Sky Magic Eye & Terrestrial

danny2012

Hi,
I am not sure whether this should be in this forum or the Terrestrial forum, please feel free to move it if I chose the wrong one.
I have Sky, as well aerials on the roof which receive the Northern Irish and Irish TV Channels from Brougher Mountain and Cairn Hill, channels 21, 22, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 44 and 47. These are both in one room in the house.
I wish to have access to both the Terrestrial channels, and the Sky channels (through the Magic Eye) in another room.
What is the best way to do this?

Thank you

steveon

Plug the terrestrial connection into the Aerial in socket on the back of the sky box, then run a cable from rf1 to the tv in same room and from the connection marked rf2 to the second room for use with a magic eye, this will also carry the saorview and freeview channels with it down the one cable. You will need to set the frequency of the skybox away from the frequency's your terrestrial aerial brings single from e.g set sky box to ch 55 or higher.

What kind of sky box is it. If its a standard old white box or white sky plue set the frequency by pressing services then key in 4,0,1 select to enter secret menu...change rf to ch55 or higher and enable rf2 power.

If its a newer sky box hd then press services and key in 001 select. If you got the newer boxes again that have no rf2 or aerial input's you will need to purchase an Global I/O Link.

danny2012

Thanks for that! Will the signal be degraded much? Channels 21 and 27 are already low enough in quality (20% or less) and it's rare for them to go more than 5 minutes without a few drops in audio and any more would be quite irritating.

The Cush

danny2012 wrote: »

Will the signal be degraded much? Channels 21 and 27 are already low enough in quality (20% or less)

Are you using a masthead amp on the NI aerial?

danny2012

Yeah I am, its to do with my location, not my aerial, i'm in a hollow quite a distance from the border

Peter Rhea

danny2012 wrote: »

Channels 21 and 27 are already low enough in quality (20% or less) and it's rare for them to go more than 5 minutes without a few drops in audio and any more would be quite irritating.

Channels 21, 24 & 27 are on lower power from Brougher than 22, 25 & 28 (2kW v. 20kW) & added to that, there could also be interference on 21, 24 & 27 from the Divis (Belfast) transmitter (100kW).

Also, don't use channels in the high 50s for your Sky box RF output, as all these channels are in use at Saorview transmitters that could possibly be picked up on your aerial (Truskmore, Monaghan, Clermont Carn, even Kippure & Maghera), adding interference to the Sky picture. Channels in the 60s could be prone to interference from phone masts at some point: I would choose from chs. 36, 37 or 38. Less signal loss in cable at these frequencies too, than there would be in the 60s.

danny2012

How much signal would actually be lost?
Most of the channels I watch are on channels 21 and 27 so if they wouldn't be received then it would be pointless for me to do it.
Would I be right in saying that the signal strength would probably be affected but not the quality? I'm not sure why but something tells me that would be the case...

Peter Rhea

Signal quality is the important measure: strength can always be boosted if it falls to an unacceptable level but, it has to be a good quality signal to begin with. You already have poor quality on the Brougher commercial services & the modulator in the Sky box could cause further impairment.

I only really mentioned signal losses on the Sky RF output as an added excuse to use the lower channels. It would only be an issue on a long cable run or if you use poor quality cable.

If co-channel interference from Divis is the cause of your poor signal quality, the only way to tackle it would be to see if any improvements could be made to the aerial: maybe different aerial or different location, make sure all cables & components are well screened.

danny2012

Thats what I can't understand, the lowest quality I've ever seen on channel 24 is 72%, could there be some reason for 21 and 27 being so bad?

The Cush

danny2012 wrote: »

Thats what I can't understand, the lowest quality I've ever seen on channel 24 is 72%, could there be some reason for 21 and 27 being so bad?

I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that Divis Ch.24 is the DVB-T2/FreeviewHD mux and not interfering the same way as the 2 other muxes from Divis?

Peter Rhea

danny2012 wrote: »

. . . the lowest quality I've ever seen on channel 24 is 72%, could there be some reason for 21 and 27 being so bad?

In you measured the quality on all 3 with professional equipment, there probably would be no difference worth commenting on.