Atlantic Bird 3...chaines francais

Shinto

Hi everybody,

Does anyone use a satellite dish to get the national french channels (France 2, France 3, ARTE, and M6 etc)?

If so, did you need to get a 'SECAM' to 'PAL' converter?...or is your reciever able to pick them up anyway?

p.s. Some people are telling me that this SECAM to PAL analogue thing is an issue, yet others are saying that its no longer an issue cos the channels also come in Digital DVB thus making them accessable by nearly all recievers?

Could anybody enlighten me?

Appologies if this question has been asked before but ive only discovered this website a few weeks ago.

Eurorunner

According to lyngsat, theyre in secam. However, why would you bother with 5*W when they can be picked up much more easily on 13*E (Hotbird)?

Tony

Eurorunner wrote:

According to lyngsat, theyre in secam. However, why would you bother with 5*W when they can be picked up much more easily on 13*E (Hotbird)?

what freq are they in the clear on hotbird?

PacMan

These channels are *Not* in the clear on Hotbird, the only exception being Arte.
I have viewed these channels many times on 5w and all you need is a FTA receiver, a scart lead and away you go. My FTA receiver is a Palcom which i bought from the excellent satellite.ie site.(A Lidl receiver will do just as well) Anyhow back to topic. France 1,2,3, Arte are all clear. if you have a TV which is fairly new, you should have no problem.

Mossy Monk

and before anybody asks how do you get them on Hotbird dont bother

Eurorunner

Tony wrote:

what freq are they in the clear on hotbird?

PacMan wrote:

These channels are *Not* in the clear on Hotbird, the only exception being Arte.

Tony wrote:

and before anybody asks how do you get them on Hotbird dont bother

Lads, see my OP. I never said they were in the clear on 13*E - just a much stronger beam..
Available with a full sub of course.

JZF

Hi,

Be careful, the analog french channels still use Secam, so you do need a converter to get colour TV. The transmission of DVB channels of France Televisions ( 11591 V ) is a actually a feed for DTT transmitters and is due to be encrypted shortly.

Hope this helps.

Marc

Tony

Eurorunner wrote:

Lads, see my OP. I never said they were in the clear on 13*E - just a much stronger beam..
Available with a full sub of course.

You should have said so as they are clear on Telecom, its not a stronger beam either.

Tony

JZF wrote:

Hi,

Be careful, the analog french channels still use Secam, so you do need a converter to get colour TV.

Not necessarily most new ish tv's can handle secam via scart socket and give colour

watty

NO the SCART doesn't help.

However the French Chjannels on DIGITAL @ 5W are still FTA and don't need Secam. On a any Digital receiver they are RGB and/or PAL composite.
I think it is a SR that the Sky Digibox doesn't do. see www.satellite.ie for a Digital FTA box that costs less than some Secam / PAL convertors.


A Thomson TV will likely do Secam. Most others offer NTSC as alternative to PAL. Cheap ones just do PAL or RGB. I don't know of any other PAL + Secam TV other than my very small 6" CRT Colour A/V monitor/TV (doesn't do NTSC).


*** Digression (but back later).
A very very few analog RX boxes do give RGB from NTSC, PAL or Secam, but most just give Composite (PAL, NTSC, SEcam according to TX signal).

Digital boxes, the MPEG is kind of in "Component form" (YUV coding) so RGB is simple matrix. There is no "Secam" on Digital, just 60Hz/30 frames or 50Hz 25 frames with UV subsampling slightly different for PAL and NTSC source. A digital box actually has a PAL and an NTSC encoder (possibly in DSP rather than traditional BBC 19" rack hardware), which is why some Digital receivers have a menu for what to do on 60Hz or 50Hz MPEG detection.

DVD & DVB is PAL or NTSC "related" (50Hz 576 line/60Hz 480 line) not really PAL (625 lines) or NTSC (525 lines). HDTV isn't even PAL or NTSC related, though USA and Europe tend to use different standards (i.e. 720p and Euro1080). The popular in USA 720 standard is unlikely in Europe as it is not enough improvement from our 576, though a good improvement from 480 line DVB/DVD (I'm not likely to buy region 1 DVD as they have 30% less definition!). This is why "Entry level" HDTV is 1080 visible lines in Europe. Other higher defintions exist. Most true HDTV as yet only do the 1080 line and some "HD ready" only display HDTV on less lines by "downsampling" or "reverse interpolation". Don't buy HDTV yet unless you getting a projector and us it with PC a lot!


== Back to topic --->

However the DIGITAL F2, F3, F4, F5 etc are still clear and very strong on my 80cm dish. I'd guess a smaller dish is OK.

Every PC TV analog card I have seen does offer Secam. Use the composite input with analog Sat box as the RF will have no sound when you select Secam on TV or P)C TV Card!
(The Secam uses a different subcarrier frequency for sound, the Sat box will output secam RF, but with sound at the PAL I audio subcarrier frequency).

Some of the French ANALOG are a bit low in signal on my analog box (same dish & LNB as the digital, by using loop out on the Palcom DSL4 digital RX in standby) and thus a bit sparkly. B&W on the TV, colour on the PC.

Shinto

Thanks for all the advice. I'll be honest...i didnt understand all the acronyms and technical stuff above, but now at least i know it is possible to view those "Chaînes françaises nationales" (French national channels) from ireland.

Merci.

Rippy

Last week I did aerial work and wired extension points and and a distribution amp for a French customer.
He had a nokia analogue receiver on 5W for French channels.
I explained to him that if the Rf output was piped to the other tv's he would get a B&W picture at best.
On tuning in the tv's I was suprised to see that 3 out of four gave a colour pic.
Zoot Alors! Magnifique! said my happy punter.
two of the tv's that handled SECAM were 17" Philips LCD's (new, bought here) and the 3rd was some ropey old froggy dual standard thing.
Signal strength was pretty poor even wth the 1 MTR dish he had up,but he was happy with it so I did not go near the dish to check alingment. It was pretty rusted up anyway.

Pal

Shinto wrote:

view those "Chaînes françaises nationales" (French national channels) from ireland.

answer : YES .

it is possible to receive over a hundred French channels in Dublin with very little equipment.

Smeagol

Mind you, TF1 is not part of the digital channels on 5°w, only on analouge.