[opendtv] I have installed DVB-T

Hello friends, 

I've just returned from 10 days vacation in Italy (Montecatini), 
and on Saturday I've decided on impulse to buy a DVB-T receiver. 
It's this receiver: http://www.anysee.com/eng/product/anyseeE30Plus.php . 
It has a tuner, demodulator, Conax decoder and smart card reader, 
all in a package of about the volume of a pack of cigarettes. 

I have connected it to my home theater PC (Windows XP MCE) via USB. 
It comes with its own viewer application, which is not too stable, 
and it has limited functionality with the Media Center player. 
This software takes 10 seconds just to change channels ! 

The only real problem that I have encountered had to do with low 
signal strength. The receiver came only with a passive half dipole, 
a telescopic antenna actually, and no suggestions as to how to 
orient it (vertically !) and to what length to extend it (UHF !). 
Eindhoven is irradiated from a 10 kW transmitter (per channel) on one 
side of the town, and another of 15 kW is expected to be operational 
in September. See: http://www.agentschaptelecom.nl/dav/index.html

So I've had some problems due to a weak signal on the ground floor. 
Yesterday I have found an old Yagi in the attic, which I have 
modified for vertical polarisation (two new mounting holes in the 
bar) and installed on a 4 foot mast (a broomstick, actually) on the 
terrace. Now I have a very strong signal and rock steady reception. 

Other minor inconveniences were installing the software (easy), 
activating the subscription (it is mandatory through Digitenne.nl), 
doing a channel scan (for some 25 programs on 4 UHF channels), and 
trying to stay away from the free pornchannel (PrivateSpice).  ;-) 
See http://www.digitenne.nl/pagina_49.html and below the signature. 

So I can say that IF you have a strong enough signal, then the 
rest of the installation process is a no-brainer. They gave me the 
lousiest antenna that they had... But even an existing roof top 
antenna would have been a problem, because those have all been 
designed for horizontal polarisation and the new DVB-T channels 
are all vertically polarized. Bummer that they don't mention that ! 

Picture quality is better than what I expected for ~ 2 Mbit/sec. 
The biggest artefact that I can see is some loss of horizontal 
sharpness. I can read that the horizontal pixel count varies 
between 480, 528 and 704 pixels per line. There's always 576 
lines, and a decent part of the programs is anamorphic 16:9. 

Best regards, 
-- Jeroen

+------------------------------------------+------------------------------------+
| From:    Jeroen H. Stessen               | Phone:  ++31.40.27.40246  |
| Deptmt.: Philips Applied Technologies    | Mobex:  ++31.40.27.99650  |
|          Digital Systems & Technologies  | Mobile: ++31.6.4468.0021  |
| Address: High Tech Campus 5 - room 5.025 | Skype:  Jeroen.Stessen      |
|          5656 AE Eindhoven  - Nederland  | VoIP: 
Jeroen.Stessen.at.Philips  |
| Website: http://www.apptech.philips.com/ | E-mail: 
Jeroen.Stessen@xxxxxxxxxxx |
+------------------------------------------+------------------------------------+


Per 6 juni 2007 bestaat het Digitenne programma pakket uit:

TV (per 6 juni 2007)            Radio (per 6 juni 2007)
1       Nederland 1             101     Radio 1
2       Nederland 2             102     Radio 2
3       Nederland 3             103     3FM
4       RTL 4                   104     Radio 4
5       RTL 5                   105     Radio 5
6       SBS 6                   106     Radio 6
7       RTL 7                   107     Radio Veronica
8       NET 5                   108     Sky Radio
9       Veronica/Jetix          109     Radio 538
10      Tien                            110     CAZ!
11      één                             111     Q-Music
12      Canvas/Ketnet           112     Classic FM
13      Nickelodeon/ AT5                113     Radio 10 Gold
14      TMF                             114     Arrow Classic Rock
15      MTV                             115     BNR Nieuwsradio
16      Discovery Channel       116     SLAM FM!
17      Animal Planet           117     REGIO RADIO (*)
18      Eurosport 1             118     Concertzender Classic
19      BBC Prime                       119     FunX
20      BBC World 
21      CNN 
22      REGIO TV (*) 
23      Private Spice 
24      Tele2 Voetbal 1 
25      Tele2 Voetbal 2/Planet Prime

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