Northern Ireland Saorview reception reports:

Digifriendly

hawkwind23 wrote: »

belfast
get all the RTE on 801 onward
and
rte 1 +2 and tg4 on 51.....

noticed that i dont get a full epg for 800 channels and they dont record from guide either.

great service for me anyways , living in a flat with single feed meant sky was a waste of money.
couldn't be happier with the youview

My Sony PVR won't record Saorview channels (800 upwards) from EPG when a recording is already set from a Freeview channel or when PVR is tuned into a Freeview channel but otherwise it will record. I can also manually record from both Saorview and Freeview at same time. Unsure whether you can do this with Youview box. Having RTE1/2 and TG4 on Freeview EPG (51 upwards) obviously is a great advantage for recording apart from some programmes being geo-blocked i.e. blacked out due to programme rights issues.

Mr. Rabbit

Unsure whether you can do this with Youview box

You can with the ordinary Humax PVRs so I would imagine it should be OK with the Youview boxes.

The Sony PVRs are hopeless for Saorview, in my opinion. No programme info is displayed at all, apart from the TV guide which is really annoying. Thank goodness for the NI mux.

Mine also loses Saorview channels every so often, and I have to keep manually tuning them in every so often.

The Humax boxes are much better overall.

Digifriendly

Mr. Rabbit wrote: »

Mine also loses Saorview channels every so often, and I have to keep manually tuning them in every so often.

The Humax boxes are much better overall.

I think if you turn the auto update off in the menu you should keep the Saorview channels. At least this is what I did and they don't disappear now.

Mr. Rabbit

Digifriendly wrote: »

I think if you turn the auto update off in the menu you should keep the Saorview channels. At least this is what I did and they don't disappear now.

Thanks for that.

Sometimes Cambret Hill comes in off the back of the Divis antenna and that also causes problems . The NI Mux and Saorview both disappear, and BBC One Scotland replaces BBC NI etc. so that should clear that problem as well.

patrickwaldron

I was thinking of getting a youview box.....would that work in the republic? The main attraction is the i players and the 7 day catchup services....does anyone know would that work?

Mr. Rabbit

patrickwaldron wrote: »

I was thinking of getting a youview box.....would that work in the republic? The main attraction is the i players and the 7 day catchup services....does anyone know would that work?

Should be OK with Saorview as the Youview boxes are made by Humax.

Other than the Saorview channels appearing in the 800's, I have no issues with Saorview and my Humax PVR.

zg3409

patrickwaldron wrote: »

I was thinking of getting a youview box.....would that work in the republic? The main attraction is the i players and the 7 day catchup services....does anyone know would that work?

Any players/streamers that are region locked will not work unless you are in the UK. We cannot discuss ways to circumvent regional restrictions on boards.ie. The 7 day catchup is just a very good user interface for accessing streams from various channels, some are which are region blocked.

mrc70734

Help! In Bangor. I bought a TECHNIKA T8030 IRISH FREEVIEW HD SET TOP BOX but all I get is my standard freeview channels! No RTE or TG4. Last number is 791. Nothing in the 800s, Any ideas? My aerial looks pretty new.

Peter Rhea

mrc70734 wrote: »

. . . I bought a TECHNIKA T8030 IRISH FREEVIEW HD SET TOP BOX .

The Technika T8030 is a Saorview box, not Freeview HD. Saorview is the proper name for 'Irish Freeview'.

You will only get Irish channels with this box if you have an aerial pointed at a transmitter in the republic. If you want to get RTE & TG4 from Belfast, you'll need a receiver with a DVB-T2 tuner: most of these are Freeview HD branded.

zg3409

Peter Rhea wrote: »

The Technika T8030 is a Saorview box, not Freeview HD. Saorview is the proper name for 'Irish Freeview'.

You will only get Irish channels with this box if you have an aerial pointed at a transmitter in the republic. If you want to get RTE & TG4 from Belfast, you'll need a receiver with a DVB-T2 tuner: most of these are Freeview HD branded.

I agree. If you are in Bangor you need a Freeview HD box and a fairly good aerial pointed at Black Mountain in west Belfast or Carmoney Hill and RTE will appear as channels 51, 52 and 53 and a radio channel at 729

Any local installer should be able to help you out. I would first recomment just trying a Freeview HD box and it may work without any aerial adjustments. With this setup you will not get all Saorview channels, just TG4, RTE1 and RTE2, none in HD.

culabula

zg3409 wrote: »

I agree. If you are in Bangor you need a Freeview HD box and a fairly good aerial pointed at Black Mountain in west Belfast or Carmoney Hill and RTE will appear as channels 51, 52 and 53 and a radio channel at 729

Any local installer should be able to help you out. I would first recomment just trying a Freeview HD box and it may work without any aerial adjustments. With this setup you will not get all Saorview channels, just TG4, RTE1 and RTE2, none in HD.

Well, that's not strictly true. It is wholly accurate that you need a Freeview HD box, you will get the NIMM (North of Ireland Mini MUX) which will give you RTÉ One and Two plus TG4, albeit with georestrictions.

This is not Saorview.

However, depending on your locale and aerial position, you may ALSO get Saorview, which is an additional service to your local Freeview bouquet. For example, my sister gets it just 3km from me on Shaw's Road whereas I don't get it at all.

If you are lucky enough, then in addition to the NIMM, you will get RTÉ One, RTÉ One + 1, RTÉ Two HD, TV3, TG4 and more. These Saorview channels appear in the 800s.

NorthDown2

mrc70734 wrote: »

Help! In Bangor. I bought a TECHNIKA T8030 IRISH FREEVIEW HD SET TOP BOX but all I get is my standard freeview channels! No RTE or TG4. Last number is 791. Nothing in the 800s, Any ideas? My aerial looks pretty new.

Can we ask whereabouts in the town you are located (East/West/South - Clandeboye/Bangor West/Ballyholme/Ashbury etc)? There are some areas of the town where good Saorview reception is possible.

Mr. Rabbit

NorthDown2 wrote: »

Can we ask whereabouts in the town you are located (East/West/South - Clandeboye/Bangor West/Ballyholme/Ashbury etc)? There are some areas of the town where good Saorview reception is possible.

There is also a local Freeview light relay station in Bangor, so it's possible the aerial could be pointing in that direction rather than Divis/Black Mountain:


http://www.ukfree.tv/txdetail.php?a=IJ500817

Digifriendly

Mr. Rabbit wrote: »

There is also a local Freeview light relay station in Bangor, so it's possible the aerial could be pointing in that direction rather than Divis/Black Mountain:


http://www.ukfree.tv/txdetail.php?a=IJ500817

Interesting that link says Bangor transmitter covers less than 500 homes. Is this one of the fewest in UK in terms of its reception base?

Shakyfan

Have a Walker Saoirview box which until yesterday was working great! RTE, TV3 etc on channels 1 to 8, radio stations from 200 on and the UK channels starting with BBC1 at 250 and so on. Last night there was no picture coming up on RTE so I foolishly tried a retune and now no matter how many times I try I can't get any of the Irish stations. The channels are coming up starting with BBC1 at 1 etc;

I'm in County Antrim (Ballymena). Oh and when re-tuning I have the active antenna on.

Patricia Mackle

Shakyfan wrote: »

Have a Walker Saoirview box which until yesterday was working great! RTE, TV3 etc on channels 1 to 8, radio stations from 200 on and the UK channels starting with BBC1 at 250 and so on. Last night there was no picture coming up on RTE so I foolishly tried a retune and now no matter how many times I try I can't get any of the Irish stations. The channels are coming up starting with BBC1 at 1 etc;

I'm in County Antrim (Ballymena). Oh and when re-tuning I have the active antenna on.

I'm in N Antrim and getting all Saorview Channels from Moville OK.
I did lose them for a few days some weeks ago. I did nothing and they reappeared

Have you set the Country as Ireland before re-scanning?

Shakyfan

Yeah country to Ireland (it actually doesn't give UK as one of the options!). I should really have left it last night and it would probably have come back on its own. Looks like I'm just going to have to keep re-trying. I wouldn't mind but RTE is probably the channel which is most watched - we lost the BBC stations a few months back for 3 or 4 weeks but didn't miss it at all!

Patricia Mackle

Which Saorveiw transmitter do you receive from? Maybe posting again, naming the transmitter you receive Saorview from, will get more replies.
You can check if there are any transmitter problems at http://www.ukfree.tv/closedown.php
Does the Walker box allow you to check the Strength and Quality of each Channel or MUX?

I lost the analogue RTE1, RTE2 and TG4 channels in early 2012 when the 12v power unit to the masthead amplifier failed. A new power unit fixed that problem.

Peter Rhea

Shakyfan wrote: »

Have a Walker Saoirview box which until yesterday was working great! RTE, TV3 etc on channels 1 to 8, radio stations from 200 on and the UK channels starting with BBC1 at 250 and so on. Last night there was no picture coming up on RTE so I foolishly tried a retune and now no matter how many times I try I can't get any of the Irish stations . . .

Given the weather we've had over the past day or 2, have you checked for something obvious like an aerial that's blown down or been damaged?

geriatrix

Peter Rhea wrote: »

Given the weather we've had over the past day or 2, have you checked for something obvious like an aerial that's blown down or been damaged?

Or a frayed co-axial cable.

Shakyfan

All sorted! A quick inspection showed that the aeriel was sitting at a peculiar angle. Called out a repair man who arrived this afternoon and within an hour everything was back to normal. The aeriel was actually very badly rusted and had to be replaced - in fact the repair man was surprised we'd been able to pick up anything in the first place.

formerly scottish paddy

Saw on another thread someone having problems with Saorview mux 2 (ch.56) from Clermont Carn in Belfast. I was wondering if anyone else is experiencing problems with the mux 2 signal being down/lower than mux 1 (ch.52)?

SRB

Mux 2 is more prone to break up here in Portaferry, and is weaker with me, though I could probably do with the aerial being further up the pole, as the signal was so good when it came on last year, I left it at roof hight, when using Kippure/Three Rock it was on a 20ft pole. Mux 1 is fine on an indoor roof aerial with me, but Mux 2 is a good bit weaker.

SRB

Mux 2 is more prone to break up here in Portaferry, and is weaker with me, though I could probably do with the aerial being further up the pole, as the signal was so good when it came on last year, I left it at roof hight, when using Kippure/Three Rock it was on a 20ft pole. Mux 1 is fine on an indoor roof aerial with me, but Mux 2 is a good bit weaker.

formerly scottish paddy

I am worried as my mum in Belfast watches mostly RTE 1 and if that is moving on to Mux 2 that could be a problem. Her RTE 1 at the moment is perfect on Mux 1 and since her tv doesn't do DVB-T2 no NIMM!

Digifriendly

MUX 2 not working without masthead amp. here in Moira Co. Down while Mux 1 comes through without the amp.

Peter Rhea

Digifriendly wrote: »

MUX 2 not working without masthead amp. here in Moira Co. Down while Mux 1 comes through without the amp.

It's not necessarily 'getting through' the amplifier.

You would have a separate aerial for Freeview? How is it combined with the Saorview aerial feed?

Anyway, as was mentioned in other examples of this 'working/not working', it doesn't mean there is any big discrepancy in signal level between the muxes.

formerly scottish paddy

Well we have seen the comments from people who have had problems getting Mux2. But, anybody getting Mux2 OK, specifically in Belfast? Perhaps we won't hear much until RTE 1 is switched off on Mux1.

JamesyBelfast

I'm getting Mux2 fine with my outdoor aerial in Belfast - indoor aerial gets Mux1 fine, Mux2 with picture breakup.

On my outdoor aerial, although picture is fine on all channels - Mux1 channels show a signal strength reading of 30, while the new Mux2 channels show a reading of 13 (its a Philips TV and I get that info from the "Status" option while watching the channel).

So basically I am not too worried right now - my outdoor aerial is a very basic cheap aerial which I installed myself on an existing pole on the back wall of my house which has a satellite dish on it (and I can reach the pole from indoors through a Velux window!). And as I say - Mux2 channels are absolutely fine from that, no breakup at all.

The indoor aerial is getting a Mux2 signal that's "almost there" - so I'm gonna trick about with that / maybe get a better aerial.


It's just a bit of a shame that the 2nd Mux is not broadcasting at anything like the same level as the 1st. I'm not knowledgable about any of this in terms of the reasons - but same aerial getting "signal quality" 29/30 on Mux1 channels versus 12/13 on Mux2 channels, says it all.

Peter Rhea

JamesyBelfast wrote: »

It's just a bit of a shame that the 2nd Mux is not broadcasting at anything like the same level as the 1st. I'm not knowledgable about any of this in terms of the reasons - but same aerial getting "signal quality" 29/30 on Mux1 channels versus 12/13 on Mux2 channels, says it all.

Factors causing apparent differences in received signal strength have more effect as you move towards the margins of coverage & in analogue days, people with less than optimal reception would always comment on the difference in picture quality across the channels.