[Ashford Steve]

During late morning and early afternoon schedules, my Panasonic Viera cuts off, repeatedly, if tuned to BBC stations. All I get is a blank screen and a white bar showing the message
NO SERVICE
I have to tune into a non-BBC station, then tune back, only for the whole thing to o down, just minues later. Does anyone have any idea what the problem might be?

[Nigel Goodwin]

Can you check the signal strength on the BBC channels? - sounds like it might be too weak?, possibly tuned to the wrong transmitter following a retune?. Do you have other BBC channels up in the 800's? (where they place multiple channels).

[Ashford Steve]

As for signal strength or wrong transmitter, 2 other tvs bought since London switched fully to digital signal seem to have no problem. Previously, the Panasonic was our only digital set. We do have BBC channels in the 800s, though I haven't checked to see if the problem affects them. Certainly, BBC News Channel 80 is hit. Don't know if that helps anyone.

[chrisjr]

If you have channels up in the 800s then you are receiving more than one transmitter. That could be the cause of the problem. Your Panasonic may have tuned a weaker transmitter first and allocated those services to the "normal" channel numbers then found the stronger local transmitter and put those services up in the 800s.

Do you know what transmitter you should be receiving from? If so then perhaps manually tuning in the 5 (6 if you have a HD capable device) muxes would sort the issue. If not stick your details in to

http://www.digitaluk.co.uk/postcodechecker/

and click "Detailed View". This should give you the details of what transmitter you should be receiving and the UHF channel numbers you need to do a manual tune. Before retuning you should delete all existing channels so you start from fresh.

[Nigel Goodwin]

Originally Posted by Ashford Steve

As for signal strength or wrong transmitter, 2 other tvs bought since London switched fully to digital signal seem to have no problem. Previously, the Panasonic was our only digital set. We do have BBC channels in the 800s, though I haven't checked to see if the problem affects them.

Then check them - they will almost certainly be the correct ones and be fine.

You need to manually move them down to where you want them.

Modern TV's deal with multiple transmitters better than the old ones - but still not perfectly.

[Ashford Steve]

Latest news is, I don't have the 800 + channels now, and BBC News channel is affected. Oddly, the problem is limited to late mornings and early afternoons.

[chrisjr]

Originally Posted by Ashford Steve

Latest news is, I don't have the 800 + channels now, and BBC News channel is affected. Oddly, the problem is limited to late mornings and early afternoons.

Does the problem only affect BBC News? All the BBC channels are on the same mux (excepting the two HD ones) so in theory any random interference causing the problem on BBC News should randomly affect the other BBC channels as well.

It would be something very exceptional that could interfere ONLY with the BBC News channel to the exclusion of all the others. So if you haven't already try the other BBC channels when it happens and see if they are also affected.

If all the BBC channels are affected then there could be some electronic gadget near you that only springs into life at certain times of the day that could be putting out interference affecting the BBC mux. Tracking down the culprit may be the hard part and once tracked down working out how to stop it might be even more fun (not )

[Nigel Goodwin]

Originally Posted by Ashford Steve

Latest news is, I don't have the 800 + channels now, and BBC News channel is affected. Oddly, the problem is limited to late mornings and early afternoons.

So why don't you have them any more?, did you check the performance on the 800 channels when they were there?.

As we've all said, it's almost certainly that you have the BBC channels tuned to the wrong multiplex, which is why it's dropping out.

Either retune manually (which can be a nightmare), or retune automatically, and then move the correct channels down from the 800's.

Bear in mind you will have to do this every retune, which is an ongoing thing with Freeview.

[iangrad]

Just a thought on this , Do you have a HDMI lead routed anywhere near the aerial lead ? if so separate them or replace it with a better ( screened ) one !

PS Manual tuning on a Pana is easy once you know the multiplex ch Nos from "post code checker" at www.digitaluk.co.uk