Forum Discussion

debbiebushby's avatar
debbiebushby
Tuning in
13 days ago

TV Fault

Since the big storm a few months ago where everyone's TV went bad at the same time, once that was fixed across the whole VirginTV network, we had no problems for 2 months. For the last few weeks, the signal has been bad again mainly watching sports channels. Frustratingly, the pre-match or race interviews etc... can have perfect signal, then as soon as the match starts, the screen starts stuttering and pixelating and then, again, at the end when it's back to interviews and such, it's fine again. That's why I assumed it was some sort of intentional signal jam to try and stop people from using the dodgy sticks and such, but ending up affecting actual customers too 🤷🏼‍♀️

11 Replies

  • japitts's avatar
    japitts
    Very Insightful Person
    13 days ago

    If you're hoping to use this forum as a means to report a fault with your TV service, it may help to be a bit more specific about which sports channels you're having issues with?

    There is no intentional degradation of picture - otherwise this forum would be absolutely chock full of complaints.

  • John_GS's avatar
    John_GS
    Icon for Forum Team rankForum Team
    10 days ago

    Hi debbiebushby 

    Thanks for posting and welcome back to the community. Very sorry for any TV picture issues. 

    We've tried to run some tests today but the TV box is showing as offline. Can you pop it on for us and let us know so we can run some tests?

    There is a few things you can do in the interim, please go round all white cabling, ensuring finger-tight, no kinks/cracks in the cabling at all. Also ensure the HDMI is fully in properly, check a new HDMI if able to do so, another HDMI port in the TV as well if you can (those are just to rule out being a cabling issue).

    Keep us posted.

    • debbiebushby's avatar
      debbiebushby
      Tuning in
      10 days ago

      Tv box is not offline, we've been watching it all morning BUT now trying to watch South Shields football on TNT1 and it says channel not available even though other channels are there 

      • newapollo's avatar
        newapollo
        Very Insightful Person
        10 days ago

        Tv box is not offline, we've been watching it all morning 

        Hi debbiebushby​ 

        Your 360 box may be showing as offline to the VM systems if it's set to Eco mode.

        Go to Settings > System > Standby power consumption.
        There are 3 options:- Fast Start, Active Start, and Eco(slow start)
        The first two options are best if you have a mini box and want to watch a recording on it.

        If you try to set a recording via the TVGo app when the 360 is in Eco mode then it won't work as the box appears to be offline to the app.  It would also appear to be offline to VM so they would be unable to test for faults.
         

        I've just checked and TNT Sports1 is working fine on both of my 360 boxes. Are any other channels appearing to be offline?

        Have you tried rebooting your TV360 box?

        You can perform a quick status test of your 360 box by going to Settings > System > Diagnostics.

        Whenever you do appear to have problems with any of the VM equipment you should use the /check-services/ function to check for problems in your area. You can also a run a test on your equipment from there. If nothing is showing  you could also try the automated Service Status number  0800 561 0061.  This is generally  better  as it gives details of more local issues down to postcode level.

  • debbiebushby's avatar
    debbiebushby
    Tuning in
    10 days ago

    I actually don't know why it has posted this as a seperate post when I was replying to a comment on my original query/complaint. As said at the time, all sports channels were working fine outside football season, then on the first day they became pixilated and stuttering no matter what sport was on (worse during football and F1) THEN, when the whole network went down during a storm and everyone reported the same problem, after everyone's was fixed we had a perfect picture for a couple of months until a few weeks ago. We also had this last football season, and then good picture between May and August ....

    • japitts's avatar
      japitts
      Very Insightful Person
      10 days ago

      Pixellation is usually the sign of a signal fault. Digital-TV-platforms carry channels in clusters where all channels on the same cluster share the same frequency and thus should be similarly affected by a signal problem.

      Those clusters are grouped randomly, thus there's not a cluster for sports, and one for entertainment etc. Picking one sports channel for example - TNT Sports 1 shares with Sky SciFi, Comedy Central, U&Alibi, 4-Seven & BBC News

      If you're having issues with picture breakup with multiple sports channels, it's a pretty safe bet there's dozens of other non-sports channels that should also have issues. Has there been any particularly wet weather in your area recently? Just by means of one example, if there's a poor connection somewhere between the streetcab & your TV box, water ingress or suchlike could cause interference on one or multiple frequencies - and all the channels on those frequencies would have symptoms.

      • debbiebushby's avatar
        debbiebushby
        Tuning in
        9 days ago

        I wrote a long reply to you and it seems to have disappeared 🤷🏼‍♀️

        It's 11.15pm now and I've just checked all the channels you mentioned in the TNT1 cluster and they're all either ''channel failed" or very pixilated and stuttery 

        This afternoon, the sky sports channel the Newcastle match was on did have some issues, but not as bad as some days

        Checked Services over the last hour and have "intermittent signal" but as it's intermittent, I can check 2 mins later and it will say everything is OK 

        My coax signal is only "fair" I don't know if that's an external or internal issue, but as far as I remember, it's the original internal cable from when we first got VirginTV 18/19 years ago. When we upgraded the TV box, we were just supplied with the push-in adaptor to use the old cable so it might be the case that it just needs replacing. It's a really long cable though, and what I've read on here is that it would need a tech visit anyway as it's not a standard length and you shouldn't buy them from Amazon etc...

        Weather wise, it's been OK this week. There was another storm last month that might have set it all off again though (but I'd have expected a huge outage and not just us affected like the storm a few months ago)

  • japitts's avatar
    japitts
    Very Insightful Person
    9 days ago

    Have had an ethernet cable between hub and 360 box for a few months as we weren't sure if it was a WiFi issue when it first started

    Both TV360 & V6 use the co-ax cable for the live broadcast TV, and the internet connection for OnDemand, streaming & various updates. My point being that if broadcast TV is affected on these recording boxes, the internet is not at fault.

    It's only the newer Stream non-recording boxes that use the internet for live TV.

    My example of wet weather causing issues, is from recent personal experience. It took a street-tech to replace some corroded external connections, and (I strongly suspect) a network tech to then rectify an issue at street-cab level. Being able to identify specific clusters of channels, I am sure helped.