i have installed a sky magic eye, and after finally getting some sort of picture upstairs it is suffering bad interference, i have read that i need non isolated face plates and wondered if this would cause interference? or would i get no picture at all? is there an way of telling whats isolated and whats not?
Actually, there might be a different explanation. It could be that the RF channel you are using is experiencing interference from live TV transmissions.
Sky boxes output an analogue RF picture. The channel can be set in the same menu where you switch on the RF2 voltage. The UHF channel choice is from Ch,21 up to Ch.68
We no longer have analogue TV channel broadcasts in the UK, so you might reasonably expect that all these channels are available to use. But our TV system doesn't work like that. The digital channels use the same UHF channel frequency range. The only difference is that they are transmitting a digital stream that contains a group of channels rather than a single channel as we had with the analogue system. The DVB-T/DVB-T2 tuner in your TV then decodes that and gives the range of channels for that MUX channel frequency.
Anyway, the point of all this is that the channels are still used, just not by analogue. So when you are setting up your Sky box and secondary TV you need to play around with the channel output from the Sky box.
if you are trying to use an RF channel that already carries a DTV signal, then even though one is analogue and the other is digital then they will still interfere. You need to find those UHF channels for where you live that don't carry digital TV broadcasts.
This might sound like a formidable task, but there's a number of ways to do it. You could start with the transmitter map of the UK.
LINK Locate your local transmitter, click on the icon and it shows you a list of the UHF channels that carry broadcasts in your area. Remember that many homes in the UK can pick up transmissions from more than one mast. Look to see what UHF channels are being used from adjacent transmitters. Once you have this info you can work out the channels where there's a good chance of no interference.
The next part requires some juggling. You are best off doing this on the main lounge TV above the Sky box. What you'll to get set up is an RF cable to the TV from RF2. You should already have a HDMI or SCART connection from the Sky box to the TV.
Put your TV on to the AV channel for Sky. Go in to the RF2 setup menu, and change the channel to the first unoccupied channel for your region. Follow any onscreen prompts about saving new settings. Now put your TV on to the analogue tuner and then start the TV tuning process. You should pick up the RF version of the Sky screen. Once you do then have a look at the quality. If it is fuzzy then try your next UHF channel number by changing the Sky box output. When you do this then the TV will display snow. You have to continue TV tuning until you catch up with the new frequency. Keep doing this until you have looked at all the available channels. Pick the one that gives the clearest signal. If you get lost, just quit the TV's tuning menu and switch back to the AV input so you can see what's happening on the Sky box.
Now when you try the remote connection to the bedroom TV then you'll know that you are giving it a decent signal, so you can diagnose any connection problems properly rather than trying to fix one thing when the cause is something different.
I hope this helps.
