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All posts by Simon J Bolton

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

S
Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) Full Freeview transmitter
Monday 8 October 2012 1:21PM
Aylesbury

Hi. Help. We seem to be having the same problem as MH was having at the end of September. We live in Aylesbury (HP19 postcode) and should pick up from the Beckley transmitter. Well, we did until last Thursday at 1645 when we lost all channels and no amount of First-Time Installation retuning will get them back. We have a Toshiba 22BL702 22" widescreen Full HD 1080p Backlit TV with Freeview (to give it its full title) which we bought on May 23rd 2012 and worked fine until last Thursday. Is the fact that we cannot pick up a signal likely to be with the TV tuner? Nothing has changed with the set-up so I'm a bit stumped. And I missed the Liverpol match last Thursday (not that it was the result I wanted...). Thanks for any help or advice you can give.

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S
Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) Full Freeview transmitter
Tuesday 9 October 2012 2:24PM
Aylesbury

Hi Paull. Thanks, but we've tried both (sorry, should have mentioned that in my first posting) and still get nothing. We tried the (roof)aerial of our neighbour but the TV still does pick up any channels. We know the aerials (next door and ours) are ok and we know the transmitter is ok, so I think our next step is just to return the TV for repair/exchange. Mind you, the way Liverpool are playing at the moment there's no rush...
I'll post an update when I have one.

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S
Oxford (Oxfordshire, England) Full Freeview transmitter
Wednesday 10 October 2012 1:01PM
Aylesbury

Thanks for that jb38. There is no booster connected, but here's a quick update: last night, having sat through 90 minutes of heavily pixellated picture and intermittent sound, an audible 'pop' was heard from the TV (similar to the sound heard from an earthing spark when connecting car battery booster cables) after which the picture and sound quality was excellent. We then threw caution to the wind and did another first-time installation and the tuner returned 171 channels, including some we didn't even know existed, like Argos TV and God TV.
Then, this morning, we had the BBC channels but no sound or picture on ITV channels ... then BBC News 24 on Ch 80 started playing up again...
Frankly, we're fed up with all this and we are going to return the TV. We KNOW there is nothing wrong with the transmitter, the aerial, the co-ax cable or anything else and the TV sometimes picks up channels and sometimes doesn't without us doing anything more than turning it on. It has also developed a high-pitched whisling sound on power-up which wasn't there last week.
What I find most frustrating is with all the technology available it still comes down to having to haul the TV to a neighbour's to try their aerial and scouring the interwebnet to try and find a website for information. I cannot find a phone number to call for help and to be honest if we rang a TV repair company they'd just say we need a new aerial at some ridiculously exorbitant price and we'd be expected to believe them. Bring back valves! At least you could se when they weren't working...

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mary t - I think your post might have been lost in the middle of the 'when-did ITV-Central-become-Meridan-or-whatever' posts...
You don't say where you are, but there was a bit of messing about on the Beckley transmitter last Wednesday and we had to do a re-tune here in Aylesbury. I guess the thing to do would be a First-Time Installation on your TV and that should pick up all available Channels.
Or maybe you could re-post and someone with more knowledge than me could help you?

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GB flag

Rob/JB38 and all - I've been following this topic with interest but I have to ask: Why be subtle with your neighbour? Just go round, explain the problem and ask them if they have anything against or near the party wall which might be causing interference. If they're nice neighbours they'll tell you anyway, and if they're not there's no point in being subtle!
If there is some sort of mobile device next door causing intermittent interference then if the neighbours are reasonable they will reposition it and that may indeed solve your reception problem. Surely better to be direct with your request rather than hope the neighbours understand subtle? Just a thought...

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GB flag

Can I just echo JB38's comment above, Rob? Well, done for sticking at it, well done for diagnosing the cause of the problem and above all well done for badgering Virgin Media until they actually sorted out the problem caused by their equipment. It's all too easy these days to be fobbed off with 'technical' explanations from companies who use the "the-equipment-is-fine-so-it's-not-our-problem" gambit and leave those with less technological know-how to try and sort out problems themselves - usually at great expense.
I hope, if anyone else is in the same situation, that they read all the posts and suggestions on here and reach a quicker solution to their problems. Me? I would have stripped the wall and shielded it with aluminium foil about a month ago... :)

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GB flag