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All posts by Chris

Below are all of Chris's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.

C
Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) Full Freeview transmitter
Thursday 14 February 2019 9:49PM
Chatham

MikeP:

Full postcode ME5 8UN.

The channels must have came back on early afternoon (successful recording at 2pm). I have been out all afternoon until 8pm and the picture was fine then. However, as I am writing this at 9.30pm the channels are coming and going. Signal strength 70-90% Signal quality 0-10% on CH45, 46, 55 & 56 multiplexes. There is no problem with the strength which is stable, but the quality is fluctuating resulting in pixelation and "no signal" messages. Had enough of it now but will check again in the morning.

Thanks

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The channels were working when I first switched on this morning, but now I have lost them again from around 9am. Recording failed at 10pm last night due to no signal. CH45, 46 and 56 have no signal quality. CH55 has 90-100% signal quality but is registering "bit error rate" and keeps pixelating.

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Alan overy:

Are you still having problems with your reception from Bluebell Hill or has it resolved itself yet?

Is it particularly bad this (Friday) evening? My HD channels are currently off or ar very best unwatchable..

I have been having similar problems to you for months now.

Which channels are affected?

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Chris.SE: & MikeP:

I have been checking the Digital UK website for months now and every time I go on there, it says there are Planned Engineering Works at Bluebell Hill with "Possible Weak signal". Does this mean that there is a known problem with the transmitter but it is not being fixed? Or is it false information? How can I find out?

From my point of view it is very frustrating because my problems started immediately after the retune on July 19th last year when they carried out changes for 700mhz clearance. I have watched through hours of recorded programs to test this, and there is no doubt that all recordings before that date are problem free, whereas recordings after that date have frequent glitches along with loss of picture/sound.

I have tried attenuating the signal strength back to around 80% as suggested by MikeP because I am within 2km of transmitter. This had no effect or if anything made it slightly worse due to dropping back the signal quality as well as strength. The signal quality fluctuates then drops out giving brief "no signal" message before recovering back to it's peak. The peak also fluctuates from one day to the next.

I have also replaced the wall socket and renewed all cables inside the house, which made a slight improvement but not enough to eliminate the issue. The only thing left is the aerial, which is old but exactly the same as everyone elses around here and pointing in the same direction. I live in a rented house and cannot afford to replace it, and besides, it was perfectly adequate before July 19th 2018.

Sorry for the lengthy post, but I am desperate to get this resolved after 7 months of patiently waiting for the freeview engineers to sort the problem.

Is there anything I can check between the rooftop aerial and the wall socket that may help?

Thanks

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Yes, I have also had issues over the last couple of days with poor signal quality. Today and last night I have 'no signal' message on most channels, especially those on the higher frequencies. This includes all HD channels which are the only ones I watch most of the time. I believe it is related to high pressure warmer weather, although I don't understand why the system cannot cope. It is a regular problem with Freeview these days..

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YZ

Signal gone to shit again this evening. As you say, there are no engineering works now or in the last few days. The fact is that Freeview has sold out to 5G clearance and has become unreliable since the start of these changes. If you want free TV, just accept that the service will get progressively worse, or pay your money to greedy service providers that don't use the same system

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C
Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) Full Freeview transmitter
Wednesday 7 February 2024 4:10PM
Chatham

David Austin: I also have the same problem with the Bluebell Hill transmitter. I live much closer in postcode ME5 8UN. It is fine most of the time but occasionally I have problems with it frequently cutting out or no signal at all on the HD channels. I can also view the SD channels during this fault. It has been doing this for a few years now and it drives me nuts because 99% of the time it is all perfectly ok.

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David Austin:

Hello David. It's 9.20am and I am having problems with signal quality from Bluebell Hill transmitter. Are you also having problems? I would really like to work out if it's my set up or the transmitter causing the problem.

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