Please help improve my Freeview picture quality.

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Hey, I recently bought a Sony KDL 26T3000 for my room, which has freeview built in. Unfortunately the picture quality isn't always that good, certainly not consistent, and secondly depending on the posistion of the TV aerial cable, I can never seem to pick up all channels. For example, one moment I'll have BBC3 and BBC4, the next they'll be a black screen but I'll have E4 instead.

1. Will upgrading my TV aerial cable help? I hear QED build some decent cables.
2. Is the built-in freeview on the Sony Bravia just not that good?
3. May I need to adjust / upgrade the roof aerial itself?
4. Sony is releasing PlayTV for the PlayStation 3. I know it acts as a PVR, but I think it's also a tuner. Is this true, and if so, would it be worth waiting till its March release to see if it does a better job?

Thanks for any help.

 

[laserman16]

[quote user="Manic Inc"]Hey, I recently bought a Sony KDL 26T3000 for my room, which has freeview built in. Unfortunately the picture quality isn't always that good, certainly not consistent, and secondly depending on the posistion of the TV aerial cable, I can never seem to pick up all channels. For example, one moment I'll have BBC3 and BBC4, the next they'll be a black screen but I'll have E4 instead.

1. Will upgrading my TV aerial cable help? I hear QED build some decent cables.
2. Is the built-in freeview on the Sony Bravia just not that good?
3. May I need to adjust / upgrade the roof aerial itself?
4. Sony is releasing PlayTV for the PlayStation 3. I know it acts as a PVR, but I think it's also a tuner. Is this true, and if so, would it be worth waiting till its March release to see if it does a better job?

Thanks for any help.[/quote]
Hi, I have a Sony 40w2000 and I must say the freeview tuner on it is superb. My next door neighbour has a smaller Sony which is also superb on freeview. I would guess your problem lies elsewhere. Perhaps your aerial needs upgrading/re-aligning.

 

[Anonymous]

Yeah I guessed it might be the cable - it's about 10 years old is was proberbly free with some TV from years back. So would QED be the best guys to go to?

 

[Andrew Everard]

No, it's probably not the cable, but the aerial itself. Over time, aerials can get moved by wind, and the internal connection between the aerial and the downlead can be attacked by water ingress, not to mention both the aerial itself and the downlead downgrading as a result of prolonged exposure to the elements.

I think a thorough aerial checkover by a competent installer - the Confederation of Aerial Industries is a good starting-point when looking for one - is a good idea. I'd much rather spend the money toward this than take a chance on a 1m socket to TV cable that may not bring any benefits if the aerial itself is shot.

 

[John Duncan]

[quote user="Andrew Everard"]
No, it's probably not the cable, but the aerial itself. Over time, aerials can get moved by wind, and the internal connection between the aerial and the downlead can be attacked by water ingress, not to mention both the aerial itself and the downlead downgrading as a result of prolonged exposure to the elements.

I think a thorough aerial checkover by a competent installer - the Confederation of Aerial Industries is a good starting-point when looking for one - is a good idea. I'd much rather spend the money toward this than take a chance on a 1m socket to TV cable that may not bring any benefits if the aerial itself is shot.
[/quote]

Agreed - a hundred quid spent on getting your aerial up to scratch pays enormous dividends.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for all responses. I'll see what I can do about getting the aerial checked out.

 

[laserman16]

[quote user="Andrew Everard"]
No, it's probably not the cable, but the aerial itself. Over time, aerials can get moved by wind, and the internal connection between the aerial and the downlead can be attacked by water ingress, not to mention both the aerial itself and the downlead downgrading as a result of prolonged exposure to the elements.

I think a thorough aerial checkover by a competent installer - the Confederation of Aerial Industries is a good starting-point when looking for one - is a good idea. I'd much rather spend the money toward this than take a chance on a 1m socket to TV cable that may not bring any benefits if the aerial itself is shot.
[/quote]
Spot on advice as usual

 

[John Duncan]

[quote user="Manic Inc"]Thanks for all responses. I'll see what I can do about getting the aerial checked out.[/quote]

or for ten quid, start with a plug-in tv signal amplifier, see if that helps, and if it does, then go the whole hog.

 

[Andrew Everard]

IME, signal amplifiers usually create more problems than they solve

 

[John Duncan]

And in mine, they at least allow a freeview box to pick up all the channels they're supposed to, since it's usually a case of a channel being "on/off" rather than "fuzzy/not fuzzy" if the signal's poor. And for only a tenner, if it shows an improvement then it shows the signal as being the problem and I'd definitely then go down the route of sorting the aerial out.