Just helped set up my next-door neighbour’s new tele by setting off an auto scan for all the available channels. Thing is she gets channels we can’t and we get channels she can’t. Both our aerials point the same way. Puzzled, me!

Your aerials arent pointing exactly the same way would be my guess..

afaik they are pointing at the same transmitter. I suppose one or the other may have shifted in the wind, but would just a few degrees make that much difference?

have a go with this to see if you have transmiters that line up

http://www.ukfree.tv/transmitters.php?P=DE222BU&s=map

modern uhf aerials have quite a wide acceptance angles so unlikely to be an alignment issue but still could be

there’s a 101 possible causes
lower threshold tuner on one box at certain frequencies
cable pick up

it’s more of a black art than science sometimes

Digital televisions are much more sensitive to direction than analogy. I’m no expert but antennae technology is quite complicated.

Your aerial might be tuned more to one end of the frequency than hers, hence the different channels. The quality of your cable might be better. Her aerial might have the mounting bracket in a non ideal position. Do you have a booster, if so where is it connected, dose she have a booster, if so where is it connected? I think a high noise to single ratio can cause drop out on digital t.vs so positioning of boosters at the tail of the cable run can be bad if not splitting the signal. Plus loads of other stuff.

I’m no expert either but, as I understand it,

Different aerial designs can pick up different frequencies, and a digital TV broadcast is made up of multiple frequencies. You can pick up some, your neighbour can pick up others. A replacement ‘wideband’ aerial should let you pick up everything.

Also, aerial position is surprisingly finicky as reception is susceptible to dead spots; relocating it a couple of feet sideways can make a massive difference.

As said above aerial direction can make a big difference, even a couple of degrees on a weak signal. Receiving technoology in the telly or box can also make a difference. Digital TV is not quite what we were promised….(unless you like the Gay Rabbit channel and 30 shopping channels 🙄 ).

Just found this, bit of theory reading.

http://www.aerialsandtv.com/aerials.html

I think quantum theory is easier to understand!
I’ll wait for the switchover when, hopefully, the signal will be boosted and that’ll sort it. Failing that I’ll get the engineer in.

Can depend on the tuner in the TV
When I do an auto scan the one in the bedroom automatically picks up the west midlands signal from Sutton coldfield I have to do a manual tune to override it and get the correct east mids frequencies, the one downstairs tunes to east midlands from Waltham automatically
Both from the same aerial

It’s one of those new ‘smart’ TV’s:

You know, the ones that analyse their environmment then give you the channels it assumes you want – if it spots a copy of FHM you only get Sky, Dave and all the Jazz channels.