AceGrace - 2 hours ago »
Postcode first part is BN14
Channel 1 - BBC1 - 24 498000 khz
Channel 3 - ITV - 35 586000 khz
Sorry I used an arbitrary BN14 postcode but that shows me that coverage in your location isn't straightforward. Please could send me a Personal Message (top right of the Forum Index page) with the full postcode so I can do a proper check.
Martin Liddle - 17 hours ago »
Sorry I used an arbitrary BN14 postcode but that shows me that coverage in your location isn't straightforward.
OK I have now received the full postcode by PM and it does look as though the local transmitter (described as Whitehawk Hill by the Freeview Coverage Checker) should give good reception. Two provisos: it is a low power transmitter 4kW (as opposed to 200kW) so might be more susceptible to interference and secondly the Aura seems to have its tuning mixed up. BBC1 on multiplex channel 24 is probably from Rowridge whereas ITV on multiplex channel 35 is from Whitehawk Hill. My suggestion is that you try another automatic channel search then select BBC One (LCN 1) and do a signal test and see if the multiplex channel is 48, repeat for ITV (LCN 3) should be 35, Sky Arts (LCN 11) should be 34, Quest (LCN 12) should be 32, Yesterday (LCN 26) should be 33, BBC One HD (LCN 101) should be 36. If any of the values are wrong, the next step would be a manual tune.
I had a similar issue where SD channels were breaking up and HD channels were fine. The SD channels were being picked up from the wrong transmitter.
I resolved the issue by doing a manual scan of the channels from the main transmitter. If doing the automatic scan doesn't work, I would suggest doing a manual scan of channels 48, 35, 34, 32, 33 and 36.
I will give that a try thank you.
How do you do manual tune of those channels specifically?
The automatic tuning is OK for the majority of the channels.
AceGrace - 13 mins ago »
I will give that a try thank you.
How do you do manual tune of those channels specifically?
The automatic tuning is OK for the majority of the channels.
It is difficult to mix automatic and manual tuning as you aren't deleting the incorrect multiplex. As I suggested above you might give the automatic tuning a second chance otherwise try reading the FAQ on manual tuning for the FVP-5000T which I think will be similar to the Aura. https://myhumax.org/forum/topic/manual-tuning-instructions-1 It might sound difficult but is actually fairly straightforward and with a bit of practice is quicker than an automatic tune.
I am now on my second Aura in a week. Both units suffer from intermittent but severe pixelation on COM7. All other multiplexes are OK.
The Aura is connected to an Antiference distribution amplifier. Four other televisions of different makes and vintages, including the one connected to the Aura “TV out”, do not show the same problem. Indeed the Humax HDR FOX T2 I wanted to replace also does not suffer the same problem.
My location is in the NW corner of Staffordshire receiving the Winter Hill transmissions. The Aura when not pixelating on COM7 shows a signal level of about 80 and a quality of 100%. When severe pixelation occurs these both rapidly fluctuate and jump about anywhere between 0 and 100, especially the quality.
Initially I thought the first unit had a tuner fault but clearly it is a tuner performance issue. Of course COM7 is an SFN and I suspect that the tuner cannot handle the simultaneous transmission on channel 55 from Winter Hill, Sutton Coldfield and perhaps Fenton. Winter Hill and Sutton Coldfield are virtually equi-distant. Fenton is much closer but with a much weaker signal. The area is where TV regions/transmitters overlap and the signals from each are all quite strong relative to each other. The severity of the pixelation and the frequency of happening presumably depend upon the atmospheric conditions at the time. Signal attenuators appear to provide no improvement.
The aura is clearly not fit for purpose, at least in an area where there is relatively small difference between the signal strengths of different transmitters within SFN’s. Looks like it will have to be a Manhattan!
Is it something that can be fixed with software or is it a hardware issue i.e. the tuners they are using?
AceGrace - 55 mins ago »
Is it something that can be fixed with software or is it a hardware issue i.e. the tuners they are using?
COM7 multiplex has its own set of problems that might relate to it being broadcast on a single frequency (channel 55) across the whole country. It isn't relevant to your case as you appear to have no access to COM7 (neither do I).
I too experienced problems with signal and sound breakup on SD channels with my Aura. There is a comment above about a method of being able to reproduce the problem which I think is likely correct. I am unable to do the test as the Aura was sent back as faulty. So this is a vague recollection - but when I had it I did notice that it was possible to get 100% signal strength and 100% quality when the Aura was switched on on a SD channel and excelelnt quality vision/sound - but that dropped immediately to strength 100% quality 50-70% when changing to another channel and then back to the SD one. On HD channels it was always 100% strength 100% signal quality and 100% brilliant picture.
I tried an attenuator from Amazon as was suggested and that was a 100% waste of money - it made no difference.
Support from Humax was terrible for reasons I mentioned elsewhere - but I finally rang them and was told that the problem was caused by my aerial and I needed to replace the complete installation. This is despite the fact that my old HDR Fox T2 gave excellent picture/sound and so did every other TV type device I plugged into the aerial.
I felt I was getting nowhere with Humax and asked for a refund - which they kindly supplied. Its a pity as I really had high hopes of the Aura and am now not sure how to proceed for the future for replaceing the Fox T3.
I felt I was getting nowhere with Humax and asked for a refund - which they kindly supplied. Its a pity as I really had high hopes of the Aura and am now not sure how to proceed for the future for replaceing the Fox T3.
I bought both of the Aura's from Amazon because I knew that it would be so easy to return. The Manhattan T3-R hopefully arrives tomorrow - I hope that performs better. But at least they appear to have a far better reputation for support than Humax. - which is probably not difficult!
The T3-R will replace an old HDR Fox T3 which suffers from the "green screen" problem when feeding a new TV.
Clearly the tuners in the Aura are a poor design and give all sorts of problems. It is interesting that Manhattan say they do not add 4 tuners is because of the cost - perhaps Humax are making a false economy.
I will report how the T3-R performs - it is just about as close as you can get to a modern HDR Fox T2 equivalent.
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