My portable telly was showing signs of another channel showing underneath C4, and it turned out to be some actual cross channel interference!
Tuning around found
ZDF with BBC1 as sound, but it was quite watchable
Nederland 3 with no sound
NDR with no sound
I got sound by trying to tune in on my main Philips set which can change the TV signal format to a more european standard. Not bad for not even moving the portable tv's aerial!
They've been around all day, similar quality to watching an neighbouring ITV region on analogue.
...do u live near a hill, or high built up area ? this could be also why you recieve this tv station from abroad. I recieve BBC South West signalling., and I am in London - used to recieve meridian, but just BBC South West local news now.
My friend who lived in Scarborough used to get the German channels all the time during the summer - amazingly good pictures as well. I remember watching a programme with him which culminated in people wearing lederhosen dancing to accordion music, with lots of thigh slapping. Nice to know that stereotypes still exist!
I also once picked up ZDF early one morning when I lived near Wakefield (quite high up) back in the days before BBC 1 broadcast 24 hours. I could tell there was another channel coming through on the BBC1 frequency - a little retuning got a fairly decent picture.
Out of interest, is this kind of thing about to become a thing of the past when we all go digital?
Out of interest, is this kind of thing about to become a thing of the past when we all go digital?
It would be possible, but less likely. A DTT MUX with as much strength as those ZDF examples might well be enough to be recieved by in the UK. However you would have to scan your box at the crucial moment in order to get it into the box.
You might even just get the channel names, but not the channels themselves
I have never, ever, ever managed to get anything interesting by DXing. The closest I've got is a really blurry 'South Today'. From London.
I thought I'd finally got something a few months back when I found something that had a '2' at the bottom left, making me think it was a foreign TV channel DOG, but then I remembered Top of the Pops was on BBC2, and it was just the number 2 single that week...
I did get a Dutch channel once, back in the 80s, but unfortunately it was showing a testcard at the time so nothing interesting there.
One of the stranger DXs I've had was an entire overnight of an ITV "Night Time" service, with in-vision announcer, around 1994. I have no idea what channel it was; but they actually welcomed people in "the North Of England" who were able to receive the channel as well. It wasn't TTTV or YTV, but it was very clear. It had faded away by the time GMTV took over so I never did find out what channel it was.
Interesting to note that most of these nl channels were showing their versions of pages from ceefax and info pages till about 10AM and probably even later.
Yeah, almost all of the tv channels in the Netherlands and Belgium (apart from cable channels) are essentially off-air until around lunchtime. Een, Belgium's main PSB show's news in the morning until 0900 and then show's programme slides with music until 1200. Other channels show webcam shots from European cities or quiz tv. One channel shows a shot from inside the studio of Radio Donna all morning.
...do u live near a hill, or high built up area ? this could be also why you recieve this tv station from abroad. I recieve BBC South West signalling., and I am in London - used to recieve meridian, but just BBC South West local news now.
SDA's on the east coast of Lincs so there's very little between him and the Netherlands and northern Germany, except lots of water. It's quite common for those on the east and south coasts to get foreign TV, (french Tv is possible, but often only in B&W because they use Secam)
I've mananged Dutch TV and S4C in London before - meridian is possible in some parts of london normally. Would give it a try now, but the remote control for my telly won't work
