Updated/corrected ini file for various main (8 or 9 multiplex) transmitters in UK

[martinu]

I've done a spot check of various main transmitters (the ones that broadcast all 8 national multiplexes plus 1 local) and found quite a few that are missing COM7, COM8 and local. I've zipped the ini files up into one file. I might look at the others tomorrow, so watch this space.

The ones I've updated are:

Oxford
Sutton Coldfield
Crystal Palace
Hannington
Rowridge
Belmont

The implication of the changes that I'm making is that people will get another 26 channels (plus a few more if a local mux exists), so I'm surprised that people haven't been asking why they can't get those channels. It only relates to the main transmitters; others don't have (and AFAIK never will have) those muxes.

Also, I see that Rowridge has four different entries which represent the situation at different times. Since only the latest one is relevant today, I've taken the liberty of renaming it as "Rowridge" (as opposed to "Rowridge (Final)"). I suggest you delete all the others.

By the way, what's the policy in the ini file when a transmitter has some muxes on a small offset one side or the other of the nominal every-8MHz channel? Do you prefer the nominal frequency (and people need to enable offsets) or the actual frequency with the offset?

All the info is coming from the ukfree.tv site - I'm assuming that is accurate throughout since it is definitely accurate for my transmitter, Bilsdale.

[sub]

Thanks - much appreciated. Updated.

I think a lot of people have just been doing the all regions scan to get all the channels.

By the way, what's the policy in the ini file when a transmitter has some muxes on a small offset one side or the other of the nominal every-8MHz channel? Do you prefer the nominal frequency (and people need to enable offsets) or the actual frequency with the offset?

Most tuners will lock +/-166KHz, so center frequency and rely on device to take care of offsets.

[martinu]

Looking at the transmitter ini files for the UK, a thought has occurred to me. I presume that the order of the multiplexes in the file is not important. Assuming that, I wonder if it might make maintenance of the files easier if the multiplexes' frequencies were sorted in the conventional order PSB1, PSB2, PSB3, COM4, ..., COM8, Local, since that's the order that most transmitter data sites list them.

There are "only" 220 files (!) and I could work through them all gradually. May be time well spent if it is easier to maintain the files for subsequent changes, without having to compare a list in an ini file with a list on a web site when they are in different orders.

Also there are a number of duplicates. For example I sent you a complete file for Rowridge yesterday which doesn't have the ITV region in the name, not realising that there is another partial one "Meridian - Rowridge" which has a name that is consistent with all the rest.

There's also a trivial case of "Yorkshire -Keighley.ini" when all the other ini files have a space before and a space after the hyphen. Maybe for consistency that should be renamed.

There could be an interesting situation with York because they get their TV from Emley Moor which has a low-powered local multiplex for Leeds area. There will be a separate transmitter which only transmits York's local multiplex, such that people in York will see both transmitters on roughly the same bearing. I wonder if that should be handled as a separate ini file "Emley Moor (York local)" which is a copy of the Emley Moor one but with the Leeds local deleted and the York one substituted. No need for a quick decision on that one because AIUI the contract for York local TV hasn't even been awarded yet.