Whats the coverage of N.I. digital TV down south?

KeRbDoG · 26-12-2007 9:39pm #1

Hey all,
Does anyone have a coverage map of N.I. digital TV down south? In north Dublin county and wouldn't mind checking coverage before I throw up another antenna.

Cheers,
Kerb

watty · 27-12-2007 5:57pm

Terrible till Analogue is turned off and the power increased. Satellite coverage is good though.

Ganymede · 27-12-2007 8:32pm

Most people in north County Dublin get their UK signals from the Kilkeel transposer in Co. Down and DTT won't be available from this site for a few years yet - probably as late as 2012. The Mourne Mountains block Divis so you'd be better off investing in a satellite system, as Watty suggested.

KeRbDoG · 28-12-2007 12:24am

Arse, ah well

Can yea get Channel4 on freeview sat? Prob not the right forum

watty · 28-12-2007 12:38pm

Freeview is UK Terrestrial
Freesat is BBC/ITV free channels platform. Any Satellite receiver will pickup all the free to air channels
"Freesat From Sky" is the Free To View (needs Sky box and Sky Card only sold to UK postcodes £21 once off), C4, Five, Five Live, Five US and Sky3, plus of course the free to air channels.

There is no law against bringing a UK Sky FTV card to Ireland. It will work in any Sky digibox.

lawhec · 29-12-2007 7:56pm

Effective coverage right now is only in some small parts of the border counties. It is in theory possible beyond it but you're unlikely to get all the services thanks to co-channel interference with some analogue transmitters & you'll need a serious amount of metal in the air. If you can live without Ch4 & five a FTA satellite setup is the best option as already mentioned for now.

Digifriendly · 29-12-2007 10:33pm

lawhec wrote: »

Effective coverage right now is only in some small parts of the border counties. It is in theory possible beyond it but you're unlikely to get all the services thanks to co-channel interference with some analogue transmitters & you'll need a serious amount of metal in the air. If you can live without Ch4 & five a FTA satellite setup is the best option as already mentioned for now.

Living here in the North I feel those on the other side of the Border get a raw deal without CH4 and Five via Satellite. The only Southern station not available here via satellite is TV3 and it is available via an aerial in most places. We can relatively easily receive all the southern stations here but you cannot receive all the UK stations. Seems a bit unfair. I would have thought with borders across the EU continually breaking down that the issue of programming rights etc which prevent stations being broadcast in another country should be challenged maybe even in a European court and freedom of watching stations in whatever country you want be finally accepted. However maybe I'm a bit naive. I hope not!

watty · 30-12-2007 10:53am

You have UTV so why whould you miss TV3?

I wonder do Sports & TV rights holders split up "rights" per State in USA. Have you looked at size & GDP of California versus any typical EU country. There are many reasons the USA Administration doesn't like the "European Experiment" (maybe that's why they are main force pushing for Turkish entry). EU attitudes to Monopolies and Copyright "fair use" and the success of the Euro ...

lawhec · 30-12-2007 4:20pm

Digifriendly wrote: »

Living here in the North I feel those on the other side of the Border get a raw deal without CH4 and Five via Satellite. The only Southern station not available here via satellite is TV3 and it is available via an aerial in most places. We can relatively easily receive all the southern stations here but you cannot receive all the UK stations. Seems a bit unfair. I would have thought with borders across the EU continually breaking down that the issue of programming rights etc which prevent stations being broadcast in another country should be challenged maybe even in a European court and freedom of watching stations in whatever country you want be finally accepted. However maybe I'm a bit naive. I hope not!

On the other hand though up north you can't get RTÉ 1 & 2 plus TG4 without a Sky subscription. The BBC & ITV channels are freely available without any subscription via satellite in the Republic. There's still plenty of places as well where reception of southern broadcasts via terrestrial aerial is either very difficult or impossible.

illiam · 30-12-2007 6:44pm

Good set of coverage maps including DTT in N. Ireland at:

http://www.wolfbane.com/articles/tvr.htm

see approximate area of spillover on large map at:

http://www.wolfbane.com/articles/ukdcmap2.htm

All the best.

Digifriendly · 30-12-2007 6:53pm

lawhec wrote: »

On the other hand though up north you can't get RTÉ 1 & 2 plus TG4 without a Sky subscription. The BBC & ITV channels are freely available without any subscription via satellite in the Republic. There's still plenty of places as well where reception of southern broadcasts via terrestrial aerial is either very difficult or impossible.

Yes you're absolutely right there. However don't ITV channels on Sky digital have to be added in ROI under 'other channels' and are not on the EPG or am I wrong? Major disadvantage of being in the North for sports fans who can only get RTE via a dish is that quite a lot of sport is blocked e.g. Premiership football, European Cup rugby. I have even seen 'Dukes of Hazzard' blocked on TG4 via Sky Digital! Programme rights issues are a real pain and I wish they were gone for good!

PauloMN · 30-12-2007 10:06pm

Digifriendly wrote: »

Programme rights issues are a real pain and I wish they were gone for good!

Totally agree. Such a shame that we limit the abilities of all this new technology by rules and regulations.

For example, shouldn't the ability to receive Sky satellite TV in say Germany be a great advantage to English speaking ex-pats now living there? It should, but technically someone living in Germany cannot have a UK Sky subscription. :mad:

KeRbDoG · 31-12-2007 12:27pm

illiam wrote: »

Good set of coverage maps including DTT in N. Ireland at:

http://www.wolfbane.com/articles/tvr.htm

see approximate area of spillover on large map at:

http://www.wolfbane.com/articles/ukdcmap2.htm

All the best.

Thanks for that, exactly what I was after.

Richard · 31-12-2007 4:37pm

Ganymede wrote: »

Most people in north County Dublin get their UK signals from the Kilkeel transposer in Co. Down and DTT won't be available from this site for a few years yet - probably as late as 2012. The Mourne Mountains block Divis so you'd be better off investing in a satellite system, as Watty suggested.

According to this site - http://www.ukfree.tv/shutdowndetail.php?tx=IJ281180 - Kilkeel will switch to digital on Friday 1st March 2013.

Which is odd, as I thought all of Northern Ireland would have switched by the end of 2012.

In any case, it'll be at least 4 years from now

watty · 31-12-2007 6:07pm

PauloMN wrote: »

Totally agree. Such a shame that we limit the abilities of all this new technology by rules and regulations.

For example, shouldn't the ability to receive Sky satellite TV in say Germany be a great advantage to English speaking ex-pats now living there? It should, but technically someone living in Germany cannot have a UK Sky subscription. :mad:

Legally they can. Sky just won't sell it. It's actually quite legal to subscribe in UK and watch in Germany. Though it may contravene Sky T&C, that are not legally binding with any penalty greater than disconnection.

In practice many, many 1,000s of UK "ex Pats" are in Spain with Sky Subs.

However in areas that get the 2D beam, no sky subscription is needed for BBC/ITV. A sky sub doesn't improve the reception.

Whats the coverage of N.I. digital TV down south?

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