Television picture pixelation

[crankedup5]

For the past few months we have had picture pixelation on our screen, mainly on the ITV broadcasts. BBC is clear. We had a television aerial guy round and he fitted a mast booster box and retuned the BT box which all helped but the problem has gone back to the original situation.
Got in touch with BT who carried out a on-line test of our BT box and decided we needed a replacement box.
Fitted the new box and the problem was fixed for about one day, but has now got back to where we started. Any suggestions.

[Sticks.]

I had the same sort of problem. I got someone in who fitted a new booster and power supply, but also a 5G filter. I also have a signal booster between the aerial socket and freeview box.

[crankedup5]

Thanks sticks, I will try a 5G filter next then and see if it resolves the issue.

[shtu]

Head here and do some reading, in particular about your transmitter and the correct aerial type for it,

https://www.aerialsandtv.com/

It's possible the aerial type in use doesn't match the transmitter. Or it could be an iffy cable, etc.

Start by switching off every non-essential gadget nearby, completely retune the TV, and check the signal strength and quality on the problem channels.

[crankedup5]

Thanks Shtu some good advise there, done most of it and still had problem. Rushed down the B&Q and spent a tenner on a filter, as suggested above and Hey Presto job done

[crankedup5]

I celebrated to soon, the pixilation is back and as bad as ever. I’m at a loss as to what to do about it.

[xeny]

The way it is coming and going leaves me wondering if it is local interference.

Is the TV up against a party wall or could somebody in your house be turning an appliance off/on?

[crankedup5]

Thanks for reply, the telly is in the corner of our room but it’s always been in the same area for years. The interference started about a year ago, we do have a water tower quarter mile away and it’s loaded with transmitter / receiver aerials. My guess it’s something to do with that, but I don’t know if there is anything I can do to resolve the issue.

[xeny]

Unless the water tower is pretty close to the bearing of the TV broadcast station it is unlikely to be the cause.

A TV aerial is directional so is unlikely to pick up significant interference from something significantly off axis - this is why pointing them reasonably accurately is important.

[OutInTheShed]

1) Do you have more than one TV? Are they all equally bad, could it be the set is 'broken'?
2) Does the TV have anything in the settings menu to report signal strength? It could just be a weak signal due to a poor aerial, bad cable etc, making everything marginal.
3) Is the TV tuned to the correct transmitter?
4) Do your neighbours have the same issues?
5) any radio ham nutters locally?
6) there is a website somewhere (ofcom?) showing all mobile base station locations. Is there a new one in your aerial's 'view' or very close?

You could spend a lot of time faffing with intermittent interference sources.

There are possible solutions. Filters. Different aerials. A TV with a better receiver. Aiming your aerial at a different transmitter even if it's a bit further away. Aiming the aerial 'off' a bit so a null in its directional pattern points at the interference source. Talking to Ofcom.

My suggestion though is to get a Freesat dish and recorder box. That is most likely to just work.

[megaphone]

Does it coincide with rain? Could be water getting into the aerial connection or the cable.

You rarely need a masthead amp these days, usually a 'bodge' for a badly installed or faulty aerial, did the aerial guy get up and look at the aerial?

[crankedup5]

Some more great tips and advise, thanks for contributing, I have lots to work through now.

[crankedup5]

megaphone said:

Does it coincide with rain? Could be water getting into the aerial connection or the cable.

You rarely need a masthead amp these days, usually a 'bodge' for a badly installed or faulty aerial, did the aerial guy get up and look at the aerial?

Weather doesn’t seem to make any difference, the aerial man stuck on the masthead aerial and checked the leads, re-tuned the box. All that did seem to improve the picture si*nificantly but it has slowly gone back to bad interference again over the course of the past few months.
I did go to re-book the aerial guy but that ended in a bad atmosphere so I didn’t bother.

[megaphone]

crankedup5 said:

megaphone said:

Does it coincide with rain? Could be water getting into the aerial connection or the cable.

You rarely need a masthead amp these days, usually a 'bodge' for a badly installed or faulty aerial, did the aerial guy get up and look at the aerial?

Weather doesn’t seem to make any difference, the aerial man stuck on the masthead aerial and checked the leads, re-tuned the box. All that did seem to improve the picture si*nificantly but it has slowly gone back to bad interference again over the course of the past few months.
I did go to re-book the aerial guy but that ended in a bad atmosphere so I didn’t bother.

First thing you need to do is check the aerial and cable. Check it is pointing at the correct transmitter and that it is the correct type and gain. Too much gain can also affect the signal, where is the masthead amp, can you take a pic of your aerial etc?

Stick your details in here, this will tell you what you can expect signal wise, post up the results.

https://www.freeview.co.uk/corporate/detailed-tran...

Edited by megaphone on Tuesday 28th March 12:27

[crankedup5]

Thanks for that megaphone.
The results are signal strength through the list of the channels I watch are listed as ‘Good’.

I played around and used the remote handset that came with the tele’ I went to ‘input’ and then I went from HDM2 over to ‘TV’ . This change of input has cleared all of the interference on screen.

My tele’ is a cheapo ‘ Hisense’.