News items for tag dx - Koos van den Hout

I picked up the at this moment cheap outside DVB-T antenna from KPN which didn't even have a KPN logo, just Funke. It is the Funke DSC310. It came with 10 meter antenna cable and mounting materials. I went to Radio Centrum, the local electronics shop and picked up a König DVB-T power inserter. The mounting materials for the Funke antenna include a clamp for a pipe so I used a broomstick to raise the antenna out the window.

The results were spectacular. Depending on antenna orientation (the DSC310 is directional) I received 19 to 22 transmitters with in total 208 to 234 services (with a lot of duplicate Digitenne services). Details in the DVB-T reception log for 10 June 2010.

Notable new services: Digitenne multiplex 1 Zuid-Holland Zuid with TV Rijnmond and Digitenne multiplex 1 Zuid-Holland Noord with TV west.

Update 2010-06-13: I just noticed browsing those results with some more time and energy available that I also had WDR Mux 2 Aachen at 602 MHz in one direction, which is new for the home location. The reason I did not notice before is that my script to generate the logbook did not see that frequency as 'new' because I have seen it in Limburg, the southern part of the Netherlands.

According to DVB-T Frequenties - Wikipedia Nederland the 602 MHz transmitter is the one at Aachen-Stolberg which is 167 kilometer distance. A new DX record!

Distance calculations using Calculate distance, bearing and more between Latitude/Longitude points and normal reach calculations using VHF/UHF TV Line of Sight Calculator. The line of sight calculator shows me both this distance and the 112 kilometer to Sender Wesel are above the normal reach of those transmitters.

Ik zat weer eens te bladeren of er nog een leuke tweedehands antenne te vinden was voor de DVB-T DX experimenten en kwam deze tegen: Fuba yagi uhf tv type d. Gezien het specifieke type D en de lengte op de foto is dit een Fuba XC391-D en die is dus 2 meter 25 lang, volgens Frage zur Fuba XC391 Yagi - DIGITAL FERNSEHEN - Forum Duits. Een beetje ernstig groot voor een antenne die binnen blijft, dus die gaat het niet worden ook al is het erg weinig geld voor zo'n goeie UHF TV antenne. Zonder mast en rotor is dat geen handige antenne en ik heb even andere prioriteiten dan die op het dak knutselen.

Opmerkelijk is trouwens dat de buitenantenne voor Digitenne bij KPN momenteel 6.75 kost (verzendkosten?) terwijl volgens mij dezelfde Funke buitenantenne bij satshop 34.95 kost. Voor die 6.75 kan ik het niet laten, ik heb er ook een besteld bij KPN. Je hoeft er geen Digitenne klant voor te zijn.

The good thing about trying to receive distant transmitters via dvb-t is: when it works, all the results are on the computer. So there is now a script which converts the scan results from all the DVB-T dx experiments into a nice webpage: DVB-T reception log.

The Tropospheric ducting forecast for Northwest Europe showed not much happening yesterday evening but I tried a dvb-t scan anyway. No foreign services, but the highest score in services from the Netherlands: 16 active frequencies with 180 services in total. The new find: Digitenne Mux 3 on 554 MHz.

I saw interesting conditions coming up on the Tropospheric ducting forecast for Northwest Europe so I ran a dvb-t scan and indeed found:

tune to: QAM_16   f = 674000 kHz I999B8C23D0T8G4Y0 
SDT (actual TS)
        service = MDR S-Anhalt (ARD)
        service = NDR FS NDS * (ARD)
        service = SWR Fernsehen RP (ARD)
        service = WDR Düsseldorf (ARD)
        service = WDR Wuppertal * (ARD)
        service = WDR Duisburg (ARD)

tune to: QAM_AUTO f = 690000 kHz I999B8C999D999T999G999Y999 
SDT (actual TS)
        service = arte (ARD)
        service = Phoenix (ARD)
        service = Einsfestival (ARD)
        service = Das Erste (ARD)

tune to: QAM_AUTO f = 746000 kHz I999B8C999D999T999G999Y999 
SDT (actual TS)
        service = ProSieben (ProSiebenSat.1)
        service = SAT.1 (ProSiebenSat.1)
        service = kabel eins (ProSiebenSat.1)
        service = N24 (ProSiebenSat.1)

No extra services from the east of the Netherlands, so this must have been some interesting tropospheric ducting. First time for ARD and Prosieben/Sat.1, I have seen the WDR multiplex on that frequency before from Brunssum, a sign this must be a single frequency network. Searching DVB-T Sender Tabelle shows the transmitter at Wesel is the most likely source, a distance of 112 kilometer.

Onderweg op de fiets zie ik nogal eens oude tv antennes op daken staan die duidelijk niet meer gebruikt worden (allemaal horizontaal gepolariseerd, terwijl alle dvb-t zenders in nederland verticaal gepolariseerd zijn). Misschien dat er daar nog eens eentje tussenzit die ik voor weinig kan meenemen voor meer DX experimenten. Of iemand moet een antenne weten? UHF / VHF band III.

Seeing another set of DVB-T DX pages by Hans makes me think I should have a look at parsing the vdr files from w_scan into an automatic DX logbook, noting when muxes are first found. I collected the output files since 3 January 2009. I started doing that after I saw the WDR program at 674 MHz so that was not logged in that format. Documentation: VDR file format.

In the dvb-t scan yesterday evening late:

TV Gelderland :642000:I999B8C999D999M999T999G999Y999:T:27500:7041:7042:7043:0:1104:0:0:0
Radio Gelderland:642000:I999B8C999D999M999T999G999Y999:T:27500:0:7112:0:0:1111:0:0:0

Part of Digitenne bouquet multiplex 1 at 642 MHz. The transmitter could be Oss or Veenendaal given distance and transmitter power. I only noticed it yesterday but now I see it in the w_scan output a few times. The reception is not error-free (I had to wait a bit for a chance of a screenshot with not too much distortion).

No extra foreign channels from the dvb-t scans.. yet. I keep an eye on the tropospheric ducting forecast for northwest europe. I also updated the DVB experiments page with the DX results.

Bouquet or Multiplex? It is described as bouquet at DVB-T zenders Digitenne Nederland but the mpeg standard term for multiple program streams in one transport stream is 'multiplex'. Bouquet in DVB terms means a set of 'programs' logically grouped together.

I caught the Omroep Brabant logo last night: after dark reception is a lot better! The Digitenne B1 bouquet at 546 MHz and Digitenne B2 at 786 Mhz scanned fine.

The log-periodical antenna has effect: a number of signals show workable data in w_scan. New:

490 MHz - Digitenne B3 from probably Lelystad
514 MHz - Digitenne B1 from Lelystad, including TV Flevoland / Radio Flevoland
682 MHz - Digitenne B4 from Lelystad

And with aiming and trying (3 windows with dvbsnoop for pid 0x00, 0x10 and 0x11, one window with tzap reading the signal strength):

546 MHz - Digitenne B1 including Omroep Brabant, source unknown

Updated the DVB experiments page with the latest findings. Time to take pictures of the antenna I built.

First success with the self-built antenna: I tried it in the 'home office', approximately 5 meters above ground, north-east direction. With the log-periodical antenna pointing outside through the window I was able to receive Digitenne bouquet 1 at 618 MHz UHF, which includes radio and TV Noord-Holland.

Several times when I scanned for DVB-T signals in the UHF band from home I saw some very weak signals on several frequencies. Too weak to make out anything other than that the signals are very probably DVB-T as the radio scanner does not pick up a thing there (for as far as I know FM receivers cannot pick up QAM signals). The DVB-T receiver I use has a small external antenna (simple half-wavelength wire), so to get more signals I will have to use a good antenna. Buying something is expensive and it is to me much more interesting to build something myself from scrap materials. Most promising seems to be Alan Yates' Laboratory - UHF Log-Periodic Array so I'm browsing my scrap electronics for materials to build this.

The empty slot I found before in a dvb service scan where BemBem used to be is now:

0x0000 0x0072: pmt_pid 0x0474 Digitenne -- 100%NL (running, scrambled)

As reported by radio-tv-nederland.nl.

Just heard on the scanner on one of the air traffic channels: "Request for sightseeing the Amsterdam Schiphol sector" describing (I think) the plane as a Cessna. It must be Sunday :)

So, the US is now also switched over to digital television. I found a nice compilation of analog shutdowns on youtube: 2009 DTV Transition: Analog TV Shutoffs in Los Angeles As They Happened and one particular WABCEndsAnalogShrtVrs061209 from ABC channel 7 New York. Some stations made a nice item out of it with a countdown and some just dropped their analog signal in the middle of a program. One big thing in the US is a lot of TV channels use their channel number in their branding (like ABC 7 for WABC above) and the US brother of DVB-T named ATSC has provisions for channels 'named' with a number which is not equal to the VHF/UHF frequency.
Update: Journal entry describing the end of analog tv broadcast: uneventful

The new scanner has been found: a Commtel COM225 scanner, which has a range from 25 MHz to 1300 Mhz and good scanning and receiving capabilities. A nice secondhand one, found via Marktplaats. Now I am programming lots of frequencies including Schiphol airport frequencies and other airport and eurocontrol frequencies. Commtel COM225 review at strongsignals.net.

I have been looking for a better radio scanner recently. For the amount of use it will get and what I want a second hand one is probably best. I also noticed the new ones on sale at the moment in the Netherlands are quite limited.
There are the simple ones with 50-100 channels which don't have the militairy air communications band that I want, and no 'tuning' option (tuning up and down the dial when looking for signals in a certain area).
Those are sometimes sold as 'church radio' in the Netherlands because somewhere in the years the rescue services moved to encrypted speech (C2000), frequencies 148.0125 to 149.0875 MHz and 153.0125 to 153.6875 MHz were opened especially for 'church radio': transmitting a church service (and nothing else). Most scanners will support this range. I really don't think the 'target audience' of church radio, people who want to hear a church service but are unable to go to church, usually elderly or sick people will be able to deal with all the little knobs and dials on the average radio scanner. I looked at the designs for church radio via Internet 'receivers' and those have a volume control and an on-off switch. The very advanced model has a 'channel' selector for choosing a church or gospel music.
The higher-end radio scanners sold new are really high-end with alphanumeric channel descriptions and trunk-tracking options. A bit too much for what I want, and too expensive.
So I'm browsing the secondhand scanner ads on a few websites. And everytime I see an offer that looks nice I look up the details of the offered scanner on the scanner reviews on the Strong Signals site which is a very good resource for finding out the options of scanners and comparing them.
I hope to find one for a reasonable price. In browsing the ads I learned about brands I haven't heard of before. There is Commtel which is actually from Uniden and GRE, making some Commtel models near copies of Uniden Bearcat models. There is also Realistic which seems to be the other name for Radio Shack scanners. Icom also makes receiver / scanners but those are out of my price range.

Interesting article The Great Brazilian Sat-Hack Crackdown in Wired on-line today. UHF-Satcom.com audio samples has some interesting samples of pirates using these frequencies and other interesting stuff (such as space shuttle audio). Time to dig up my radio scanner and see what I can find on these frequencies as listed at UHF Satellite reception - UHF-Satcom.
Update nothing, as this is outside the range of my trusty old Uniden Bearcat UBC120XLT, ranges 66-88, 108-174 and 406-512 MHz. Maybe time to find something better.

Oh and in Paris I did bring my laptop and the dvb-t stick. Tried a scan, and found 5 bouquets with in total 29 services (18 free-to-air). Some services with 'HD' in the name, which mplayer could not play. I also saw some multilingual services. Free-to-air services seen by w_scan: Canal 21(Multi-7), IDF1(Multi-7), NRJ Paris(Multi-7), CAP 24(Multi-7), M6(MULTI4), W9(MULTI4), NT1(MULTI4), PARIS PREMIERE(MULTI4), ARTE HD(Multi 4), CANAL+(CNH), TPS STAR(CNH), CANAL+ SPORT(CNH), TF1 HD(MR5), France 2 HD(MR5), M6HD(MR5), TF1(SMR6), NRJ12(SMR6), TMC(SMR6).

Another scan of the vhf/uhf spectrum in Brunssum, and this time I got lucky and found the VRT dvb-t bouquet at 506 MHz (UHF 25) from Genk. With scan:

scanning /usr/share/doc/dvb-utils/examples/scan/dvb-t/be-Genk
using '/dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0' and '/dev/dvb/adapter0/demux0'
initial transponder 506000000 0 1 9 3 1 3 0
>>> tune to: 506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE
0x0000 0x1090: pmt_pid 0x1090 VRT -- Klara continuo (running)
0x0000 0x1080: pmt_pid 0x1080 VRT -- MNM (running)
0x0000 0x1070: pmt_pid 0x1070 VRT -- Studio Brussel (running)
0x0000 0x1060: pmt_pid 0x1060 VRT -- Klara (running)
0x0000 0x1040: pmt_pid 0x1040 VRT -- Radio 1 (running)
0x0000 0x1050: pmt_pid 0x1050 VRT -- Radio 2 (running)
0x0000 0x1010: pmt_pid 0x1010 VRT -- EEN (running)
0x0000 0x1020: pmt_pid 0x1020 VRT -- Canvas/Ketnet (running)
0x0000 0x10b0: pmt_pid 0x10b0 VRT -- Canvas+/Ketnet+ (running)
0x0000 0x10a0: pmt_pid 0x10a0 VRT -- Sporza (running)
0x0000 0x10c0: pmt_pid 0x10c0 VRT -- Nieuws+ (running)
0x0000 0x10d0: pmt_pid 0x10d0 VRT -- MNM hits (running)
Network Name 'VRTmux1'
>>> tune to: 482000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE
WARNING: >>> tuning failed!!!
>>> tune to: 482000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE (tuning failed)
WARNING: >>> tuning failed!!!
dumping lists (12 services)
Klara continuo:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4241:4240
MNM:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4225:4224
Studio Brussel:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4209:4208
Klara:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4193:4192
Radio 1:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4161:4160
Radio 2:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4177:4176
EEN:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:4113:4114:4112
Canvas/Ketnet:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:4129:4130:4128
Canvas+/Ketnet+:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:4273:4274:4272
Sporza:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4257:4256
Nieuws+:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4289:4288
MNM hits:506000000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_8_MHZ:FEC_1_2:FEC_AUTO:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_4:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:4305:4304

In the evening reception was ok, during the day lots of errors. I guess an outside antenna with preamp could make this usable. I updated the DVB experiments with the new data. This brings the total listing of free-to-air services found in this place to 24 television and 24 radio stations. The tuning to 482 MHz is because that is the other VRTmux1 frequency.