Digital tv

[Matthew_374539188]

Hi Guys,

Im about to have a couple of nights in this country iv my compass rallye gte,1994, can I get digi tv through the vans aerial if I use a set top box, appreciate any advice available, thanx. By the way, Happy new year everyone.

 

[S_374382905]

Mathew.

Short answer is 'Yes' - providing that the aeriel is a 'Digital one'. Mine is the 'flying saucer' type and works perfectly with the Digi Box. You just need to retune it for each location that you visit.

 

[Matthew_374539188]

Mathew.

Short answer is 'Yes' - providing that the aeriel is a 'Digital one'. Mine is the 'flying saucer' type and works perfectly with the Digi Box. You just need to retune it for each location that you visit.

Thanks for that,I have the flying saucer aerial but with it being quite an old van i wasn't sure if it was digital.

 

[WoodlandsCamper]

You will only get a digital picture if you are in a strong signal area. You may wish to use an external domestic aerial with at least 11 elements.

 

[xtrailman]

yes the status is quite poor, i never use ours now, just a high gain wideband ariel on a pole 1m above the caravan.

The new type status are much better, being height adjustable.

 

[S_374382905]

Mathew

The others are correct - quality does depend on signal strength. I bought one of the 'fishtail' type aerials and a pole for it, so you can get the best direction, but I found it to be a bit of a pain. If you live anywhere near North Lancs you can have it for a fraction of what I paid - only used it once.

I went for a satellite system - I already had a spare sky box and just married it to a portable dish which was about

 

[Woody3]

To emphasise once again - there ain't no such thing as a DIGITAL aerial. All aerials will work on digital or analogue. The only difference may be that post DSO it may be necessary in some places to replace a banded aerial with a wideband equivalent. This won't affect caravanners as they will already be using one.

As for the Status being poor, once again I would urge users that are having problems to disassemble every TV plug in the van that they can and make sure it is correctly assembled. My 315 was useless until I did just that and found two with short circuits. It actually works quite well now.

As for signal strength, digital TV actually needs much less signal stength to give pictures without fault. Most major sites that are now transmitting digital operate at about 1% of the analogue power at the same site - for instance Emley Moor transmits 870KW per channel on analogue but only 8.7KW on digital. Most sites - Emley included - will see a substantial increase in radiated power post DSO, Emley going to 176KW.

Signal strength is not so much of an issue but quality is much more important with digital, and what would appear as ghosting on analogue that can be lived with will make digital fall over. That is why more often than not a directional aerial will help get a decent signal as it tends to reduce any reflections (that cause ghosting) which may be present. You will of course never see ghosting on digital TV.

For the record - and the cost - Freesat is a vastly better option.

 

[xtrailman]

Woody

with my last van i always used the status on a pole, 1m above the van, i did the same with my 2004 van, this was ok until digital was being phased in, then on sites were i had a record of the reception, i started having reception problems.

I was one of many on site who was having problems, were previously there was none, those with statics, had to fit high gain aerials.

Once i fitted one, again on the pole, all was well again. I did check all the connections and found no fault.

The story on site was the local ariel man was saying the digital signal was reduced, and on change over would be boosted.

 

[Matthew_374539188]

Woody

with my last van i always used the status on a pole, 1m above the van, i did the same with my 2004 van, this was ok until digital was being phased in, then on sites were i had a record of the reception, i started having reception problems.

I was one of many on site who was having problems, were previously there was none, those with statics, had to fit high gain aerials.

Once i fitted one, again on the pole, all was well again. I did check all the connections and found no fault.

The story on site was the local ariel man was saying the digital signal was reduced, and on change over would be boosted.

Thanks alot for all the advice guys,really appreciate it,Matthew.

 

[Woody3]

Woody

with my last van i always used the status on a pole, 1m above the van, i did the same with my 2004 van, this was ok until digital was being phased in, then on sites were i had a record of the reception, i started having reception problems.

I was one of many on site who was having problems, were previously there was none, those with statics, had to fit high gain aerials.

Once i fitted one, again on the pole, all was well again. I did check all the connections and found no fault.

The story on site was the local ariel man was saying the digital signal was reduced, and on change over would be boosted.

Most likely the serving transmitter was a relay which does not yet have digital although it will have a partial service post DSO.

DTTV is currently only being radiated from the 86 main stations and a few hundred higher power relays, hence why you change of aerial would have worked - you changed transmitters.

I have found one odd thing with the 315. We stayed at a CL north of Cambridge in 08 and used Sandy TV station. The analogue signal was horrible. When I scanned with the TV it didn't find all of the muxes, but when I fitted an attenuator it found the missing mux but lost the originals. This suggests that either the amp in the aerial does not have a very linear response - it amplifies some signals more than others - or it is sensitive to overload. Humans can be very tolerant of minor imperfections on analogue - such as ghosts or minor local interference that causes a white noise bar across the picture - but present these to a digital signal and it will fall apart completely. (Much of the minor pixelation occassionally seen on a home TV using Freeview is often caused by vehicle ignitions.)

As I said, if you want good reception anywhere (well almost) get Freesat. After the first two attempts it is no more difficult to set up than a conventional aerial, especially ooe on Freeview!

 

[John_374375667]

Woody, I totally agree, all the factory fitted co-ax was very poor quality in my van. However once I replaced this although slightly better I still think the Status is poor. I have a portable sat kit and a redundant sky box but I miss the Dave channel which is available on freeview but not on freesat.