[alchemist]

Recently bought a usb master tuner, setup everything according to instructions. latest drivers. Im using an indoor aerial in Nottingham 6 miles from Nottingham transmitter and 18 miles from Waltham and i always get 75% signal strength in all good positions. I can tune mux 1 (bbc and stuff) and sometimes one other mux, I think this is because of my poor SNR. Its always above 11 but generally varies between 12 and 15 can get up to 16/17 in some awkward places in my room but it still jumps down making loads of multicolored squares and the picture and sound poor choppy and poor.

around my setup i have a router, and ntl cable modem, printer, subwoofer for pc speakers and the pc itself with all the wiring for these ...extension cable..connecters, adapters etc...Oh and my aerial is an Labgear Tristar ANR310.

Is there anyway of improving my SNR? (buying a super indoor aerial? or an amp, what kind of amp?...some websites say amps will make things worse? is this even so if you have good signal strength?) All and any help much appreciated :S

thanks

[Bill]

Ideally you'll need a SNR of greater than 19dB and BER below 0.1

A better aerial will always help. I would avoid the amplified indoor types they are very likely to pick up local interference.

Given that you are only 6 miles from the transmitter a small indoor aerial should be enough (in fact you may need an antennuator even on simple aerial)

[alchemist]

Thanks for the reply,

[alchemist]

So i borrowed my mates laptop, and at the same aerial position i get 99% stable snr at 16 on QAM 16 (mux1?) with no BER...guess im buying a powered usb hub then...im guessing that means i cant get ch4 5 or itv?

[chriswillsher]

If you put your post code into the URL below you will get details of the digital reception that you should be able to receive and the most suitable aerial type. [link]

Be aware that not all internal aerials are created equal! You can find some reviews on internal aerials at this URL:
[link]

[alchemist]

i should be able to receive all channels...but since im using an indoor aerial (im a student in rented house on the ground floor) its gna be a bit limited, using the laptop i can get mux1 99% stable at 16db snr and 75% signal strength....was hoping if there was anything that could be done to get the other muxes/stronger snr