Query Regarding Aerial Installation for RTE

Darkness

My aerials UHF/VHF are on their last legs and the picture quality is very poor. I live in the Trillick area being a few miles from Brougher I was going to purchase a new TV also and the one that I had my eyes on for the past few weeks was a Panasonic PZ80 and I just found out it doesn't have a VHF tuner.

I have Sky but I prefer to have the flexibility to receive RTE One/Two via the old terrestrial aerial setup so the Sky box is available to the other family members. Because the PZ80 hasn't got the VHF tuner, I am left in a bit of a dilema. I have heard that RTE is transmitted on UHF at certain transmitters but how do I find out if I can receive RTE on a UHF transmitter? Everyone around my area even new houses have the VHF aerial so I am thinking it is not possible.

I would be gutted if I have to give up the Panny tv and change to another brand that supports VHF.

Your opinions would be appreciated.

lawhec

In around Trillick, the following should be possible -

UK TV - It's piss easy to receive from Brougher Mtn. I've seen TV's in the village have crystal clear analogue reception with nothing connected in the aerial socket! Haven't seen results for DTT. Unless multipath is a problem, a standard 10 element Group A aerial should be fine. If ghosting is a problem, you might have to get a more directional area which will also give more gain but in this case you might need an attenuator which would fit in at the input of the UHF combiner.

Irish Rep. TV - Around Trillick it appears that only Truskmore provides a reliable service - Carin Hill from Longford would be the next best bet as somehouses in towns and villages nearby to Trillick can pick these signals up enough for decent reception but the hills in North Fermanagh seems to provide an effective barrier. Clermont Carn isn't possible either and Holywell Hill transmits on frequencies that are used for DTT from Brougher (and even before DTT, it's quite likely that the strength of the analogue signals from Brougher would have caused interference) so is also a non-runner. If Truskmore was to soon start transmitting the Irish DTT service it would almost certainly be doing so on a UHF Frequency which would only require an MPEG-4 DTT Receiver which would help matters, but there's no concrete date set for testing or broadcasts yet. So VHF from Truskmore it is for now.

How to get around the problem with only a UHF tuner? Well in the old days locally, when people usually had only one TV and maybe another in a master bedroom, if it was UHF only a frequency shifter was often used to move the VHF signals into a portion of the UHF Band but these are hard to find now. Another alternative then and one that can still be used is to get a video or DVD recorder that has a VHF tuner built in that then relays its signal to the TV. Bear in mind though that most DVD recorders (especially the cheaper ones) don't have a modulator so would need to be connected by SCART, composite or another direct AV connection - but if this is only for one TV it may prove useful. If you have an old VCR lying around, it might prove useful in this case.

I'd like it for RTÉ to get DTT rolled out to Truskmore when they can do so, if only in that one UHF C/D aerial on the roof would be required for their services rather than two for Truskmore. Would certainly put less wind load on the pole and make less rattling on windy nights.

Darkness

Cheers for the info mate.

Not sure whether to replace the aerials and use the old video recorder to receive VHF or find an alternative TV with VHF tuner, or get Sky multiroom and use the extra box to view RTE etc when needed.

I'll have to ponder this over a few beers.

foxire

I had a VHF aerial and I was getting the signal from Truskmore but I was not getting TG4 or TV3. I started to get a very week signal for TG4 and TV3 and I thought I was getting the signal from Truskmore. I got an aerial installer out to install a bigger aerial as I thought that the aerial was not strong enough.

I was informed that the signal that I was getting was from the Cairn Hill Transmitter and it was the UHF aerial that I had for Brougher Mountain was picking up the signal. This was a number of years ago. The VHF aerial was taken down and a new UHF aerial was put up so that I could get the signal from Cairn Hill in Longford. I get a very good picture from RTE 1, RTE 2, TG4 and TV3

I live in the Mid Tyrone area.

Recently I saw that there are two aerials put up for the Tuskmore transmitter for the four channels. I don't understand this as I thought that only one aerial is required to be directed at a transmitter to pick up the channels that are transmitted from that thansmitter. Could anyone enlighten me please.

foxire

Mayo Exile

RTE 1 & 2 from Truskmore are broadcast on VHF Band III (Channels I & G, horizontal polarisation), while TV3 & TG4 are on UHF group C/D (chs 60 & 63, also horizontal polarisation), hence the need for two aerials. This would be the usual aerial setup for the current analogue transmissions from Truskmore. However as lawhec predicted (correctly!) above, Irish DTT transmissions are in the UHF band only, (as well as in DVB-T/MPEG4) so you would need only one aerial for them.