Chorus Digital Kildare Town - Satellite dish needed?

machalla

A relation of mine in Kildare town was thinking of getting Chorus Digital. She already has the analogue channels coming in although they are not exactly reliable as there have been several cases where channels have disappeared for days on end.

She was on to them the other day and they suggested that the digital service would be more reliable. Shes not particularly interested in the digital channels but it apparently will work out over 100 a year cheaper to go digitial than it is to stick with just the analogue service! Bizarre I thought but it appears to be the case she can keep the analogue service, add digital instead and instead of paying nearly €400 per year it works out at abouit €300.

One thing that was mentioned to me before was that for digital in Kildare town you need a dish (presumably mmds?) to pick up the signal? Even though the current analogue signal comes in by cable? Is this correct as getting a dish or mmds reciever on the roof might prove to be a problem.

Any advice on this would be helpful, thanks.

steveon

In Kildare you do indeed or did when I last installed for Chorus up there 2 yrs ago, an MMDS Aerial for Digital, whereas the cabling system was Analog.

If this is still the case you would probably not be allowed keep the analog signal unless you pay separately or a nice engineer turning up on the day.

machalla

Thanks steveon thats very helpful. I think they might have to as she is apparently paying for a second point (analogue) at the moment and would expect to keep that. I suppose all she can do is try it and see.

Thanks again.

steveon

Most installers would turn a blind eye to the analog points I would imagine...as at least your paying unlike a lot of people who just tap in..

abraxas01

checked with my buddy in UPC, and you can get the digital service through the analogue cable now.

machalla

Cheers. I just got a text to say the installers have turned up and all seems to be going ok with it. No aerial required as mentioned which avoids a problem.

Bit of a curious thing. There was a splitter to pipe the analogue to the nearby kitchen tv. Once the digital was installed the BBC and UTV no longer work through the splitter? My relation was told that its because the digital was drawing more power and that there isn't a strong enough signal to pipe those channels through anymore. The only way to get that to work they claimed was to put in another digibox which is not something she wants. She pays enough for it as it is. All the other channels seemed to be fine. I wonder woulda signal booster help improve the signal?

stevethesatguy

sounds like you need an decent TV cable splitter

zilog_jones

machalla wrote: »

Once the digital was installed the BBC and UTV no longer work through the splitter? My relation was told that its because the digital was drawing more power and that there isn't a strong enough signal to pipe those channels through anymore.

Cable TV does not work that way! They don't know what they're talking about :rolleyes:
Either the signal is being split in a different (i.e. worse) way, the digital box is interfering with those two channels, or something else is interfering and it is coincidental that this problem apparently started happening when the STB was installed.

How is the kitchen TV connected exactly? Is it connected from the "RF Out" on the digital STB, or from a splitter before the STB?

machalla

zilog_jones wrote: »

Cable TV does not work that way! They don't know what they're talking about :rolleyes:
Either the signal is being split in a different (i.e. worse) way, the digital box is interfering with those two channels, or something else is interfering and it is coincidental that this problem apparently started happening when the STB was installed.

How is the kitchen TV connected exactly? Is it connected from the "RF Out" on the digital STB, or from a splitter before the STB?

If I recall correctly the kitchen TV is connected via a splitter (I think it may be a signal booster now that I think of it) that was there feeding the tv into the sitting room tv as well as the kitchen tv. There was one proper analogue point in the sitting room which split the signal between the sitting room and the kitchen via the splitter/signal booster.

Its a little while since I last looked at it and I may have terms incorrect (splitter/booster). I am not sure what way they have connected it all up now but I can only assume the booster/splitter is still in use and they have connected the digital box from that while the Kitchen setup stayed the same (feeding off the anlogue cable).

Its hard to know from this distance. With luck I will get to check it out later in the week. I do know they reconfigured some cabling outside the house but thats about all I know about what they did. The other "official" analogue point is upstairs and that gets the BBC and UTV channels perfectly as before I am told.

The installers I am told were adamant that the only way you would get the proper analogue signal in the kitchen was for them to install yet another point and put a digital box on it. Which seemed crazy as the whole reason for going digital was that it was actually cheaper than just sticking with analogue.

I am not sure what else might be interfering as there is only the digital box in the sitting room, analogue point upstairs and the signal booster which then provides the cable into the kitchen for analogue service.

Thanks for the help again.