The whole concept of watching TV hasn’t changed, but under the hood, the frequencies of TV stations is changing, and if you don’t change the tuning of your TV to match, you won’t be watching anything at all.
Thanks to the digital switchover happening in Australia, different cities and places will need to retune by a certain date, otherwise their reception will be pretty much next to nothing and put in black, leaving you with no picture, and no show to watch.
In Sydney, you need to retune by today, otherwise some stations like SBS will cease to be visible until you do the retune.
The numbers on your TV channels won’t technically change when you do it, but the settings behind them will, and the technology in your TV or digital TV box knows what to do, so just make it happen.
Depending on your TV, head to the settings menu, and setup your TV once again, looking for options like “auto-tuning” or “setup TV,” which should start a scan of television broadcasting frequencies and remap the channels accordingly for you.
As we mentioned before, Sydney TVs need to be retuned from March 18, otherwise you won’t see anything. You can retune after the 18th, but if you don’t retune and you switch the TV on from the 19th onwards, you won’t see SBS, and possibly other stations.
Other places around the country will go through the same issue soon enough, while others again have already been through the switch off and retuning process. Melbourne, for instance, went through it on February 7, but the inner suburbs of Melbourne will have to go through it by July 31, while South Yarra will see it done by the 3rd of November.
By the end of this year, though, all of Australia will have dealt with a retune, so if you’re curious when it’s happening in your area, head to the Digital Ready website run by the government.
I live at Baulkham Hills and we are supposedly in a good signal area. Every day, usually between 5:00 pm and 8:00 pm every day. I have spent $1800.00 this year getting a new aerial system with one unit facing Sydney and another facing Woolongong. I have new cabling, including splitters, installed and a signal booster as well. Sometimes the signal from Sydney is good while the other one shows “Weak Signal” and vice – versa. Usually, both show the weak signal message. I have read the material on the government’s website but it is pretty equivocal. Any ideas??
No idea, to be honest. Could be something in the materials of your home, and could be the location. We’d probably look at getting a specialist out there.