UPC - Going from Analogue to Digital

Onikage

After the recent upgrades in Chorus areas to digital tv, I'm being asked questions about it. The most pressing one is "if I go to digital do I lose my analogue channels?" The important part being of course that you can watch different analogue channels on different tv's at the same time. It seems that they are both carried on the same line but perhaps there is some way of controlling whether a house can get digital without getting analogue? Or is it that they will leave analogue on the line until every customer in that area switches to digital and then turn it off?

Ranicand

You get a digital set top box and the Analogue is still on the same cable so no change there.

When most people have digital I think UPC will turn off the analogue at some point however nobody knows when.

Onikage

Thanks for the info Ranicand. Is that a former Chorus or former ntl area?

edit:
Ok, I see from the this thread that you are in an ntl area. I wonder if anyone can confirm that the same is true in a Chorus area?

icdg

On cable there will, generally, be no way of stopping a house that gets digital installed from continuing to have the analogue service (and this is factored into UPC's pricing policy, in NTL areas at least). The reason for this is, as I said in another thread recently, NTL (and most Chorus cable areas) broadcast their analogue service unencrypted and you simply need to plug your television into the wall socket to recieve the analogue channels.

So yes - on cable, if you get digital, you will (until analogue switch off) still have your full analogue service.

There is (AFAIK) just one cable network in the State to which this does not apply, which is the old Cork Communications cable system, which does encrypt its analogue service. In this case Chorus will presumably take away your analogue STB when you upgrade to digital and you won't be able to continue viewing analogue.

Chorus MMDS systems are in a similar position - when you get digital, your STB is swapped and you lose analogue.

Onikage

One of the newly upgraded areas is Athlone, which was Chorus and before that CMI (I think, been a while). There's a complex mix of MMDS and traditional cable in that network, which probably explains why they don't provide broadband. They claimed to provide premium channels on the wired service but I don't know how they delivered them (encryption+stb?)

I remember when I was young(er) Cork Multichannel had a stb with loads of channels and athlone had a handful. I always wanted to bring a box to athlone to get "the other channels" :rolleyes:

Anyway guys, thanks for all the help. Now if I can just find someone in athlone who is not on mmds and has switched to digital, I'll be set... (I may be waiting a while )

watty

Chorus Analogue MMDS will be turned off very soon.

To increase the broadband and digital channels they will gradually reduce the analogue probably to just the 4 Irish channels.

mayto

Onikage, I am on chorus digital cable here in athlone for a few months. The analogue channels are still there as you would expect.
A few friends have digital cable here and its perfect for them. My analogue signal was never perfect, well bbc 1 always poor and the poor cable quality is affecting my digital signal. I am getting max signal strength of about 58dbmicroV and lows of 54 on the sagem stb. Do you think getting chorus to put in new drop lead will increase signal strength in any way? I asked chorus guy to run a new cable into the house a few months ago but he said it would not make any difference:rolleyes:. I am getting a lot of glitches on most channels atm.

Onikage

Hi again mayto. I think bbc1 has always been iffy on cable in athlone, though maybe the mmds users weren't affected. Since I've switched to fta sat I haven't had that problem

As for new cable, I've not seen any planned or noticable improvements to the quality of lines in a looong time, usually they only act when someone complains loudly. If you're still getting glitches after a few months you may need to kick up a bit more fuss, otherwise they will happily take 100% of your money without delivering 100% of the service.

Big thanks to everyone who responded.

ChuckProphet

icdg wrote: »

On cable there will, generally, be no way of stopping a house that gets digital installed from continuing to have the analogue service (and this is factored into UPC's pricing policy, in NTL areas at least). The reason for this is, as I said in another thread recently, NTL (and most Chorus cable areas) broadcast their analogue service unencrypted and you simply need to plug your television into the wall socket to recieve the analogue channels.

So yes - on cable, if you get digital, you will (until analogue switch off) still have your full analogue service.

There is (AFAIK) just one cable network in the State to which this does not apply, which is the old Cork Communications cable system, which does encrypt its analogue service. In this case Chorus will presumably take away your analogue STB when you upgrade to digital and you won't be able to continue viewing analogue.

Chorus MMDS systems are in a similar position - when you get digital, your STB is swapped and you lose analogue.

Question - i had analogue chorus, then got in digital. still have the analogue connections and they still work as before. if i were to cancel my subscription to chorus altogether would they cut both or just the digital? would they charge me for analogue if so?

Onikage

They don't ever "cut" anything, they just take away your digital box. They should unplug your analogue connection but that seems to depend on how the installer feels! Leaving a wire going from the cable into your house might leave you exposed to back-dated charges.

scath

Onikage wrote: »

They don't ever "cut" anything, they just take away your digital box. They should unplug your analogue connection but that seems to depend on how the installer feels! Leaving a wire going from the cable into your house might leave you exposed to back-dated charges.

I suspect lads that there will be a Digital Ireland type org set up once Irish DTT is near launch. I imagine all stakeholders will be part of it. Analogue alongside digital is usual for a while. Then there is either a decision once digital reaches critical mass of the customer base to either switch of analogue or all stakeholders as in UK agree on switchover including cable/mmds operators. This is what happened in Brandenberg-Berlin. The cost of spectrum wastage against adding new services is the issue. In time either they will turn analogue off where it is still receivable but digital is available or they'll swap and turn off. But expect analogue to be turned off by 2012 at least anyways and possibly 2010. They could save on regulatory fees by turning it off thus releasing more spectrum for digital cable and other services ie 'digital dividend' as Commission Reding calls it.