any advice on why i keep losing certain digital channels

lucimirlucimir Posts: 7
Forum Member
I have a brand new Sony digital TV and I keep losing some of my digital stations. Analogue is fine. At first I thought that I was losing the channels as I was routed through my VCr and my DVD recorder but even when I place the aerial cable directly into the back of the wall of the building it doesn’t necessarily improve the signal. I have brought these fancy expensive plated cables etc and there is no difference. Sometimes when I jiggle it around it improves and then the channels disappear. But it’s the same channels that fail to tune or not appear from searching the internet they belong to multiplex 2 64 qam which are channel 4 itv1,2,3,4,E4 etc. Sometimes there are there which is fine but then I will suddenly get screen freeze/tiling/blocking of the pictures. So for the last 36 hours I have had none of these channels no matter what time of the day or night. The BBC 1 etc are not affected. I keep tuning and retuning constantly. ( by the way if I disconnect the aeriel from the wall or the dvd recorder do I have to always do a retune on the TV and the DVD Recorder. )I live in a council flat three storeys with shared communal aerial. Any advice will be very much appreciated.
Tv is only four weeks old and it wasnt so bad the first week or so but now nothing. But all the other channels are good. thanks

Comments

  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 6,890
    Forum Member
    lucimir wrote:
    I have a brand new Sony digital TV and I keep losing some of my digital stations... But it’s the same channels that fail to tune or not appear from searching the internet they belong to multiplex 2 64 qam which are channel 4 itv1,2,3,4,E4 etc. Sometimes there are there which is fine but then I will suddenly get screen freeze/tiling/blocking of the pictures.

    Multiplexes broadcasting in 64QAM require a higher signal strength to decode properly and reliably, it sounds like your aerial provides a marginal or borderline signal, potentially due to either a weak signal or a source of interference (perhaps being introduced due to poor quality cabling).
    I live in a council flat three storeys with shared communal aerial. Any advice will be very much appreciated.
    Tv is only four weeks old and it wasnt so bad the first week or so but now nothing. But all the other channels are good. thanks

    Speak to your landlord or housing association, the communal aerial system perhaps isn't designed to provide a reliable digital signal (having been designed to provide analogue TV) and needs to be upgraded so that it can... in fact the communal aerial may be setup to filter everything but the analogue channels out, hence the poor digital reception in the first place.

    Some people may suggest you use a plug-in signal booster, however this may not achieve much, in fact it may make reception worse of possibly even affect the entier communal aerial. The ideal solution is to get the aerial (and/or cabling) sorted out so it provides sufficient signal in the first place.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 799
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    What is the signal strength on the channels you keep losing?
    You may need a signal booster.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 52
    Forum Member
    lucimir wrote:
    I have a brand new Sony digital TV and I keep losing some of my digital stations. Analogue is fine. At first I thought that I was losing the channels as I was routed through my VCr and my DVD recorder but even when I place the aerial cable directly into the back of the wall of the building it doesn’t necessarily improve the signal. I have brought these fancy expensive plated cables etc and there is no difference. Sometimes when I jiggle it around it improves and then the channels disappear. But it’s the same channels that fail to tune or not appear from searching the internet they belong to multiplex 2 64 qam which are channel 4 itv1,2,3,4,E4 etc. Sometimes there are there which is fine but then I will suddenly get screen freeze/tiling/blocking of the pictures. So for the last 36 hours I have had none of these channels no matter what time of the day or night. The BBC 1 etc are not affected. I keep tuning and retuning constantly. ( by the way if I disconnect the aeriel from the wall or the dvd recorder do I have to always do a retune on the TV and the DVD Recorder. )I live in a council flat three storeys with shared communal aerial. Any advice will be very much appreciated.
    Tv is only four weeks old and it wasnt so bad the first week or so but now nothing. But all the other channels are good. thanks
    Have you tried another Digibox?...yours might be faulty!
  • lucimirlucimir Posts: 7
    Forum Member
    Thanks for your advice. I will contact the council re the aerial. I am not sure on how to check the signal strength. I think its in there somewhere as one time when i was doing something ( either tuning or setting up) it showed the signal strength as maximum. But when I have gone through all the options ( its a digital TV so the tuner is inside the tv so no seperate digibox) I cant find the signal strength. It seems to only show if I am in some section ? what. I went to the sony website to see if i could email them to ask where on the TV I can check signal strength but it looks as if will have to phone them next week. ( its not in the manual.)
  • lucimirlucimir Posts: 7
    Forum Member
    Hi Just to update. While waiting for the local council to get back to me about when they plan to update the aerials I unplugged my vcr and removed the monster cables with the gold bits and now only have my dvd recorder plugged into Tv with cables seperated as far as possible from each other and this appears to give to have given me some temporary relief. Also I am sure its worse when the weather is bad. i.e raining etc. But now whats happened is that I have unplugged something which allowed me to use the videoplus and or maual recording on the dvd recorder because it only records a black screen but if I use the EPG its records fine. ( But the EPG is unreliable). I use the smart link between dvd recorder and TV but that doesnt appear to allow me to set the dvd recorder ( using videoplus or manually) it was fine before. I cant figure out what i have done wrong. I am presuming that maybe the scart plug needs to go into two different sockets. If so does that mean that I can only use either the EPG or the videoplus and not both. Any advice
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