pixilating

[jacko50]

can any one please explain why sky and free view pictures pixilate ,my sky has done it for ages but not enough to bother me ,but i recently bought a free view box with a hard disc ,i had a bloke round to fit an areial and he said he had to fit a high definition which he did this cost �60 i was happy with that and he left. after a couple of days i noticed that the picture was pixilating every 10/20 minutes and it lasted long enough to spoil the programe being watched ,i called back the ariel bloke and asked him to move the arial to a position better suited for reception ,he said that would not help but he would fit a booster for �35 ,i told him i would think about it and he left again .also when i went to the set up menu on the freeview and pressed arial alignment it read 55% out of 100% and the signal was comming from wenvoe near cardiff ,i live near swansea and my arial is pointing in that direction i asked the arial man (before he left of course) if we should point the arial towards wenvoe to see if that helped and he said no .so anyway any advise would be welcomed .sorry about rambling on but it is so annoying thanks.

[kempie]

Pixelation is the digital equivalent of 'snow' on an analogue TV signal; errors caused by degraded transmission.

Without knowing your location I cannot verify if your aerial is positioned correctly, however for reference

Neath... Kilvey Hill (Swansea)
Maesteg... Wenvoe (but limited channels)
Bridgend... Wenvoe

You can find accurate coverage details here.

[jacko50]

thanks a lot kempie,i went to that site and it said i should be kilvey hill but my ariel says wenvoe on the alignment section ,do you think i should turn it towards swansea more?

[kempie]

To remedy the problem I would start at the tuner and work outwards.

Firstly, reboot the tuner (be it a set top box or integrated with the TV). Switch it off at the mains for about 10 mins and check the aerial connection is secure before reapplying the power.

If this has no effect try a rescan of the channels.

If the problem still persists it may be either the cable or the aerial. I would presume the fitter used a signal meter to originally align the aerial in which case realignment should not be an factor. That having been said, if you have easy access to the aerial and you are able to check signal levels by viewing your TV while you adjust the aerial, that may be an option you wish to explore.

It may well culminate in you needing to boost the signal.

[jacko50]

thanks again kempie ,the problem is i do things backwards its a major fault of mine ,i got the aerial fitted while the tv i was going to connect it to was still in the shop window at currys so the fitter could only guess at the general direction of swansea. so i could try adjusting it myself as it is not on the roof it is just below my guttering from the roof. i noticed that if i turn the digibox off the reception for the tv is aufull but there is a black box thingy that i have to plug into the back of the digibox so i think this is a booster? because when it is switched on with the digibox the picture is very good.Iwill try to move the aerial and let you know what happens so once again thanks a million .ps if nothing else you have taught me how to spell aerial .