Can this Satellite/Aerial Combination work?

Brian h

Hi all,

I'm thinking of making my Sky box available on a second TV in another room that currently only has Saorview and UK Freeview. I would like to use the existing cable already running to the second TV to carry both the Sky feed and the aerial feed. I've got an idea that it should go something like the attached drawing. The black lines represent the current set up and the red lines are what I would like to do. Is there a better way to achieve this or can such a combiner be used?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Ronnie Raygun

If you're going to use existing cable, then the splitter must be located in the room with TV1?

The signal from RF2 is in the UHF terrestrial tv band. You don't need a satellite/UHF combiner, or any combiner for that matter.

Just plug the aerial cable into the Sky box RF-in & then RF2 will carry the aerial signal, along with the UHF analogue signal output by the Sky box. You can use RF1 to pass the aerial signal on to TV1.

The Cush

just to add to Ronnie's post - where is the splitter and the feed to TV2 located?

If it's located beside TV1 the splitter can be removed and the Sky box will act as the splitter to the 2 TVs combining aerial and sat feeds

If the splitter is located elsewhere you'll have to run a new cable back from RF2 to where the splitter is located, remove the splitter and join it to the TV2 cable or run a new cable directly to TV2 - whichever is easiest.

TV1 will be via RF1 (aerial) and scart/HDMI (Sky) as Ronnie explains above.

Brian h

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

If you're going to use existing cable, then the splitter must be located in the room with TV1?

The signal from RF2 is in the UHF terrestrial tv band. You don't need a satellite/UHF combiner, or any combiner for that matter.

Just plug the aerial cable into the Sky box RF-in & then RF2 will carry the aerial signal, along with the UHF analogue signal output by the Sky box. You can use RF1 to pass the aerial signal on to TV1.

The Cush wrote: »

just to add to Ronnie's post - where is the splitter and the feed to TV2 located?

If it's located beside TV1 the splitter can be removed and the Sky box will act as the splitter to the 2 TVs combining aerial and sat feeds

If the splitter is located elsewhere you'll have to run a new cable back from RF2 to where the splitter is located, remove the splitter and join it to the TV2 cable or run a new cable directly to TV2 - whichever is easiest.

TV1 will be via RF1 (aerial) and scart/HDMI (Sky) as Ronnie explains above.

Thanks Ronnie Raygun and The Cush for your advice. I think I'm getting my head around it now! Just to make a clarification. I re-read my post this morning and realised I omitted a piece of the jigsaw namely the Saorview/Freeview HD Box. Will that make any difference? I've updated the drawing to reflect what I think you are both advising me to do. Have I got this right?

All the best,

Brian H.

Ronnie Raygun

If you connect the aerial to the Saorview box RF-in, then its RF-out would be connected to the Sky box RF-in, not RF1 as your drawing appears to show. (Maybe that's just a typo?)

However, I would connect the aerial first to Sky box RF-in, then RF1 to Saorview box RF-in & Saorview box RF-out to TV1 RF-in (if TV1 RF-in is needed). Then the aerial feed gets to TV2 having only been looped through 1 device, rather than 2, & potential problems with the loopthrough in the Saorview box being disabled in standby are avoided.

Brian h

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

If you connect the aerial to the Saorview box RF-in, then its RF-out would be connected to the Sky box RF-in, not RF1 as your drawing appears to show. (Maybe that's just a typo?)

However, I would connect the aerial first to Sky box RF-in, then RF1 to Saorview box RF-in & Saorview box RF-out to TV1 RF-in (if TV1 RF-in is needed). Then the aerial feed gets to TV2 having only been looped through 1 device, rather than 2, & potential problems with the loopthrough in the Saorview box being disabled in standby are avoided.

Thanks for that Ronnie; that was indeed a typo. I meant to label it RF IN and not RF 1. I have just ordered a Magic Eye RC extender which should arrive tomorrow or the next day so I will wait til it arrives and report back after I have it set up. In the meantime, I've attached a revised drawing which I hope is right this time!

Regards,

Brian

Ronnie Raygun

Yes, that's the way I'd set it up.

Brian h

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

Yes, that's the way I'd set it up.

Hi Ronnie,

I didn't receive the magic eye in the post today but I went ahead anyway this evening and connected it all up and for the most part, everything is working fine. The only extra step I did was to enable the power on the RF2 in the Sky box settings. However, I did notice one thing that doesn't seem right. If I put the Sky box into standby mode, it cuts off the power on the RF2. I double checked that I had enabled RF2 power and did a system reset on the box but it made no difference. Is it normal to have the box running in fully on mode to use RF2? The box is an Amstrad DRX890 Sky+ HD.

Ronnie Raygun

You must have checked with a multimeter or something to know that the 9v "power" is switched off?

Or do you mean the aerial signal isn't being passed through?

Brian h

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

You must have checked with a multimeter or something to know that the 9v "power" is switched off?

Or do you mean the aerial signal isn't being passed through?

Both. When I checked it with a multimeter with the box fully powered on, ie green light, the voltage at the end of the cable at TV 2 reads 9.18 volts and the channel is viewable. When I go to standby, ie amber light, it reads zero and the channel disappears.

Liameter

I'm not familiar with that model but earlier models pass the aerial signal in standby. My ancient Panasonic TU-DSB40 also maintained the RF2 power in standby. AFAIK the later models should do likewise unless there's an extra "power saving" option somewhere.

(The latest "wireless" models, of course, have NO internal modulator and you have to buy a "Sky IO-Link Module" to plug in if you want RF outputs.)

Brian h

Liameter wrote: »

I'm not familiar with that model but earlier models pass the aerial signal in standby. My ancient Panasonic TU-DSB40 also maintained the RF2 power in standby. AFAIK the later models should do likewise unless there's an extra "power saving" option somewhere.

(The latest "wireless" models, of course, have NO internal modulator and you have to buy a "Sky IO-Link Module" to plug in if you want RF outputs.)

The settings for standby are None, Eco or Active but the signal to TV 2 cuts off in all three modes.

Liameter

I suspect the Digibox is faulty. I'm sure it shouldn't do that in "Active" mode.

Brian h

Liameter wrote: »

I suspect the Digibox is faulty. I'm sure it shouldn't do that in "Active" mode.

I think you may be right Liameter. I've tried a couple of other things to try to get to the bottom of it. Shortening the cable run from eight metres to two metres; putting Sky on RF1 and Saorview on RF2; using a different TV in place of TV2 and doing a forced software update on the box but none of those things made any difference.

Also, Saorview works fine on either RF1 or RF2 when the Sky box is in standby but for some reason the Sky box won't pass the satellite signal to another TV when it's in standby mode.

The Cush

Brian h wrote: »

Also, Saorview works fine on either RF1 or RF2 when the Sky box is in standby but for some reason the Sky box won't pass the satellite signal to another TV when it's in standby mode.

A little confused here, you said above in post #10 that both aerial (Saorview) and satellite signals don't come through when the box is in standby but above you say Saorview works fine with the box in standby, which is it?

Regarding the satellite channels not coming through when the box is in standby, I thought this was normal - no satellte channels through RF1 or 2 unless the box is switched on and RF2 power is there to power the magic eye only?

Brian h wrote: »

Ronnie Raygun wrote: »

You must have checked with a multimeter or something to know that the 9v "power" is switched off?

Or do you mean the aerial signal isn't being passed through?

Both. When I checked it with a multimeter with the box fully powered on, ie green light, the voltage at the end of the cable at TV 2 reads 9.18 volts and the channel is viewable. When I go to standby, ie amber light, it reads zero and the channel disappears.

Brian h

The Cush wrote: »

A little confused here, you said above in post #10 that both aerial (Saorview) and satellite signals don't come through when the box is in standby but above you say Saorview works fine with the box in standby, which is it?

Regarding the satellite channels not coming through when the box is in standby, I thought this was normal - no satellte channels through RF1 or 2 unless the box is switched on and RF2 power is there to power the magic eye only?

Hi The Cush,

Sorry about the confusion in post #10. I should have said,

"... and the satellite channel disappears".

As for no satellite channels coming through RF2 unless the box is out of standby, you are probably right about that being normal.

Brian H