New TV aerial for 'strong' or 'weak' signal?

Unless you are served by Hannington (Hants/Berks)

BBC 1 39 BBC 2 45 ITV 42 C4 66 C5 35, Ironically just DTT from Hannington only requires Group B (40,41,43,44,46,50)

Indeed I do.

The day a balun turns one pile of aluminium scrap intyo a 'digital aerial' is the day I send my degree in electronics back..

;-)

No one said it did. But DTT (DVB-T) as currently transmitted in the UK is somewhat more demanding of receiving antenna performance than analogue, particularly if you want (a) an aerial that bears some relation to the assumptions used by the transmitter planners in regard to gain, directional properties and cross-polar discrimination, and (b) freedom from impulsive interference.

The term "digital aerial" has come in to use to mean an antenna that meets a certain set of criteria that will distinguish it from your "pile of aluminium scrap."

Go read

HTH

But will the frequencies change during analogue switch off? I'd still prefer to install a wideband in case they do.

Christian.

Yes, definitely. In most areas the three public-service muxes will move on to three of the four original analogue channels. The other three will go elsewhere, TBA. Channels 31-40 and 63-68 will no longer be used for what is currently called Freeview, but might be used for new TV services such as HD and/or DVB-H.

This is a good strategy, although it's a fair bet that in large centres of population (i.e. areas served by Crystal Palace, Sutton Coldfield and Winter Hill) everything will remain more or less in the original aerial group - although that won't necessarily apply to any new services.

Now that differs from my understanding that all the digital will be up in group C/D. That gives the Bliar thieves the whole of groups A and B to sell off. Surely there is no other reason for the rapid push to a digital service?

Dunno where you got that bizarre idea from. In principle anything remains possible, but that one, I think, is most unlikely.

Conspiracy theory runs wild... The proposal to 'release' 14 channels (only) has been in the public domain for some time now, although detailed channel plans certainly aren't, and won't be until international coordination work is much further advanced. There's also a major radio regulatory conference in progress (RRC04-06) considering VHF & UHF broadcast allocations in Region 1 and nothing is firm until after that concludes next year.

As to "rapid push," it's actually quite slow. From The start of DTT (1998) to the proposed conclusion of switchover (2012) is 14 years. Now, let me see, UHF/BBC2 started in '64 and the last 405-line TX shut down in '85 - that's 21 years, so you could say that the digital change-over is 30% faster - hardly as drastic as "rapid push" would suggest, perhaps.

It was always the original intention to make money aka the 3G sell off (albeit on a much smaller scale), as it is there are numerous parts of the existing allocations lying idle due to the demand completely evaporating. So the sell off is increasingly more likely not going to happen, particularly when 99% of traffic uses / will use GSM900/1800 or 3G.

Yeah. They should keep the spectrum for more DVB, IMO. Preferably HDTV.

Christian.

Yep, that's exactly what the broadcasting lobby is, err, lobbying for.