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Thread ID: 121682 2011-11-06 03:41:00 Is satellite worth it, or is DVB-T a much better idea? Agent_24 (57) PC World Chat
Post ID Timestamp Content User
1242267 2011-11-06 06:59:00 Reception from this transmitter is not supposed to be active until April 2113 but has been running successfully for a long time now in some form of test mode.

So no need to worry for a 100 years then

:D
driver (16592)
1242268 2011-11-06 07:15:00 Two apologies..... the first my misunderstanding of the set-ups and the second just carelessness. xx Scouse (83)
1242269 2011-11-06 07:44:00 Yeah DVB-T is well well worth it if you can get it. The quality difference between it and the satellite freeview is like night and day (if you have a HD TV). Also cheaper to set up if your TV has a DVB-T tuner built in.

Just to re-iterate for a second.. :p

The satellite freeview (DVB-S) broadcasts over the whole country, and will continue to do so indefinitley. It is in widescreen (not all the content on all the channels is in widescreen though. This is when you get black bars on the side of the picture on your widescreen TV). It is not in high definition though, and even on the channels (Four, for example) that aren't broadcast in HD on freeview HD, the bit rate is a lot lower, resulting in a more 'blocky' picture, especially on a big TV. You need a satellite dish, and a seperate decoder to receive satewllite freeview.

Terestrial freeview|HD (DVB-T) is broadcast in all the main centres, and now in more smaller cities too (Nelson/Tasman, Napier/Hastings, Tauranga, Whangarei, etc). You need a UHF aerial to receive this, and if your TV doesn't have a built in DVB-T Tuner, you will need a seperate decoder too. Don't skimp and get a budget decoder - the DishTV 1020 is a good value decoder. TV1, TV2 and TV3 broadcast in HD, TV3 in 5.1 surround too. The rest of the channels are in stabdard definition, 576i I think, but have more bandwidth allocated on the DVB-T freeview than on the DVB-S, resulting in a clearer looking picture.

Most new TVs have an optical audio out, which makes it very easy to connect the 5.1 sound from freeview|hd to your home theatre receiver.
wratterus (105)
1242270 2011-11-06 07:45:00 The only thing wrong with satellite freeview is it is not transmitted in HD. Don't know whether there are any plans too.
:)
Trev (427)
1242271 2011-11-06 07:52:00 Nup, apparently it'd be too expensive to be worthwhile for free-to-air.

I agree, if you can get terrestrial, then get it. Aside from being in an area that won't receive it, I fail to see any reason why you'd want Satellite for Freeview, unless you were going to try and get other non-NZ channels.

High-Def TV is significantly better than the standard you get with the satellite!
Chilling_Silence (9)
1242272 2011-11-06 07:59:00 The bigger the dish the less likely you will get rain fade, even a standard 90cm suffers very little rain fade.

DVB-S is Everywhere, well anywhere you can see the sky. DVB-T Terrestrial based and not avaliable everywhere.
More channels on DVB-S than DVB-T But DVB-S is Not in HD. DVB-T = HD But only Channel 1,2,3 the rest are not.
Both broadcast types are digital of course,
radium (8645)
1242273 2011-11-06 08:48:00 The other good thing about Dvb-t freeview hd is that pretty much all TVs have the digital tuner built in now so no need for a set top box.
However with freeview via satellite you'll need a set top box.
CYaBro (73)
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