Freeview breaks up at night

[Tefler]

More Freeview problems:

We have good reception on Freeview during the day, but in the evenings it starts breaking up on all but the BBC channels. Sometimes, indeed, there is no signal at all on channels such as Sky News and Viva. Does anybody know why this might be and what we could do to make it work?

[Buenchico]

You've described the classic symptoms of insufficient signal strength.

The signal strength at your aerial doesn't remain constant. It's affected by all sorts of things, including atmospheric pressure, general weather conditions, the 11-year sunspot cycle, individual solar flares, interference from nearby electrical devices (such as your neighbours' computers and TV sets) and many other factors.

Digital channels are transmitted in 'bundles' (called 'multiplexes') on different frequencies so it's not unusual for a group of channels to be affected by poor signal strength, while other channels are unaffected. (Ideally you should have a different aerial for every frequency but that's clearly impractical. So your aerial is only a 'rough match' to the frequencies it's required to 'resonate' with, and will be better at receiving some frequencies than others).

The signal strength at your aerial is good enough for it to cope during the day but, at night, it can't provide a good enough signal for your receiver to work with. Ideally you should replace your aerial (and cabling) but, if you've not already got a booster (for less than a tenner from most big supermarkets), getting one will probably fix your problem.

Chris

[whiskeryron]

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WR.

[Tefler]

Thanks for your help.