Installation quality cable is crucial! OFFICIAL

Eye2007

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The installation I did today took around twenty minutes. I used coaxal cable with female and male bits on the end. I got these from Sky Eye link.(This was not working for no reason. It was ten metres away from my sky box.)

I am using a one for all booster and a Temtrac aerial. I am in direct line of site between set top aerial and transmitter. My reception is confirmed as Crystal Palace on the reciever. I clipped and fixed the cable so it would be compatible with Freeview box, booster and aerial.

If I was you, I would avoid RF fly extension leads. The weakest form of lead possible. Subjective to interference, I strongly urge you to use a shielded Sat Coaxial cable. It has a gold metal rod in the middle and is insulated.

I reccomend the shortest length possible leaving a bit of slack in case you need to move aerial. The aerial has a longish lead so bear this in mind when cutting coaxal cable to the nearest metre.

If you live in a strong area then you will find that this method works best. Please also note that RF out allows an RF lead to go to your other tv set. However you will not be able to change channel from second set but may come in use if you want a sixth channel.
 
Eye2007 said:
Please also note that RF out allows an RF lead to go to your other tv set. However you will not be able to change channel from second set but may come in use if you want a sixth channel.
I distribute via RF the output from out Pace PVR to other TV's in the house via a Labgear Handilink Pro MRX270. Costs about £60 including amplifier to main TV + 4 other TV's. As well as giving me IR control from the other TV's, it also improved the picture quality to the remote TV's from my existing 1 TV setup.
 
I strongly urge you to use a shielded Sat Coaxial cable. It has a gold metal rod in the middle and is insulated.

LMAO do you know anything about cable? because it being like that don't mean its quality.
 
triplea4uk said:
I strongly urge you to use a shielded Sat Coaxial cable. It has a gold metal rod in the middle and is insulated.

LMAO do you know anything about cable? because it being like that don't mean its quality.


In the past I used classic RF lead. Had so many interferences and I live in an exceedingly strong area. Now using Sat Coax cable instead of the RF, I find that the signal is flawless. Perfect picture and sound. I find also that everything seems to be even stronger signal than ever before.

I strongly reccommend this method of installation as it is by far the best.You need to invest in a good cabling and RF is cheap and cheerful whereas Sat coaxial cable is 1.00 per metre.
 
Useful review of cable types here:
http://www.your-book.co.uk/cable.htm

I agree about cheap "fly leads" but I disagree about gold. You won't find any standard satellite cable containing gold - nor do they need to as copper is quite adequate.
 
Eye2007 said:
I strongly urge you to use a shielded Sat Coaxial cable. It has a gold metal rod in the middle and is insulated.

I think he's recommending a CT100 type cable with gold plated pins on the connectors. If you live in a fringe reception area even using RG59 will attenuate the signal too much on a run from the roof to downstairs.
 
SamRadford said:
Useful review of cable types here:
http://www.your-book.co.uk/cable.htm

I agree about cheap "fly leads" but I disagree about gold. You won't find any standard satellite cable containing gold - nor do they need to as copper is quite adequate.


Copper is what I mean.

I have a copper wire inside cable. This I presume makes a big difference.I am in a strong area. Crystal Palace four miles away and visible from my window. it is like the Eiffel Tower of my heart.
 
I used to work in the TV trade and those ready-made 'aerial flyleads' are complete junk. They are usually made from the cheapest-of-cheap cable with hardly any braid and they are just crimped (badly) instead of soldered.
In a strong signal area you can just about get away with them, but in moderate or weak areas they are effing useless.
They cause picture disturbance if you waggle them, they pick up interfering signals through the cruddy braid and can completely spoil reception.
Avoid at ALL cost!
 
Actually CT100 is still arround and is one of the best cable brands you can get. It just is not stocked much anywhere because of its cost.

Professsionally we use and supply WF100 cable as it has a good, long history of approval and as the dialectric is foam rather than air it is more resilient when used on site.

RG59/6/7 and 11 has and will NEVER be approved by the CAI, from a technial point it will work but we have heard of sky installers walking off site when seeing RG series cable installed in homes.

One final point, becareful with high signal levels, they can cause just as many problems and look just like poor signal levels. It is infact the copper braid and foil that is helping the signal the most in strong signal areas as it reduces unwanted signal from leaking onto the cable as it drops down to your tv.

The size of the copper centre conductor is more important in poorer reception areas.

Chris
 
vex said:
RG59/6/7 and 11 has and will NEVER be approved by the CAI, from a technial point it will work but we have heard of sky installers walking off site when seeing RG series cable installed in homes.

I have installed miles of RG59U, for both UHF and Sky use, never had an issue with it (until a recent drop in quality of the cable, we have now switched to CT100). Sky run a mile when they see RG59 ? I was recently at a job where a Sky installer turned up, fitted the dish (which we had already fitted the cable for) and left. When I noticed that he had only used 2 bolts to fix the bracket to the wall, I wasn`t impressed. Quite often Sky installers will not do a job if there is an element of difficulty.

My own Sky box is wired to RG59U, no problem. CT100 may be better on paper, but in the real world, RG59U will work fine.
 
vex said:
Actually CT100 is still arround and is one of the best cable brands you can get. It just is not stocked much anywhere because of its cost.

Chris

Yes it can get picked up if places have it in stock but it was discontinued like I stated dure to company that made it no longer exist Raydex was taken over then the product was discontinued it has nothing to do with price.
 
There are so many types of so called ct100 around from very good to utter crap and all called ct100 all boasting the same spec with no testing done to them,if i was going to recomend a good cable it would be from Belden or Andrews.
 
Prof - Agree completely and as I said, RG series cable will work, it just is not approve for use with Sky.

Half of the battle is because it is approved for Cable TV, the obvious arch enemy of Sky.

Triplea4K - Radex CDT marged with Beldon cable, I havent heard that they had completely discountinued the official CT100 cable.

bob1 - A lot of the cables out there are reffered to as CT100 'type' cable, it has become a hoover brand and you are right the range of quality out there is massive. One installer of ours ordered Ct100 cable and was even delivered a basic RG59 reel.

You should always buy a CAI approved cable and this should have a CAI reference number printed on it, this is why we recommend and supply WF100 from Webro. It is one of the very first foam filled coax cables to be approved and is considered the benchmark cable allong with CT100 for years.

Hope that clarifies my statements.

Chris
 
I like H109F. It's slightly more flexible (and cheaper) than WF100 and, provided you take care not to kink it, does an adequate job up to 50 metres. In fact its losses are no worse than WF100 and CT100.
See specifications: http://www.satcure.co.uk/tech/cablespecs.htm
 
Raydex was taken over then they stopped there production of CT100 thats why suppliers have dried up.

WF100 is great stuff but its foam based so its not ideal for indoor use.

I just got a drum of a Sky bloke 250m for £50 he first said £80 so I did some haggling its foam bases but not sure what it is.
 
triplea4uk said:
its foam bases but not sure what it is.
Probably that special type known as "nicked". :D
 
triplea4uk said:
Raydex was taken over then they stopped there production of CT100 thats why suppliers have dried up.

WF100 is great stuff but its foam based so its not ideal for indoor use.

I just got a drum of a Sky bloke 250m for £50 he first said £80 so I did some haggling its foam bases but not sure what it is.
WF100 is perfectly OK for indoor use. The very fact that it has a foam dielectric means that although less flexible it is much less likely to kink and deform when bent like CT100 or H109 might.
 
LOL Nicked I wish then I would of got it free.

When I open it I will see what it seize on the cable

I agree it can be used indoors but its annoying to use in tight spaces but it is great for it not kinking thats one thing that drives me crazy with cabling.
 

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