An antenna originally designed to work for the old analog TV stations should be OK for use with modern high definition and digital TVs

In principal, they should work the same but replacing your old aerial could bring advantages when tuning into the transmitter for other reasons:

• Gain
  Measures how much signal or energy the antenna will collect with modern high gain tv antennas helping to pull in more information
• Beam width
  Gives a measure of how focussed an aerial is with a wider beam making it easier to capture a signal
• Bandwidth
  Different stations are transmitted at different frequencies and bandwidth gives a measure of how gain varies with signal frequency
  If the antenna has too narrow a bandwidth it may be good at receiving some channels well but fail to give a good picture on others

Don’t be fooled by claims of digital aerials but do consider upgrading to a digital compatible aerial that can help provide a better picture thanks to improvements in aerial performance

The high data transfer rates should provide an alternative to terrestrial aerial based TV reception once the systems become properly established here in the UK

Currently EE is one of the few companies to advertise 4G but costs realistically preclude its use for streaming film and TV with 5GB of data packages currently costing over £50 per month. It should be just a matter of time before transfer allowances increase as other major players start to enter the market and look at home technologies not just mobile options

What is a Mux or Multiplex?

TV Transmission
The free or terrestrial digital channels picked up via a normal TV antenna from a nearby transmitter are transmitted in a tight frequency range band or multiplex or mux

Frequency and Channel Compression
Each frequency range can have several TV channels compressed together for transmission which are then decoded and separated by your TV, or set top box

For example,
BBC
Many of the BBC channels BBC1, BBC2,& BBC3 would be compressed together into a single digital signal band or multiplex to be decoded and separated by your TV or other receiver
ITV
The ITV, Channel 4 & E4 Stations would also be compressed together into a separate multiplex transmitted at a different frequency

I Can’t Get Some Digital Channels

Poor Freeview Coverage
If you can’t receive all the multiplexes from your nearest transmitter it may be that they aren’t covered in your area but there is likely to be a different explanation

Channel Changes
Sometimes certain channels numbers or allocations change and you will need to re-scan to recover the missing channels

Transmitter Failure or Maintenance
When scanning for channels fails to find the missing channels it’s worth checking that the TV transmitter is functioning correctly and is not down or running at reduced signal during essential maintenance

Aerial Alignment
Modern aerials are pretty good at receiving all the multiplex channels; if you originally received all channels it may be that your aerial alignment has changed and one or two of the less optimal multiplex frequencies now has too low a signal strength

Aerial Performance
Aerials need to collect a range of frequencies and if you have just bought a new TV or digital receiver it may be that your old aerial has insufficient gain or bandwidth to differentiate all the multiplex channels and needs updating

Poor Cable Performance
Once your aerial collects the signal it’s passed via an aerial cable to your receiver; poor cables or connectors can degrade an already weak signal and cause weaker signal channels to be dropped

Powerful Signal
It is possible to get too strong a signal from a nearby transmitter or relay which overwhelms the receiver; making it difficult to decode certain channels; if this is the case, an engineer can fit an attenuator between your aerial and reciver to output an optimal signal

Equipment Interference
If you have various pieces of equipment capable of receiving and outputting a signal; try turning off non-essential equipment to see if you can receive or retune the missing channels

We received a request for help from someone in the Gateshead area who had trouble with certain ITV channels and when trying to re-tune their TV they lost all of the digital channels

The weather conditions recently have been really poor with extended periods of rain although that wouldn’t normally cause continuous interference, pixellation and loss of sound or digital signal

They received their terrestrial TV via Pontop Pike transmitter but no one else had reported a problem nor was there any word to say that essential maintenance work was undertaken on the transmitter mast

It seems the aerial cable was over 10 years old and rainwater had found its way into a hollow cavity and tracked from the rooftop aerial down to the TV aerial socket

The aerial socket was wet but luckily the TV wasn’t affected and while the exposed cable top could have been trimmed and adjusted to prevent future rainwater penetration it was thought better to replace the cable due to the evidence of corrosion and rubbing wear on parts of the cable sheath

Aerial Installer Gateshead

The high data transfer rates should provide an alternative to terrestrial aerial based TV reception once the systems become properly established here in the UK

Currently EE is one of the few companies to advertise 4G but costs realistically preclude its use for streaming film and TV with 5GB of data packages currently costing over £50 per month. It should be just a matter of time before transfer allowances increase as other major players start to enter the market and look at home technologies not just mobile options