Been there, done that... part 2

Now that the dust has settled on the Digital Switchover proess in the South-West of England, what lessons are there to be learned for the rest of the country?

With Digital UK giving a passable impression of Uriah Heep it would seem that all is well in this best of all possible digital worlds, but as we've already seen in the Torbay area, that's not necessarily the case.

There are specific problems for viewers in the Ilfracombe area and we will be detailing those shortly, but a significant number of BBC Radio Cornwall listeners have been raising issues about their television reception since the completion of digital switchover in the county. These listeners have mostly been complaining of picture break-up, while the sound continues undisturbed.

We think there are two basic causes behind the majority of these problems and in different ways they are both connected with the change of transmission format which was introduced as part of digital switchover. (The new post-switchover signals being not only higher powered they are also higher capacity.)

The first problem occurs where the signal from a receiving aerial passes through some sort of amplifier or booster. Many people have these, often in areas where the old analogue signals were weak or where multiple sets are connected to a single aerial. In most cases digital tv reception is not improved by these amplifiers and there is evidence that in some cases these are now getting overloaded by the new type of transmissions and doing more harm than good.

Some of these amplifiers will actually be 'masthead' types located outside, near the aerial itself, and powered by a unit behind or near the tv set. Disconnecting or removing these power units without also removing the associated amplifier is not an option as this will simply switch off the amplifier which will then pass no signal at all.

A good aerial installer should be able to advise on this.

The second problem is with more elderly set-top boxes. A few models are known to simply not work with the new transmission format and a list of these has been published on the Digital UK web site, but from experience it seems this is not the end of the story. There are other old-ish boxes, typically those bought by viewers soon after Freeview started, which should work OK, but now appear not to. Put simply the new transmission format requires the decoder boxes to work harder and some boxes, in their old age, are now being revealed to have shortcomings. Sadly the only cure in these cases is to write-off the old box and replace it with a new one.

So to those viewers experiencing picture break-up we would suggest you start by considering the age of your set-top box. If it's older than, say, 6-7 years old you should consider replacing it. If you are also looking for a way to record tv programmes you should look for a box with a record facility built-in.

On the other hand, if you have any kind of aerial amplifier or signal-splitting booster you should consider removing it.

If neither of these solutions work you should contact a good aerial installer. Rather than just pick one out of the phone book we would suggest people seek a recommendation, perhaps from a local independent tv retailer.

Whatever happens we do not recommend an aerial booster as a solution for this type of problem; it almost certainly won't help.

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