Hiya, I have a 720p tv that a customer was throwing away, it is as good as new so I decided to take it home. It is a Sony Bravia, the model is 26EX420, i plugged in the antenna in the back but it didn't find any channels, so I am assuming it doesn't have built in freeview. Therefore I am looking at buying a hd freeview box, my question is regarding freeview hd. What resolution does freeview hd run at, will it look good on a 720p screen or will it mess up the picture, freeview hd boxes cost a fair bit so I want to find out before wasting my money, thanks...

It will work just fine. The TV won't actually be 720P (1280 x 720), it will have 768 lines.

Freeview-HD is 1920 x 1080 pixels and can switch dynamically between 1080p25 and 1080i50.

It already has a digital tuner, are you tuning the digital side?/

http://www.tv-manual.com/manuals/son...420_manual.pdf

Thanks for your response, do you think it is a good improvement over standard def freeview even at that resolution?

i don't have cable tv like sky etc, i only watch freeview, i don't think the tv has built in freevie...

It does.

well i have done the search to find channels and it didn't find any, it also says on the screen that signal strength is 0, what am i doing wrong then???

sounds like the definition of a broken TV

i have plugged hdmi sources like my ps3 in the tv and they work no problem, it just doesn't recognise that there is an antenna in the tv, doesn't find any channels. shall i just write it off as a faulty tv then?...

Are you selecting the digital tuner when searching for channels, if not and you are in analogue mode that could be why the TV is not receiving any channel information.

I assume it's a 26" TV, so I doubt whether it would be worthwhile worrying about HD.

I can see the sd-hd difference perfectly well on a sony 26in lcd.
I can also see s difference on a 23in lcd sony.
Both sets labeled "hd ready"

In built tuners and scalers (to scale sd to fit the hd panel) vary in quality.

I find with the 2 sets I have used as examples, the tuner/scaler for freeview SD on the 23in model is s bit better than the one used on the more expensive, slightly newer 26in sony. With the 26, I feel the urge to constantly want to put a hd source into it, because it makes a more noticeable difference.

My main tv is a last gen 32in Sony full hd lcd, with only the basic freeview SD tuner fitted, but has full hd panel & 4 hdmi ports. The scaler is ok on SD, but the SD reproduction is not all that faithful to the original content, the image looks a bit plastic or artificial , where the scaler is guessing more and more. Hd sources from a freesat box, or bluray are impressive however.

As well as pressing the digital key on the Sony remote to trigger its in built freeview tuner, you could also go thru the menus and find the set up, and reset the tv from scratch. This should trigger a freeview ch scan as part of the process.

Sony mucked around with the 26 screens a fair bit over recent years. But they all look more or less the same, but inside they vary. 1 specific variant, has a freeview SD tuner memory which seems to go corrupt, not saving all channels or putting them in the wrong order. Rescanning and resetting doesn't cure it. We have eliminated the aerial signal being the prob, by trying the tv on other outlets and other aerials, all known to be good. There's nothing it seems you can do to fix this.

you need to be aware that it will have two tuners

Tuner 1 is good old fashioned RF

Tuner 2 will be DTV . Digital Television.

Select DTV

It is just above the GUIDE button on remote control.

Its " Digital/ analog " button.

You do have the remote ?

As a Sony service agent I've never heard of this, or anything like it? - what model are you talking about?.

But assuming it's an OLD set, all makes often have problems with later versions of Freeview and receiving multiple transmitters (and even new sets aren't always happy with multiple transmitters).

Normal 'cures' are to not insert the aerial until it's almost at the right channels, or manually tune.

I think the memory has gone corrupt. It's not an ancient set, but def outside warranty. We don't have multiple channels, and I done the aerial out trick several times, as well as resetting the tv from scratch all with no cure. It was put on a different aerial output and a different aerial-all of which are in use and seen to be good, yet the same result.

i can confirm that i have been doing the digital auto tune not analogue, i have the antenna in the socket named cable, the other socket is uhf/vhf which i assume is for analogue. the tv works perfectly with my hdmi devices, picture is excellent, only problem is it doesn't find any channels. searching for this item online brings up the indian version of the sony website, the woman who owned it told me she bought the product in malaysia, could this be the problem, maybe it doesn't find tv signals in this part of the world?

yes that will be the problem. You need an European model

As you're not on a cable system, you shouldn't be using the cable socket (whatever that might be?) - you should be using the UHF/VHF one - although only UHF is used in the UK).

So it's not going to work unless you plug the aerial in the right socket!

ok, i did try the other socket without any luck, but i'll give it another go, i think the problem is it is not a european model as the previous poster said...

UHF is the frequency band, the same frequency band as used in the UK for both analogue (PAL) and digital (DVB-T/DVB-T2) broadcasts. The aerial you use is designed to receive UHF frequencies, the aerial doesn't care if the signal modulation is digital or analogue. There are other parameters though that are likely to make it not usable in the UK for broadcast digital TV.

Simple answer is as your original post, fit a UK specced Freeview HD set top box. HD ones can be got for as little as £25.00 or so.

TV system Analogue: B/G, I, D/K, M, L
Digital: DVB–T
Colour/video system Analogue: PAL, PAL60 (only video input), SECAM, NTSC3.58, NTSC4.43 (only video input)
Digital: MPEG-2 MP@ML/HL, MPEG-2 MP@ML/HL, H.264/MPEG-4 AVC MP/HP@L4
Channel coverage Analogue: VHF: E2–E12/UHF: E21–E69/CATV: S01–S03, S1–S41
VHF: 0–12, 5A, 9A/UHF: 28–69/CATV: S01–S03, S1–S44 (Australia)
VHF: 1–11 (New Zealand)
D/K: VHF: R1–R12, R21–R69/L: F2–F10, B–Q, F21–F69/I: UHF B21–B69/M: A2–A13,
A14–A79
Digital: VHF/UHF, UHF (New Zealand only)

That's the specs, so it looks to me as if it can get Europe E21 to E69 ?http://www.tv-manual.com/manuals/son...420_manual.pdf

Australia (and presumably New Zealand) use a different mux spacing to the UK (If I remember correctly 8Mhz in the UK and 7Mhz in Ociana) . For instance even though a Topfield UK sourced pvr is from a Aussie based company, one won't work in Australia (though in this case it's said you can re-flash the firmware). Same applies to a UK digital TV taken to Australia.

[quote]
DVB-T has been adopted or proposed for digital television broadcasting by many countries (see map), using mainly VHF 7 MHz and UHF 8 MHz channels whereas Taiwan, Colombia, Panama, Trinidad and Tobago and the Philippines use 6 MHz channels. Examples include the UK's Freeview.
[quote]

from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVB-T

It could be that - but it's certainly not the cable socket.

If nothing else, just get a Freeview box to feed it.