How can i watch ntl in another room?

[Wolf]

Originally Posted by keep it simple

hmmm, interesting. well i've been out to maplin at lunchtime and bought the sender, so i will just have to do some experimenting before i decide whether i've wasted £30.

Just to clarify, on the bedroom tv i currently only have choice of 1-5, sky news or whatever is playing on the video downstairs - i am not able to view whatever the stb is viewing at all.

If it's a pass-through analogue signal, surely it should still work? i thought the whole idea is that the transmitter will send whatever signal is coming in, so if i am receiving both digital and analogue won't i still get both on the remote set?

I work for Maplin and there are issues about senders not working with NTL boxes and even some Sky boxes. I own the QM48 senders and they say the same thing but mine actually works better with the remote control than actually trying to use the remote in the same room. Maplin will refund you if you are not happy. 14 day Box and receipt full refund ( WE ARE NOT LIKE PCWORLD ). Need help with anything Maplin wise let me know.

[keep it simple]

Ok guys, been experimenting, but without much success


I realise now that a major weakness of my current set-up is that i am not actually using the RF output from the stb. The connector is the opposite type to those on my tv and vcr - male/female, i don't know which is which, but i think the tv and vcr have female connections, with male connectors on the leads pushing into them, in which case the connector on the stb is another male, and none of my existing leads will connect to it. hope that makes some sense! everything seemed to do what i wanted at the time, so, i guess through laziness, i never bothered to tidy up and connect things 'properly'

I'm attaching a diagram of my set-up (i hope, if i can work out how to do it).



The incoming cable goes through a 2-way splitter, which then goes to the stb and to the vcr. the rf output from the vcr goes to my signal booster which has 2 outputs, one to my main tv and one to the upstairs tv. When i originally set it all up, thiswas what i wanted, as we wanted to be able to let the kids watch a video upstairs while we watched something else on the downstairs tv. Less need for this now, as we have a dvd player connected to the upstairs tv.

I have 2 scarts attached to the stb, one going to the tv and one to the vcr.

I have now discovered I CAN receive the signal from the stb upstairs, but if someone puts on a video downstairs that over-rides the signal (presumably as the booster is taking its input from the vcr, but, as mentioned above, no reason why i should continue to have the vcr feeding the booster).

Couldn't get the sender to work at all. It connects via scart, and it didn't seem to matter whether i connected it to the stb or the vcr, i couldn't receive anything upstairs. Also, using up a scart socket that way then meant other things not working properly. Also the receiver upstairs needs to connect to the scart on the tv, and it only has one, which meant unplugging my dvd player. Don't think the sender is going to solve my problems after all - i am eating a large slice of humble pie as i write; shouldn't have rushed into buying it. Hope wolf is right about maplin's willingness to take it back!

think my options are to either make up a cable to connect the rf output on the stb to my booster (probably easiest), or to get a 3-way splitter in place of my current 2-way, so that i can have a direct cable signal going into the booster as well as to the stb and vcr. all i really need to do is make sure i can watch the cable signal upstairs, uninterrupted if someone wants to watch a video downstairs. will this work, or can anyone suggest some better way i should have everything connected together - remember, though - KEEP IT SIMPLE!

Any thoughts?

[Mike Harrison]

The Maplin sender should work in conjunction with a Red-Eye Translator, and if the Maplin one is 30 quid, this combination will be cheaper than the digisender Gold option, which is the only remote+video sender that copes with NTLs IRDA (blacK) remotes

[MovedGoalPosts]

I use a product called a DigiEye to send the remote control signals from upstairs to my downstairs STB. Works fine with my NTL PACE 1000 STB. As I understand it the average infra red remote control unit cannot cope with the diverity of signal range needed by the STB having to do interactive, email and all that sort of nonsense.

http://www.easylife.co.uk/servlet/Ea...roduct=DG100DE (not an endorsement of the vendor who I have never used - other sellers probably located after a quick google)

As for your wiring, you are almost there. Simply disconnect the coaxial aerial out from your video to your booster. Instead run a coaxial from the STB aerial out to the booster and that should be it.

[daern]

Not wishing to be too harsh, but these solutions are all quite complex. My way (which is far simpler) is as follows:

Get a standard UHF aerial lead and plug it from the RF output of the STB to the socket on the wall where your old terrestrial TV used to come from. (Most people still have these)

Plug the TV in the room you want to watch into the socket on the wall (again, normal UHF aerial lead).

Go into the loft and find where the two aerial leads (i.e. the one from the STB in the lounge and the one from the second TV) come out and join 'em up. No amp needed, no fancy splitters, just a cheap 'n' simple aerial connector. Job's a good 'un!

Ok, so you can't watch cable on more than one TV around the house, you can't change channels and you can't watch more than one channel at once, but it works and it's simple. I use it for watching TV in the kitchen while I'm cooking and it works well. Good enough quality for a 15" LCD TV and simple to do (it took me 20 minutes).

[The Butler]

I just put a UHF aerial splitter (one of the cheap chearful kind) into my old aerial wall socket. The took a standard UHF aerial lead from for the "TV" connector on the STB and plugged it into one arm of the splitter. Then ran a UHF aerial from the other arm of the splitter to my other TV. Hey presto digital & terrestrial down one lead.

Not sure why it works but for two aerials and a splitter was a piece of cake

[altis]

KIS - you are nearly there.

Please print out a copy of the drawing above. Then get a pen and cross out 'Distribution Amplifier' and write 'Booster' instead. Then cross out the box marked 'Main HiFi' and the green and red lines going to it. Then cross out the red line at the top going from 'FM' to 'VHF', all the little yellow boxes and the box labelled 'Radio'. Now, there you have it - completely - and that will work. You will even be able to do fancy stuff like record a cable channel while watching different, terrestrial, ones on the TVs.

Using a 3-way splitter will not work.

Really, this is not complicated and you have already done all the hard work by putting the cable in.

[zoombini]

I used to have the STB fed via the RF through into the VCR, then on the VCR output I had a splitter (inductive) which then fed both the front room TV & the back room TV.

I could watch all channels in both rooms.
All i could not do was change the STB channel.

Total cost was about £1.

If you need to put it through an amp (you should not need to unless your signal is really naff) then try that before the splitter.
(that will then amplify the signal before it gets split, which reduces the signal level.

I took it a bit further & then went to another series of splitters to feed 3 other rooms, all via RF cables.

[zoombini]

BTW, to make a 3 way splitter, get 2 x 2 way splitters & have the output of one fed into the input of the other.

If you use splitters, the "inductive" ones are much better than the "resistive" ones as they have a lower signal loss.

[keep it simple]

Thanks all for your help.

Firstly, daern :

Get a standard UHF aerial lead and plug it from the RF output of the STB to the socket on the wall where your old terrestrial TV used to come from. (Most people still have these)

The wall socket is only linked to the cable running down the external wall from an old rooftoop aerial which is no longer there! (it blew down in a storm and was never replaced as i now have cable and didn't need it).

Go into the loft and find where the two aerial leads (i.e. the one from the STB in the lounge and the one from the second TV) come out and join 'em up.

No aerial leads in the loft, as far as i know. Main lead runs down external wall, as mentioned above. Only aerial lead to second tv is the one from the downstairs signal booster.


altis:

You will even be able to do fancy stuff like record a cable channel while watching different, terrestrial, ones on the TVs.

yup, can already do all that.

Have compared your modified diagram (with all the unnecessary bits crossed off as you suggest) to my own drawing. No problem with the scart leads . Seems to me the only real difference is i don't have the rf lead from the stb to the vcr. I'm not totally sure why that is a problem, as my incoming cable is split - if i have a direct feed from the cable into the vcr, do i need a feed from the stb to the vcr? or is it something to do with the difference between the raw incoming signal and the decoded signal which i guess comes out of the stb?

MovedGoalPosts seems to have come up with the simplest and most logical suggestion:

Simply disconnect the coaxial aerial out from your video to your booster. Instead run a coaxial from the STB aerial out to the booster and that should be it.

because the booster currently takes its feed from the vcr, that is why the upstairs tv can view whatever is on the stb, but if a video is played then it can only view what the video is playing. If i run a lead from the stb to the booster instead, as suggested, it should solve that problem, i.e. even if a video is played downstairs, the upstairs tv will still be able to see the signal from the stb.

Can someone just confirm that, because the connectors on the stb and booster are different, i need a cable with an rf plug on one end and an rf socket on the other?

Thanks all for being patient with me

[altis]

Originally Posted by keep it simple

...or is it something to do with the difference between the raw incoming signal and the decoded signal which i guess comes out of the stb?

Yes that is exactly what the problem is!

The signal that you STB decodes is digital. None of your TVs will understand this signal but, fortunately, the STB will convert it to one that they can - this is what comes out of the RF-output.

There is no need to worry about the gender of an RF connector - they both do the same function - you just need to ensure that it mates correctly! Here is a picture of the back of my STB with the connectors labelled.

MGP's suggestion will allow you to watch the STB upstairs but you will no longer be able to watch the terrestrial channels or the video upstairs and you will not be able to watch terrestrial downstairs while recording some other cable channel.

[keep it simple]

MGP's suggestion will allow you to watch the STB upstairs but you will no longer be able to watch the terrestrial channels or the video upstairs and you will not be able to watch terrestrial downstairs while recording some other cable channel.

OK, so what is the solution? Presumably you are saying i should take an rf lead from the stb output and connect to the vcr? If i do that, the incoming cable (or, rather, 'half' of the split cable) which currently goes into the vcr will be left hanging spare. That seems wasteful - should i plug it into the tv, instead of the lead it currently has from the booster? This would presumably give better quality on the terrestrial channels when the stb is switched off (on standby) - currently, because the tv gets it signal from the booster, the picture quality on 1-5 is significantly poorer than when i watch them via the stb.

Thanks again for all your help.

[Jason1]

Can someone just confirm that, because the connectors on the stb and booster are different, i need a cable with an rf plug on one end and an rf socket on the other?

Thanks all for being patient with me [/QUOTE]

You can use a rf back to back connector like this below to overcome the problem with the connecting a rf adaptor to the rf of your stb

[altis]

I'm afraid it all depends what type of STB you have. Please post the type number at the next opportunity. I also need to know if you have an ordinary terrestrial aerial that you can use. You'd probably best explain about the splitter too. Was it part of the original installation or have you introduced it yourself? Is it screwed to the wall and looks like this?

If your box has an internal pass-thru then you don't need an external aerial. Simply wire it up exactly as the diagram but without the aerial and lead - you won't need your splitter either.

If your box doesn't have a pass-thru but you do have an external aerial then wire it exactly as the diagram. Again, you won't need your splitter.

If you don't have an external aerial you can use the now-spare leg of your splitter instead. Connect it to the RF input of your STB.

However, intuition leads me to suspect that you have one of the newer boxes without an RF input connection. If this is the case then the last two options won't work. Let me know and I'll lead you through the possible solutions.

[keep it simple]

You'd probably best explain about the splitter too. Was it part of the original installation or have you introduced it yourself? Is it screwed to the wall and looks like this?

I do have one of those on the wall. The fm cable goes to my hi-fi. The tv cable, however is then split into two, and that's the splitter i was referring to. One half goes into the stb and the other half goes into the vcr. I think the engineer did it that way when he installed it because i specifically said i needed to be able to watch the video signal upstairs.

I will check what model of stb i have tonight and let you know.

Took the wireless sender back to maplins at lunchtime and they refunded me with no problem. I bought a cable to connect either from stb to vcr or from stb to booster - will do some more experimenting tonight and let you know the outcome