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Full Freeview on the Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps51.790,-1.179 or 51°47'25"N 1°10'46"Wsa_postcodeOX3 9SS

 

The symbol shows the location of the Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) transmitter which serves 410,000 homes. The bright green areas shown where the signal from this transmitter is strong, dark green areas are poorer signals. Those parts shown in yellow may have interference on the same frequency from other masts.

Are there any planned engineering works or unexpected transmitter faults on the Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) mast?

Oxford transmitter - Oxford transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 25/03/2024 Pixelation or flickering on some or all channels Digital tick


Choose from three options: ■ List by multiplex ■ List by channel number ■ List by channel name
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Which Freeview channels does the Oxford transmitter broadcast?

If you have any kind of Freeview fault, follow this Freeview reset procedure first.

Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.

MuxH/VFrequencyHeightModeWatts
PSB1
BBCA
 H max
C41+ (634.2MHz)295mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) South (Oxford), 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 17 others

PSB2
D3+4
 H max
C44- (657.8MHz)295mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
3 ITV 1 (SD) (Meridian/Central (Thames Valley micro region)), 4 Channel 4 (SD) South ads, 5 Channel 5, 6 ITV 2, 10 ITV3, 13 E4, 14 Film4, 15 Channel 4 +1 South ads, 18 More4, 26 ITV4, 28 ITVBe, 30 E4 +1, 35 ITV1 +1 (Central west),

PSB3
BBCB
 H max
C47 (682.0MHz)295mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD South (Oxford), 102 BBC Two HD England, 103 ITV 1 HD (ITV Central West), 104 Channel 4 HD South ads, 105 Channel 5 HD, 106 BBC Four HD, 107 BBC Three HD, 204 CBBC HD, 205 CBeebies HD, plus 1 others

COM4
SDN
 H -3dB
C29 (538.0MHz)295mDTG-850,000W
Channel icons
20 Drama, 21 5USA, 29 ITV2 +1, 32 5STAR, 33 5Action, 38 Channel 5 +1, 41 Legend, 42 GREAT! action, 57 Dave ja vu, 58 ITVBe +1, 59 ITV3 +1, 64 Blaze, 67 TRUE CRIME, 68 TRUE CRIME XTRA, 78 TCC, 81 Blaze +1, 83 Together TV, 89 ITV4 +1, 91 WildEarth, 209 Ketchup TV, 210 Ketchup Too, 211 YAAAS!, 267 Al Jazeera English, plus 30 others

COM5
ArqA
 H -3dB
C37- (601.8MHz)319mDTG-850,000W
Channel icons
11 Sky Mix, 17 Really, 19 Dave, 31 E4 Extra, 36 Sky Arts, 40 Quest Red, 43 Food Network, 47 Film4 +1, 48 Challenge, 49 4seven, 60 Drama +1, 65 That's TV 2, 70 Quest +1, 74 Yesterday +1, 75 That's 90s, 233 Sky News, plus 11 others

COM6
ArqB
 H -3dB
C31 (554.0MHz)319mDTG-850,000W
Channel icons
12 Quest, 25 W, 27 Yesterday, 34 GREAT! movies, 39 DMAX, 44 HGTV, 52 GREAT! romance, 56 That's TV (UK), 61 GREAT! movies extra, 63 GREAT! romance mix, 71 That’s 60s, 73 HobbyMaker, 82 Talking Pictures TV, 84 PBS America, 235 Al Jazeera Eng, plus 18 others

LOX
 H -10dB
C46 (674.0MHz)295mDTG-1210,000W
Channel icons
from 22nd December 2014: 7 That's Oxford,

DTG-8 64QAM 8K 3/4 27.1Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
DTG-12 QSPK 8K 3/4 8.0Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)

Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Oxford transmitter?

regional news image
BBC South (Oxford) Today 0.4m homes 1.6%
from Oxford OX2 7DW, 6km west-southwest (258°)
to BBC South (Oxford) region - 6 masts.
BBC South (Oxford) Today shares 50% content with Southampton service
regional news image
ITV Meridian News 0.9m homes 3.4%
from Whiteley PO15 7AD, 102km south (182°)
to ITV Meridian/Central (Thames Valley) region - 15 masts.
Thames Valley opt-out from Meridian (South). All of lunch, weekend and 50% evening news is shared with all of Meridian+Oxford

How will the Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

1950s-80s1984-971997-981998-20112011-132013-182013-1723 May 2018
VHFC/D EC/D EC/D EC/D EC/D E TW TW T
C2BBCtvwaves
C29SDN
C31com7com7
C37com8com8
C41BBCA
C44D3+4
C46_local
C47BBCB
C49tv_offC5wavesC5waves
C50tv_off SDNSDN
C51tv_offLOXLOX
C53tv_offC4wavesC4wavesC4waves+BBCA+BBCA+BBCA
C55tv_offArqBArqBArqBcom7tv_off
C56tv_offCOM8tv_off
C57tv_offBBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBCBBBCBBBCB
C59tv_off-ArqA-ArqA-ArqA
C60tv_offITVwavesITVwavesITVwaves-D3+4-D3+4-D3+4
C62SDN
C63BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2waves

tv_off Being removed from Freeview (for 5G use) after November 2020 / June 2022 - more
Table shows multiplexes names see this article;
green background for transmission frequencies
Notes: + and - denote 166kHz offset; aerial group are shown as A B C/D E K W T
waves denotes analogue; digital switchover was 14 Sep 11 and 28 Sep 11.

How do the old analogue and currrent digital signal levels compare?

Analogue 1-4 500kW
BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-7dB) 100kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB(-10dB) 50kW
Analogue 5(-11dB) 40kW
com8(-14.7dB) 17.1kW
com7(-14.8dB) 16.4kW
Mux 1*, Mux 2*, LOX(-17dB) 10kW
Mux C*, Mux D*(-18dB) 8kW
Mux A*, Mux B*(-19.2dB) 6kW

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Oxford transmitter area

Feb 1956-Jul 1968Associated TeleVision†
Feb 1956-Jul 1968Associated British Corporation◊
Jul 1968-Dec 1981Associated TeleVision
Jan 1982-Dec 2006Central Independent Television
Dec 2006-Feb 2009ITV Thames Valley
Feb 2009-Dec 2014ITV plc
Feb 1983-Dec 1992TV-am•
Jan 1993-Sep 2010GMTV•
Sep 2010-Dec 2014ITV Daybreak•
• Breakfast ◊ Weekends ♦ Friday night and weekends † Weekdays only. Oxford was not an original Channel 3 VHF 405-line mast: the historical information shown is the details of the company responsible for the transmitter when it began transmitting Channel 3.

Comments
Monday, 24 June 2013
P
Paul
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

7:47 AM

Sometime a bad connection ( for example a broken cable or loose plug ) can cause loss of some frequencies while others work OK.

link to this comment
Paul's 45 posts GB flag
Wednesday, 26 June 2013
M
MH
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

8:29 AM

Quick update on the deterioration and loss of C59 signal that I posted about earlier. Called out aerial installers to check things out.
No problem at all with the aerial (very good signal) and cable from aerial to loft distribution amplifier replaced - although no signs of water).
Signal strength now strong with good quality on all tv's in the house. Things have never been this good; makes me wonder if poor quality cable was used when by previous installer.
Another case of cable being the problem.

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MH's 25 posts GB flag
Thursday, 27 June 2013
P
Paul
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

8:02 AM

Thanks for telling us. It's nice to hear when a problem is resolved

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Paul's 45 posts GB flag
Friday, 28 June 2013
G
Geoffrey Ferres
10:18 PM

Over the last three weeks have lost the ITV3 group of channels and csnnot see any explanation from previous posts.
Have tried retune on numerous occasions.
I live off the Botley Rosd in Oxford.
Previous posts suggest 4G is irrelevant.
We access Freeview through an aerial, not cable or satellite.

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Geoffrey Ferres's 2 posts GB flag
Saturday, 29 June 2013
K
KMJ,Derby
sentiment_satisfiedGold

1:38 PM

Geoffrey Ferres: The frequency of the SDN mux from the Oxford transmitter changed to C50 on 29th May 2013. Try to do a manual tune to C50 if possible. It might be necessary to do a factory reset to delete old entries from the tuner's memory before rescanning for channels. If a communal aerial is in use, and neighbours are having the same problem, an adjustment might be required to let the new frequency through. In such cases contact landlord or building management company for assistance. One further thought, if C50 is used by a VCR or Sky box, the frequency setting for the RF modulator will need to be changed to prevent it blocking the Freeview signal!

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KMJ,Derby's 1,811 posts GB flag
Monday, 1 July 2013
N
Neil
11:33 AM

For the past week or so we've had had a lot of trouble with Freeview TV. Mostly noticeable as either no signal at all or blocking and pixelation. Definitely happening on BBC 1&2, CBeebies and Ch5, possibly other channels. It seems to vary according to time, but not sure all channels are the same time fluctuations.

We are in Newbury RG14, but don't point at Hannington as we are not far enough up the hill (though everyone on our street points in different directions including CP).

I did check signal strength at one point and it was varying around 10% and quality up to about 40%. It was much, much better than that before last week. The TV is much worse than the HDR, but then the aerial goes to HDR first.

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Neil's 5 posts GB flag
Tuesday, 2 July 2013
N
Neil
11:08 AM

Sorry, forgot to add, that it is an external roof aerial and has an external amp and splitter.

Evenings seem much worse than mornings for the channels I've seen live. e.g. CBeebies was OK this morning, but very blocky yesterday afternoon. But I gather that Thomas (CH5) recordings have failed and I believe they are morning ones.

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Neil's 5 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

6:02 PM
Newbury

Neil: What you have reported are the classic symptoms experiencing by viewers in areas who do not have line-of-sight reception (or anywhere near to) with the transmitter, and any signal that they do receive being purely through diffraction which is signal bending, this unfortunately resulting in reception which relies on this type of condition always being vulnerable to changes in weather plus being affected by other climatic based reasons, all of having the effect of altering the angle that the signal is bending.

I carried out a few tests using an RG14 6LR post code as a substitute for your own (partially unknown) one and came up with the following results.

Hannington : 7 miles @ 149 degrees obstructed from just over 1 mile away.

Crystal Palace : 54 miles @ 87 degrees multiple major obstructions from just under 30 miles out.

Oxford : 28 miles @ 13 degrees major obstructions from 11miles out.

I realise that you may not be in an RG14 6 postal code area, but at least it gives you an idea of the reasons for reception being iffy in your area, and the very fact of you having said that the aerials in your street are seen to be pointing in all sorts of directions is always an indication of an area being problematic for reception.

Needless to say, and as you will probably have already been aware of, nothing can really be done to improve things when reception is being made under these conditions.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
jb38's: mapJ's Freeview map terrainJ's terrain plot wavesJ's frequency data J's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Wednesday, 3 July 2013
N
Neil
2:33 PM

Thank you. Yes, I do appreciate that this location is probably not the best. The puzzle is, this is the first time we have had anything more significant that a rare, minor glitch. So I would say it's been working fine for... well I'm rubbish on remembering, but I think over 3 years at least. And of course it would have been much lower power before digital switchover and was fine then. This problem has now gone on for almost 2 week, so is beginning to look permanent.

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Neil's 5 posts GB flag
Dave Lindsay
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

2:59 PM

Neil: The answer must be that something's changed. As you are in the area, you are better-placed than anyone to give a more definitive answer. We can only speculate on here. Some possibilities are trees growing - perhaps when the leaves fall off the signal will return - or perhaps someone has built an extension or changed their roof tiles.

The point of all this is that in a situation such as yours you are relying on things not to change (to the degree which your picture will be affected). Usually this isn't possible so you are at the liberty of factors outside your control.

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Dave Lindsay's 5,724 posts GB flag
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Please post a question, answer or commentIf you have Freeview reception problems before posting a question your must first do this Freeview reset procedure then see: Freeview reception has changed, Single frequency interference, and Freeview intermittent interference.

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