Martin963

Almost undoubtedly no good.   I have a Panasonic machine in the UK which neither tunes system L (which is what they use in France instead of system I for terrestrial analogue) and can't make head or tail of SECAM - just shows it as black and white with red and green wavy lines!   Otherwise it's very good. If you MUST buy in the UK then get a Philips;  these seem to accept SECAM and even convert it to PAL so that a UK TV set can display SECAM signals in colour even though it's PAL.  Although - beware - Philips DVD recorders don't have RF modulators for the output (at least the 610 and 3305 don't),  you are confined to Scart/composite/S-video. But honestly,  you'll find a good deal in France as well if you look around the supermarkets and then you KNOW it works on the French system.   And when it goes wrong you won't have to lug it back to the UK.

A DAB radio is of no use whatsoever for listening to French stations in the UK.  Correct.  Pointe finale. But lots of French stations are available on long wave in most of England (F inter 162 kHz,  Europe 1 183 kHz,  RTL 236 kHz).   F Info on Medium wave in some southern counties of England. If the quality isn't good enough to hone your language skills there's almost all of them on Astra 1 and a lot on Hotbird, (on the latter a few are - unjustifiably - scrambled).

TV5 should not be confused with France 5,  though I'm sure no-one here is falling in to that trap.   However,  TV5's brief as far as I can see is to broadcast "in French" but not exclusively about France.  Their list of broadcast contributing partners includes Switzerland,  Belgium,  Canada, etc ie francophone TV not French TV.   A sort of unofficial francophone "world service". I haven't watched their stuff this week,  but I don't doubt that there has been less mention than one might expect of the "events in the suburbs". The only answer is to try and get the other domestic French channels,  or which more in the satellite section. 

Very interesting comments.  I've just turned onspeed "off" and it seems to me that the LF forum runs at about half the speed now.  The only explanation I can offer is that in general our dial up is viewed as slow (we are in Devon/24) compared say to people in London.   When I complain that someone has sent me a 1MB attachment and that it's taken 15 mins to download they reply that it only takes them 7 mins to move that sort of stuff around on dial-up So maybe ONspeed works for me for that reason (sluggish dial-up).   But really I don't know and I will continue to try it on and off because some of the comments here suggest that I'm wasting my dosh..... What I'm waiting for is a PAYG Broadband system, as it isn't worth signing up for a one year contract for us as we are in France for a lot of it.   And some UK neighbours reckon they've found a BB package that is 1p per minute,  nothing if you don't use it.  Will investigate further.

Far be it for me to disagree with such an eminence as Will T C,  but in fact Onspeed revolutionises the speed of this forum.  In my experience (and I hate computers and know nothing about them) it's just this sort of thing that really does benefit.   But I don't know why!

I've had it since March and am "fairly pleased" with it.  It does speed things up,  but can't make things faster if you have the sort of ISP that many of us have,  ie one that seems to "go to sleep" (no traffic) for - say - half a minute at a time.   This is not Onspeed's fault of course,  it does speed up the process when the ISP is working at full tilt. It does NOT speed up such things as Acrobat documents as these are already compressed effectively.   JPG picture quality is compromised a little if the acceleration is set too high. May be worth mentioning that it can be installed on more than one computer (contrary to what they say).  We have it on a lap top and a main computer (in different countries so they cannot be used simultaneously).  I imagine they would take a dim view (rightly so) of one subscriber logging on to the net from several computers at the same time! Certainly it means that we are putting off the Broadband decision indefinitely.

Seems no-one (so far) wants to volunteer any experience of TNT. Speaking from the theory,  the French are using a more robust system than even the 16QAM now partially in use in the UK.  This will even allow reception on the move (trains etc).  However,  from what one hears there ARE still problems in poor reception areas. One thing to check is that your relations are currently using the same analogue station for their set up as is being used for TNT,  rather than some local relay.  In other words that they won't have to re-engineer their aerial back to some more distant TNT transmitter.   If this is not an issue,  and if they are getting cracking 100% reception at the moment, then there shouldn't be a problem. If all they want is wall to wall F5 and Arte you could explore the digital satellite AB3 route,  bearing in mind the fact that it might be encrypted without any warning of course.

Done Miki.  Thanks.

Have solved my Nokia unlocking problem - seems you do need to put in both codes (and be very quick about it - I felt my age trying to outwit the time limit). Can't help on the credit card problem - I suspect that the yoof market all have bank cards of one sort or another....

Sorry about the triplicates!

I assume we're talking DAB (as it's known in the UK) here. If so I'm afraid the answer is that you're not going to get anywhere.  Whilst DAB is taking off in the UK,  (in spite of the lamentable audio quality of many of the channels (including - shamefully - the BBC))  the same is not true in France. France uses L band transmissions, and only in Toulouse,  Paris,  Nantes, and a couple of other conurbations.  There has been virtually no take-up by the public and there is talk of suspending the service,  which only carries public Radio France and a few commercials already available on FM. A set purchased in the UK covers VHF Band 3 and only a very few also cover L Band,  which is on a higher frequency (around 1500 MHz with limited coverage as a result) compared to Band 3 (225 MHz approx,  similar to the old ITV 405 line VHF service,  ch 13 specifically). Band 3 only has a range of about 35 - 40 miles with the powers used for DAB (1 - 10 kW) and so coverage by UK transmitters of France is limited to 62 and Calais if at all!   Certainly not Perigord. I could have just said "don't bother" but at least you now have chapter and verse.    

Thanks for the link to the trycktill site.  Went through all the stages and it seems to have given me 2 codes of similar format,  one ending with ...+1 and one with .....+2.   Do I have to put both in?   One after the other?   Sorry to be thick but as is so often the case they assume you "know"... Martin 

We were amused to see (just before returning to the UK for the winter) that our local Champion (Excideuil) had started stocking the Radio Times at €2.20.

....which is fair enough if one is only going to use it once in a blue moon (and may be just what we need). But I wonder how well adapted it is (rapport qualité/prix) to the yoof market at which it appears to be aimed.

Think I've answered my own question - seems to be the same price for cross network and landline callss.

Very useful link - thanks for posting it. And so nice to know there are at least two other people in the world as careful with their dosh as we are.  Can't bear the thought of having to "use it or lose it". Actually I'm unclear on one thing;  in the tarification section do we suppose that the phrase "vers tous les operateurs" refers to landlines as well as other mobile operators or have I missed a section somewhere?   Just seems odd (from the anglo-saxon viewpoint) that cross-mobile-network calls would appear to be same price as to landlines?    Maybe I'm being thick here....

Oh right - I was out last night and didn't witness that it's become a 2-night fix!  All should be sorted in a couple of days. It gives one an idea - confirmed in other quarters - of what a muddle the ITV empire seems to be in;  major channel allocation decisions made with minutes to go,  pulling channels to make room for others, etc etc.   Here in the south west of England we have only just got ITV News back on Freeview after an absence of over a year for "re-engineering" (and the on screen logo still said 'til two days ago that it would be back in EARLY 2005),  and even then it makes way for ITV 4 in the evening. Bring back the I.B.A. I say!

I refer to my answer on another thread m'lord  (m'lady) In fact you CAN get ITV 4 on a Sky box by scanning (via services->system set up->add channels) 10758 V 22000 5/6 ,  and save it for subsequent viewing via Other Channels.   The channel is called 10072 at the moment,  this will probably change. And on a non sky box just do a scan of 10758.   In other words it's there,  just not on the Sky EPG; (bit like Radio Caroline for example). The 136 duplicate was a one night fix;  in a few days ITV 4 will crop up on 120 when Sky next update the EPG. I assme we are taking a Sky dodgybox here from your reference to 136. Sorry not to have found your query until this am.

Glad you got it working - I was beginning to run out of inspiration there! Some families living near us in 24 would applaud you for NOT having TF1 and M6 - at least one lot consciously chose Canal Satellite for the fact it doesn't transmit these channels, and then ditched their terrestrial aerial so that the kids wouldn't be sullied by them. The picture quality on analogue AB3 is actually superb as it is used for the back up feed to the terrestrial analogue transmitter network.  However it is in SECAM (nothing wrong with that if the signal is good) except that if you have a UK sourced set it probably won't display it in colour.  But €40 ish for a receiver is often a lot cheaper than getting a UHF roof aerial up and running. So it's a toss up really depending on what TV you have and what state the roof aerial is in (if it exists). 

Ron - yes of course you are right to pick up on my slight generalisation there.   Some boxes I have come across will - when you do a rescan - simply add all the channels they find as new ones,  not replacing those already there.  One can quickly end up with 2000 channels,  99% of which are duplicates of ones already there.  Of course you can do a clear channels first,  but explaining that on the forum....?? I think we know why your French box sees things that the Sky box doesn't (Sky hide them!) but as to why it's missing things - that's harder.   In some instances FTA boxes will miss FTA channels within a bouquet that is largely encrypted - it sees the head channel as encrypted and flits on to the next transponder...  but that wouldn't appear to be the case here.   Tell it to try harder!   Actually - I've just thought - the transponders on Astra 2 that were dormant when your box was manufactured probably aren't in the transponder master list,  in which case you need to find that menu and add them. Presumably you could do a channel specific search for ITV 2?  (with pids and all...)

My understanding is that ITV 4 will join the EPG on placement 120 on a Sky box next week.  Sky only allow three EPG revisions per week and ITV 4 have had to join the queue. In fact you CAN get ITV 4 on a Sky box by scanning (via services->system set up->add channels) 10758 V 22000 5/6 ,  and save it for subsequent viewing via Other Channels.   The channel is called 10072 at the moment,  this will probably change. And on a non sky box just do a scan of 10758.   In other words it's there,  just not on the Sky EPG; (bit like Radio Caroline for example).

Delighted to have been of service.   Sounds as though you were at a loose end last night!   The satellite section makes for fascinating reading if your other half is ever glued to the footie again (tongue firmly in cheek here....)

Coco - on any box other than a Sky box you need to add the channels manaully.  Some boxes may show some ITV channels on the list already but as there has been a certain amount of shifting around (ITV News comes to mind) it's safer to do a rescan.  All the details are on http://www.lyngsat.com/packages/skyuk.html   (Amazingly for them hasn't been updated yet to show FTA) but in essence it's  SR 22000 FEC 5/6 and 10714 H  or 10758 V   10832 H   10891 H   10906 V Frequencies quoted in MHz,  to get GHz divide by 1000.   The different frequencies carry different regions,  check also for ITV 2 and 4. Enjoy.

Without going back into the dim and distant past I can't remember,  but I'm pretty certain that if you've found what your receiver thinks is 2C then you've hit what is actually AB3.   I say I can't remember 'cos the French spent a lot of time trying to keep the service at 5 deg west going with a lot of fairly moribund satellites (2B and 2D certainly) and most of of the 2* were at 5 deg west at some point.... Anyway, you can check easily as the only other thing likely to float your receiver's boat in this locality in the sky is 8 deg west where 2D and AB2 are located (and not doing much). So I should try a scan of 11591 MHz on the one you've found and keep fingers crossed. Report back please (I'm getting interested) but as it's dark here in Devon I'm going off for the evening.... Best of luck - links below should tell you which sat is which http://www.lyngsat.com/ab3.html http://www.lyngsat.com/8west.html

Mmmm.... difficult to say.  You've certainly put the 20000 in the right box - the trick may be persuading the receiver to save this data and then give you a signal meter for this frequency (11591 MHz) to look at whilst you play with the dish.  On mine the signal display comes up straight away when you've entered the parameters,  but I know on some you have to press save or OK and then "look" at this transponder on a different menu... The 12.606 GHz (12606 MHz) is one of the analogue transponders.   If your receiver is in fact trying to display the signal strength for this one it won't show anything as the digital giblets won't recognise the analogue signal.  Which makes me wonder whether indeed you haven't "persuaded" it over to 11591 MHz.  On some receivers you can "create" a new satellite position;  you could try that from scratch and put in 11591 MHz as the "default" frequency. One way round it is to find someone with a working AB3 dish and set your receiver up on it (11591 MHz) so that you are confident that it's all functioning correctly and that the signal meter is OK.   Save the channels so that you can be sure,  then go back to your place and work from there. About the best I can think of from over here in Devon..... Maybe Bannon has an idea as he's probably familiar with all sorts of receivers' menus. Laters:  just one other thought - hope I'm not insulting your intelligence here:  AB3 being nearly due south is a little higher in the sky than Astra 2/1 and Hotbird.  You can just about get the other three by swinging a dish round horizontally with no adjustment to the tilt,  but by the time you get to AB3 it does need a slight lift in comparison.  Just a thought.