nero

I know I should know the answer to this but I don't hence the question

We have a UK TV which Phillips tell us will work in NZ. We have just received our TV after its lovely trip across the sea, we can get sound and really poor quality pictures. We are putting the TV through a UK video and yes it is connected to an outside TV ariel - what are we doing wrong?

Would it help if we had a Kiwi video and recorder?

Or better still if we had a Kiwi 'Freeview' box?

Any ideas would be warmly welcome. We can watch DVDs and Videos for the moment but we do not have a great collection and we coulg get bored quite quickly.

Thanks

Nero

Am Loolah

We had to get a Kiwi freeview box to get the bog standard 4 channels! Can only watch our UK DVD's and Videos on our UK equipment.

happynz

Dare I say that you can turn off the TV and try doing a crossword, listen to the radio, read a book, send the bloke out to the shed, have sex...

Boopy

Our TV is Phillips, worked perfect once hooked through a kiwi video.

mickey_d

When we arrived in Auckland, we bought a NZ TV but picture from normal TV Aerial was rubbish, ended up getting Sky, good picture but nothing to watch!!!

mickey_d

P.S. that's why we're on here every night

littleal

What's the picture quality like with a Kiwi freeview box? TV reception was very patchy on our reccy, but I'm not sure that I want Sky.

Thanks
Alison

sarahlou2411

All the signals in NZ are pretty shocking throgh a normal roof ariel. If TV is a big part of your evenings than freeview or sky is the way to go.
We moved 2k from one side of the bay to the other and can get two more channels than before ;-)

TeamEmbo

Check your TVs PAL settings. I can't quite remember what OH said at the mo, but I'll check with him later. It's something like UK uses PAL 5.5 and NZ uses PAL 6.5. If you can re-tune you TV to that PAL setting you'll get picture and sound. But like I said, I'll check those PAL settings with OH as I may have them wrong.

We were able to re-tune our small LCD TV that we used to use in our caravan and that works fine through a normal aerial. Our big/main TV, although only 12 months old, couldn't be re-tuned, but we have that running through Sky now anyway so it works out. The only reason we have Sky is for the kids Disney channels and the endless repeats of That's so Raven, The Suite Life, etc., and for us to watch the F1. However, the kids hardly watch any of the programmes they used to; should I say they hardly ever watch tv at all now. And we've gone from UK coach potatoes endlessly flicking through 900 boring channels each evening, to actually switching off our tv and going and doing something less boring instead!

sarahlou2411

Thanks for that ;-)

Tv was bought in NZ so it must be the big hills around wellington that distrorts the signal. We did bring our freeviewbox from the uk but it wont tune in at all ;-(

Thankfully we dont watch much TV other than an hour or two in the evening before we all head off to bed. I would get sky only for the Moto GP which I do miss and the geograpghy/wildlife channels.
good luck with the disneychannel ... lol

TeamEmbo

our freeview box didn't work either. Can you get a booster for your aerial?

sarahlou2411

We are a rented house for at least 18 months. I havent found a job yet but I think I may persuade hubby into sky when I do.

With any luck my enormous collection of films and cd's will arrive from the uk soon. Why did I pack my coldplay cd's i will never know.

sammymac

You need a device of some sort that has an AV output, Scart or component video.
The coaxial input on your UK telly won't work here.

Try a cheap video player or dvd player from Kmart before you get Freeview or Sky.
We got a multi region DVD player for about $50 which plays all our UK stuff.

TeamEmbo

[QUOTE=sammymac;5283377]...The coaxial input on your UK telly won't work here.[QUOTE]

is that for using the uk freeview here or just in general, as the aerial input works fine on the small LCD tv we have managed to tune to the right PAL setting.

We unlocked our UK DVD player before we left by looking up on the internet the unlock code so it is now multi regional

lardyl

sorry but that is not quite true - as has been said before if your TV will tune to the corrrect channels and has PAL-G then you are OK - our 36" tosh CRT is the dogs danglies even though the signal is poo!
So you have to get over the rubbish reception and poor aerials using the analogue terrestrial system (that is due to go digital next year) - our aerial signal booster helps but not a massive amount.
Digital satellite "freeview" is available via quite a few suppliers - just <search> these forums or others dealing with matters ex-Pat.