Yesterday I got my antenna to install for using DVB-T on my Samsung TV. I do have analog cable but that one looks crappy. I hardly ever watch tv but I thought for the European Soccer Championship I definitely want to have a nice, clear and crisp widescreen-picture. So since my Samsung has a DVB-T receiver built-in, I got an antenna for a few bucks to try that one out. I heard lots of things about DVB-T so far, many of them not really positive. Too few channels, quality-issues due to low-bandwidth, bad availability...
Most of those didn't matter to me. After looking up info on the internet, I knew that quite a few channels are available where I live, more than enough for me and including the main 2 ones I need for the soccer broadcasts. The quality definitely is the main issue for me, since my tv is quite big and I want the picture to look good on that one, without noticeable artifacts...
Lets get the obvious things out of the way: Setting up the thing was quite easy. And I got most channels right away. The quality was ok, but did vary quite a bit since some channels don't have a lot of bandwidth. The ones with enough data-rate did look quite good though, given you didn't sit up close to the TV - definitely an improvement over the analogue input, but no competition for digital cable (DVB-C) or satellite (DVB-S). But quite satisfying.
"The first" being last?
The two programs I needed for the soccer broadcast were the main two german channels "Das Erste / ARD" and "ZDF", meaning "the first" and "second german broadcast". Of course, those are supposed to be all up on top of the availability-list for the broadcast signal. Strangely enough, I realized later that I was missing "Das Erste". The channel search of my DVB-T tuner didn't find it. Consulting google again, I found that it should be broadcasted on channel 06, but my tuner didn't let me select channels that low - it always started at 21.
The solution was to re-select the initial Plug'n'Play setup of my tv and specifically select "Germany" as country, since the built-in tuner uses that country setting to determine the correct channel-layout and the broadcasting-frequencies. It turned out my TV was set to "Great Britain", probably because I wanted to have english language in all menues. I can't recall specifically setting that country though during the very first setup after installing my tv. Ohwell, after changing that, the tuner did search those low channels too, but "Das Erste" still didn't show up...
It turned out that channels this low use quite low frequencies - close to VHF-range already. My antenna had troubles getting a good signal for those frequencies at my place. I managed to set it up in a way now that I get reception, but the signal strength still is quite low compared to the rest of the channels I have... those all are around 70% to 80%, while "Das Erste" is at 20% max. I'm glad I got it to work, but I couldn't help and wonder why such an integral channel got assigned to such a low frequency-range. My antenna was supposed to be a quite good one, but from what I read online, receiving these low channels is alittle more trickier.
All in all, I'm quite happy with DVB-T though. The antenna I bought can be mounted inside and outside and I'm happy to see that I have the same signal strength inside my living room, so I don't have to place it on the outside. I connected the TV's optical out with my surround-receiver. I didn't get to test Dolby Digital yet and I realized that sometimes my audio stopped but I'll investigate that further. I'm sure I'll get over these obstacles too. I do like the built-in program guide and a few additional features.
But there were times yesterday while installing it when I couldn't help but think "Why can't things simply work?" I use that phrase alot... it seems like no matter what I do, something always doesn't quite work the way I want it to. Do I really have such high demands?
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