Question about aerials!

cagsd

Firstly I would like to apologise in advance if I sound dim. I will state up front that I know next to nothing about tellies and aerials! My question is this: do I need a second aerial connection in my back living room if I want to watch telly in there?

Some brief background. We've only ever had one telly, which has a Virgin Media V+ box, in our front room. It also has built in freeview which we never watch, as we have V+, but which if need be, we can pick up perfect reception on through our main aerial.

However my sister in law has just donated an old TV which we've put in our back room. At the moment we've just got the kids' Wii connected to it and also a DVD player, now she has given us a digi box as well but as far as I know we wouldn't be able to use it as there is no aerial connection in that room. Am I right? Or is there some way round this, perhaps by using one of those portable aerials that we used to have many moons ago at our caravan?! I'm not fussed on the idea of having to get someone out to run cables or drill holes or anything, and if it's going to be too much fuss then we'll stick with just having it as a games and DVD telly.

To ask a really stupid question, how does everyone else manage with tellies in several rooms??? Thanks in advance, and excuse my lack of knowledge! :beer:

Blackpool_Saver

don't apologise, the whole lot does my head in, someone will be along to advise.

Torry_Quine

Depending on the signal strength and where you are in relation to the transmitter an indoor aerial may be sufficient. That's what I have for my spare bedroom and it works well but that doesn't mean yours will for definite.

brewerdave

Question 1 . Has the "old" TV got a built in digital (Freeview) tuner? If not, you would need to buy a cheap freeview box to receive the signals (assuming that you are in an area which has switched to digital signals only- and Liverpool has)
Question 2. Can you borrow an indoor aerial/Freeview box to test?? If not, it might cost you ~ £40+ to find out whether it works or not!!

I have one TV connected to an indoor aerial but the signal is only strong enough for some of the Freeview multiplexes - and depending on atmospheric conditions I sometimes lose these!

Kurtis_Blue

If your external aerial functions well (receives all the channels) in another room, you may only be looking at 45-65 to get a new feed from the external aerial to the 2nd location.
If that's the case I wouldn't bother with an internal.
Find a couple of local installers from either the CAI or RDI_lb and get an idea of price.
If you have a poor external aerial or huge long run then maybe look at internals.

derrick

brewerdave wrote: »

Question 1 . Has the "old" TV got a built in digital (Freeview) tuner? If not, you would need to buy a cheap freeview box to receive the signals (assuming that you are in an area which has switched to digital signals only- and Liverpool has)
Question 2. Can you borrow an indoor aerial/Freeview box to test?? If not, it might cost you ~ £40+ to find out whether it works or not!!

I have one TV connected to an indoor aerial but the signal is only strong enough for some of the Freeview multiplexes - and depending on atmospheric conditions I sometimes lose these!

Come on dave keep up

cagsd wrote: »

Firstly I would like to apologise in advance if I sound dim. I will state up front that I know next to nothing about tellies and aerials! My question is this: do I need a second aerial connection in my back living room if I want to watch telly in there?

Some brief background. We've only ever had one telly, which has a Virgin Media V+ box, in our front room. It also has built in freeview which we never watch, as we have V+, but which if need be, we can pick up perfect reception on through our main aerial.

However my sister in law has just donated an old TV which we've put in our back room. At the moment we've just got the kids' Wii connected to it and also a DVD player, now she has given us a digi box as well but as far as I know we wouldn't be able to use it as there is no aerial connection in that room. Am I right? Or is there some way round this, perhaps by using one of those portable aerials that we used to have many moons ago at our caravan?! I'm not fussed on the idea of having to get someone out to run cables or drill holes or anything, and if it's going to be too much fuss then we'll stick with just having it as a games and DVD telly.

To ask a really stupid question, how does everyone else manage with tellies in several rooms??? Thanks in advance, and excuse my lack of knowledge! :beer:

.

almillar

This can't really be answered - it's trial and error. You might be lucky, and have good reception, and a portable aerial might get you a goo picture in the bedroom. Or you may need to run another connection off your roof aerial. Or you may need to add a booster to the roof aerial too. Depends on how good YOUR reception is at YOUR home. If you don't have any problems with reception on your main TV, probably worth testing a portable aerial at least...

[Deleted User]

almillar wrote: »

a portable aerial might get you a goo picture in the bedroom.

But would the OP put up with a "goo" picture?:p

Moneymaker

almillar wrote: »

This can't really be answered - it's trial and error.

It doesn't have to be. It's possible to get a reasonable prediction of reception from the Wolfbane site and others.

However, as the OP doesn't understand the subject, let's leave the answer to the original question as "yes". So a professional will be required to install the additional cable and anything else required.

charlotte289

If you got a splitter, you could have a cable running through the house to the back room, but it would probably look a bit messy and someone could trip over it (unless you fitted it around door frames, etc). You could try a set-top aerial, but it really depends on how built-up your area is and how good your signal is. When I lived in a ground floor flat surrounded by other tenement blocks, I couldn't get a signal at all, but now that I've got a view south from my living room I could use a set-top aerial without problems, which is what I did before I found the hidden aerial point