BBC One Regional HD Tuning Problems

M

MartinOnline

Member
The scheduled Recording of Songs of Praise on BBC1 HD on my Aura failed to occur today. Selecting 101 results in a blank screen and no sound - after the information graphics have cleared. But selecting instant recording creates a recording which can then be viewed.

Aware of the change to Regional BBC HD I carried out a full manual retune (to avoid duplicate channels) - after starting and stopping an auto-tune. This resulted in the Regional 'BBC One Yrks HD' appearing as Channel 821 and Channel 101 remained as 'BBC One HD' when the info button was pressed whilst that channel was selected. Both channels show as 'BBC One HD' in the guide. Selecting channel 821 results in both HD picture and sound.

A manual retune of my HD-Fox T2 and my HDR-Fox T2 on the single HD multiplex results in channel 101 being associated with 'BBC One Yrks HD'. (Neither has any 800 channels.)

Channel 101 as 'BBC One HD' on my TVonics shows picture and sound but when left on that channel it displays no guide information even after 1 hour. Manually tuning the HD multiplex results in channel 101 changing to 'BBC One Yrks HD' and the guide being populated. (The 'old' HD channels are now duplicated above channel 800.)

Setting the Aura to channel 101 and manually tuning the HD multiplex resulted in 'BBC One Yrks HD' being shifted to channel 823.
Setting the Aura to channel 823 and manually tuning the HD multiplex resulted in 'BBC One Yrks HD' being shifted to channel 825.

Mains Power-Cycling the Aura had no effect.

Reluctantly I went for a Freeview Reset. I arrived at the Password prompt but every time I entered the first number of what I think is the password (PIN) the Aura took this as a channel number and switched to that channel. The cursor is in the password box because I can move it left and right to each number block.

What am I doing wrong?
 
Update:

Having avoided Auto-Tuning to ensure no duplicate channels - the local transmitter is visible from my bedroom and is about 6 miles away and the main transmitter is nearly on the same bearing - I bit the bullet and set an auto channel scan. My antenna is an indoor one oriented horizontally in the loft connected to a distribution amplifier.

As I expected the tuning picked up channels from my local transmitter but, to my surprise there were no duplicate channels. However, BBC1 HD for my local area registered as channel 101 and so solved my problem. I will have to fully check with planned BBC1 HD recordings later.

It would be interesting to learn the decision-making in the tuning algorithm (received power/quality?) because it seems to 'pick and mix' channels from the multiplexes it can detect. Thus:

ITV1 is from my local transmitter (and seems to have solved a failure to populate the guide unless tuned to the channel).
Channel 4 is from the main transmitter even though it is uses the same multiplex as ITV1.
Drama and Drama+1 are from the appropriate local transmitter multiplexes.
Yesterday is from the main transmitter.

I suppose other channels are dotted between the 2 transmitters but as long as all the channels can be detected then all's right with the world.

Martin
 
I'm not surprised that ITV1 is from a different transmitter to the rest of the multiplex channels. It is the only one on that multiplex that is truly local.
If the mixture of transmitters works for you - fine. Personally, I like all my main channels from the one transmitter, at least for the primary Humax. (Except trying to pick up some out-of-area BBC local radio - although with all the cuts that's less important now).
 
It doesn't matter so long as the multiple transmitters are all from the same region, otherwise the recording triggers don't work properly... except I believe that is no longer the case.

One reason there might be a mixture is that local transmitters don't carry the full range of services and the missing ones will get filled in from a main transmitter.

I'm not sure whether services are chosen by the strongest signal at the time of tuning, or just on a first-found basis.

Where signals from two different regions are detected, the user is offered the choice which to put on LCN 1+ (the alternate being allocated to LCN 800+).
 
I have the problem that the alternative transmitter is a different region. (In ITV terms, East Midlands and part of Yorkshire). If left to its own devices I often get Yorkshire in preference to EM . Trouble is the mixture sometimes locks on to the weaker signals for ArqA and ArqB muxes. I know when something has gone wrong when watching Pick and the picture breaks up when a bee farts.
It's possible with some Humax models that the automatic tune picks up the first found. Then if the user is offered a region choice just BBC1 and ITV1 are swapped out. That's what seems to happen to me, leaving a right dog's breakfast. (Therefore I usually do a manual tune with network search).
But, as I said, if it works for you - fine.
 
EEPhil said:
Therefore I usually do a manual tune with network search
Click to expand...
This seems like a good strategy. Pick any DVB-T mux. and select network search and it will pick up all the other DVB-T muxes from the same main transmitter (I don't know what happens with relays). Then add the (now only) DVB-T2 mux. (which don't have network search capability it seems).
 
EEPhil said:
I have the problem that the alternative transmitter is a different region. (In ITV terms, East Midlands and part of Yorkshire). If left to its own devices I often get Yorkshire in preference to EM . Trouble is the mixture sometimes locks on to the weaker signals for ArqA and ArqB muxes. I know when something has gone wrong when watching Pick and the picture breaks up when a bee farts.
It's possible with some Humax models that the automatic tune picks up the first found. Then if the user is offered a region choice just BBC1 and ITV1 are swapped out. That's what seems to happen to me, leaving a right dog's breakfast. (Therefore I usually do a manual tune with network search).
But, as I said, if it works for you - fine.
Click to expand...
For me, Winter Hill and a more distant transmitter (Wirral, IIRC) are in virtually the same direction, and from my hilltop position, my Humaxes can detect both.
Given that the distant signal is much weaker, what works for me is a cheap variable attenuator that I use to damp down the aerial signal when auto-tuning. It didn't take much trial-and-error to find a setting that made the distant signal undetectable but allows Winter Hill to be picked up, despite my Humaxes having somewhat different sensitivities.
Once tuned, I remove the attenuator to get back to a good strength signal.
(An extra male-female aerial lead is useful, as the attenuator is just a box with male&female connectors, and it might be awkward or impossible to connect without using an extra lead.)
 
prpr said:
Then add the (now only) DVB-T2 mux. (which don't have network search capability it seems).
Click to expand...
It may be that a manual search requires you to pick DVB-T or DVB-T2. An automatic search does both. Although I'm fairly sure I started a network search on a T2 mux once (by accident after the T scan) and it did them all again. (Could be a senior moment and I misremember)
 
EEPhil said:
It may be that a manual search requires you to pick DVB-T or DVB-T2. An automatic search does both. Although I'm fairly sure I started a network search on a T2 mux once (by accident after the T scan) and it did them all again. (Could be a senior moment and I misremember)
Click to expand...
Was that on your HDR-2000T? If it was then you remember correctly.

For Crystal Palace, on either an HDR-FOX T2 or an HDR-2000T/1800T, I can select the DVB-T2 mux with network search and it will also search on all the transmitter's DVB-T multiplexes.

prpr said:
select network search and it will pick up all the other DVB-T muxes from the same main transmitter (I don't know what happens with relays).
Click to expand...
This doesn't work on all main transmitters. For example, in the Eastern English region the three main transmitters are Tacolneston, Sandy Heath and Sudbury. With all 3 transmitters the associated SD Network Channels broadcast are those of Tacolneston. I.e. If Tacolneston is your transmitter then using Network search is as hoped for, but for the other two it will find no additional channels, or very weak ones from Tacolneston.
 
It appears that others have come across the 'Can't enter a password' problem - in another place (Parliament-Speak).

Possibly they tried to 'Reset Freeview', assuming, as I did, that that was required to eliminate all duplicate channels whereas a straightforward Autotune did that and resulted in zero '800' channels. In my case, they were generated when I carried out a Manual Scan where the new source parameters were different in some way to those of the registered source though they did increase every time I did a Manual Scan.

So far all recordings/channel selection on the main channels have worked. My better-half is happy.

Martin
 
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