Mar to 16:26 on 08 Mar [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,822 posts xx flag
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

4:30 AM

MIDHURST transmitter - Analogue BBC ONE Weak Signal; DSO related from 02:07 on 29 Feb BBC ONE Off Air from 16:22 on 08 Mar to 16:26 on 08 Mar [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,822 posts xx flag
D
Darren Ellis
5:39 PM
Liphook

Hi JB38,
Thank you so much for your advice. We disconnected the Humax and plugged it directly into the aerial lead from the aerial on the roof (no booster) and tried to tune it. We received no channels at all, the signal strength was down to around 20% with very poor quality on all channels/muxs. We then plugged in just a booster and that directly into the Humax and tuned. We were back to square one with 80+% strength and no quality on channel55/BBCMux and around 60% strength and 100% quality on all the other 5 channels/mux's, even channel65 with ITV1 and 2 etc. We're going to wait until after the 14th March and see what happens and make a decision then.
Thanks for all your advice, if anyone has any more ideas we'll welcome them.

link to this comment
Darren Ellis's 6 posts GB flag
Darren's: mapD's Freeview map terrainD's terrain plot wavesD's frequency data D's Freeview Detailed Coverage
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

9:47 PM

Darren Ellis: Thanks for that update on the situation having taken note of all you have reported, however on analysing same I have to say that I feel that your BBC problem could still be because of signal overloading thats causing instability to occur in the Humax 8000's receiver.

I have to point out that the aspect about being in this type of situation that can be "very" misleading to many is that the strength / quality indications seen on the receiving equipments indicators can in most cases be "exactly" the same as that obtained if from a weak signal, this being as the result of the excessively high RF level in the tuners front end causing partial instability to occur, and with this having a knock on effect in the oscillator circuitry dependant on the channel selected, the aforementioned instability corrupting an otherwise clean digital signal resulting in it only being partially measured hence the low readings. (exp somewhat simplified)

Needless of course to say, that the important part of a digital signal, namely its quality is always first to suffer when instability strikes, and as the instability level rises the quality is frequently seen to drop to zero, this exactly what you experienced when you plugged the booster back in.

I do of course realise that you cannot receive the lower powered multiplexes without the booster, but as mentioned in my original posting you are not really officially predicted to be able to receive them properly at present, and although you obviously can do with the booster I feel that you might be paying the penalty of having them by causing the tuner to be overloaded.

If its at all possible I would still like if you could manage to try a set top aerial in the manner previously described, as the outdoor aerial straight into the Humax without the booster is still not as good a test, especially where an 8000 is involved, but should this not be possible then I will look forward to a further update come the 14th as that will be the day of reckoning, so to say! as then if its not a signal overload problem then it doesnt leave anything else other than the not so nice issue of 8k compatibility.


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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Sunday, 11 March 2012
D
Darren Ellis
8:46 AM
Liphook

Thanks again JB38.
We'll see if we can lay our hands on a set top aerial and carry out your suggestion. We'll see what happens after next Wednesday too.
Thanks again for your advice, of all the people to respond (including Humax who have been no help at all) your suggestions have been the most helpful.

link to this comment
Darren Ellis's 6 posts GB flag
Darren's: mapD's Freeview map terrainD's terrain plot wavesD's frequency data D's Freeview Detailed Coverage
S
Stephen
4:38 PM

Hi there, really glad I found this link.. We live in Chichester and do not know much about the switchover ( even though we are trying to learn ) however we seem to have gone down to 29 channels from 89 via our bush LCD42911FHD3D , 42 inch tv we only just bought! It has an inbuilt "Freeview" tuner and we didnt have any problems before last week, Now suddenly we have terrible signal.. the 29 channels we do have keep cuting in and out /pixilating too. Could anyone help with this? Im guessing the March 14th date everyuone mentions is part of the reason? Cheers,
Stephen and Joanna

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Stephen's 1 post GB flag
M
Martin
5:39 PM

Darren Ellis:
Just thought I'd comment that we are near you (Greatham) with a Humax 8000T and it has no problems (either before or after 14 March).

We just did a full default setup and all channels came in no problem.

We have a televes DAT 45 active aerial and 4 way amplifier/splitter on the roof. I installed this in 2006.

Just so you don't throw away your 8000T!

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Martin's 8 posts GB flag
Dave Lindsay
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

6:25 PM

Stephen: Which channels are you getting now (but pixelated)?

See if there are logical channel numbers 800 and upwards.

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Dave Lindsay's 5,724 posts GB flag
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