Freeview TV not available, what are the options?

[TheBoyBilly]

My lady has moved from Hythe in Kent to Ashford. She has built-in freeview which worked fine at her old address but doesn't in central Ashford. A quick check on the freeview website says that the signal comes from the Heathfield transmitter and is not available to her new address. Further, it still won't be available after the digital switch in 2012. Progress eh? Are Sky or Virgin Media the only viable options?

Bill

 

[fossyant]

Freesat

 

[marinyork]

My lady has moved from Hythe in Kent to Ashford. She has built-in freeview which worked fine at her old address but doesn't in central Ashford. A quick check on the freeview website says that the signal comes from the Heathfield transmitter and is not available to her new address. Further, it still won't be available after the digital switch in 2012. Progress eh? Are Sky or Virgin Media the only viable options?

Bill

What does doesn't work mean? Did she retune? Is the picture stability not so good? Whole muxes missing? Is the rooftop aerial and cabling decent nick?

http://www.wolfbane....gi-bin/tvd.exe? tells you many more details.

I would be careful about virgin media as it won't be available in all addresses. You've probably checked this though.

I picked a postcode in central Ashford and put in TN23 1QN into wolfbane and it came up with the following

Dover B only mux 1,2,C field strength 35 dBµV/m 17 miles away amplified extra hi gain available
Dover all muxes on fairly low power 31 * dBµV/m 17miles away amplified extra hi gain available
Bluebell Hill all muxes on fairly low power 31* dBµV/m 19 miles away amplified extra hi gain available

I would say that based on the wolfbane readings, it's certainly a bit on the iffy side before switchover but shouldn't be impossible to get working.

 

[Brains]

We live in a dead TV area, we never got Channel 5, and over the last couple of years we lost channel 4 and then ITV, so were just down to BBC 1 and 2
The solution is FreeSat.
You need a dish putting up high
You need a freesat box for each TV (£70 each for good ones with HD ready)
Whole set up cost about £300. One off payment, no subscriptions.
We now have about 100 channels of rubbish but we have back 1 2 3 and 4 and now 5 and the kids chanels

As we don't care about sports this is fine with us

 

[marinyork]

By the way did some numpty installer really point the aerial in Ashford towards Heathfield North transmitter? Wolfbane lists that as 30 miles away and 23 * dBµV/m, only someone that really didn't know what they were doing would do that as there isn't a snowball's chance in hell of getting it working (unless there was some historical reason no longer the case that it's pointing that way)? It just seems really, really bizarre unless there is some explanation for it.

Other than that I can only think that is needs retuning if it thinks it's on the old transmitter. The old gf's parents lived in Kent a fair way from those transmitters and a bit of a weak signal area and I had all of the weird tales about not getting channel 5. Despite the kicking and screaming over change it worked fine.

In your case BillyTheBoy I remain far from convinced that it is impossible to get freeview, very far from convinced. It may be the case you can't but I wouldn't give up yet.