YOUVIEW set up without internet.

Jud1thJud1th Member Posts: 6
I bought my Mom a YOUVIEW some years ago so she could record and watch programmes at a later date. She has no internet and only watches Freeview channels. I set it up using internet at my house, then moved it to her house where it worked perfectly for some years. I have now moved it to my caravan, expecting it to work in the same way, except it won’t. It keeps telling there is no signal. There is no aerial at the caravan, I have a smart TV and internet. I realise that the YOUVIEW will have limited use under the circumstances, but it means I can record and watch commercial channels without sitting through the adverts! I didn’t bring an Ethernet cable with me, if this is the issue I can get one for next time I am here. Do you think this is the problem? If not, what else can I try?

Comments

  • Stevef_fr8ysStevef_fr8ys Member, Super User Posts: 771 ✭✭
    You need an aerial to get the freeview channels. You may get a signal with an internal one you can buy from Argos for example, but the signal will not be very strong so you may on!y get limited channels.

    Getting an ethernet cable would give you access to some of the catch up apps, but if you have a smart TV you will already get these.

    Does your TV have an aerial and get freeview? If so switching the aerial to the box would provide a signal, and you will then need a coaxial cable from the box to the TV to restore the TV channels. Ensure you have antenna out in settings switched to on, if you choose this route.
  • Jud1thJud1th Member Posts: 6
    Thanks Steve. My TV does not have an aerial but I do get freeview. The TV is wall mounted, and the caravan has HDMI leads protruding near the power socket, and also an aerial socket. I have an aerial lead, so I fitted that between the YOUVIEW and the wall socket, and I fitted one of the HDMI leads into the YOUVIEW. This is exactly as I had installed it for my Mom, who did have an aerial. The TV recognises there is something at the HDMI lead but that it has no signal. I don’t have any way  of attaching anything directly from the YOUVIEW to the TV as its wall mounted, only via the HDMI leads and aerial socket from the wall. 

    Is there anything else I can try? Or do I just have to watch adverts?
  • RoyRoy Member, Super User Posts: 17,805 ✭✭✭
    edited 28 February 2022, 6:48PM
    @Jud1th

    There is some confusion here. If you haven’t got an aerial, then you won’t have Freeview. 

    And things won’t work like they did at your Mum’s, where there was an aerial.

    But you say you have an aerial socket. so does this go to some communal service (assuming you have a static caravan)? Or actually to a roof mounted aerial on the caravan? Or is it that there is a cable from the TV to this socket, and you are supposed to plug an aerial into this socket?

    Or do you actually get Freeview on the TV, which means there must be an aerial somewhere? Possibly directly wired, and the socket is for anything extra that wants an aerial, like the YouView box; but that may be too much to hope for,

    The thing to know is what the aerial socket actually does; you may have to look behind the TV, and see what wires go where.

    I do know what the No Signal is; it means that the TV is seeing the output from the YouView box, but the box wants to be tuned in. Can you tune it?
    if you have been using the box in a different area up until now, it will want retuning. Though this will need an aerial of course.

    Can you press the YouView button and get the Main Menu of the YouView box to show?

    Definitely get an Ethernet cable; if you have good internet there, you may at least get the Players on the box (though you may have these on the smart tv anyway), but you will likely want the picture thumbnails for programmes and recordings, which come over the internet.

    Are you on a caravan site? You may well find that a neighbour can explain what the wires do, even if they don’t have a YouView box; and if you can find this out and report back, we may be able to tell you how to make the best use of what you have there.

    Once we know what it is 😛
    ‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’ Wm Morris
  • Jud1thJud1th Member Posts: 6
    Thanks Roy

    I don’t have an aerial on the roof, but I do get all of the freeview channels via the TV. There is an aerial lead coming out of the back of the TV, plugged into an aerial socket behind the TV. I know, contradictory. The caravan is on a site, so perhaps I am plugged into a communal aerial that I didn’t know I had. I thought I was watching TV via the Internet (very good internet here), but maybe not.

    I already retuned theYouView, but it seems to have found all the pay to view channels, which I don’t want, and none of the freeview ones. 

    So still a mystery. Next time I come I’ll bring an Ethernet cable, and meanwhile I’ll find out if there is a site aerial.
  • RoyRoy Member, Super User Posts: 17,805 ✭✭✭
    edited 2 March 2022, 9:25AM
    @Jud1th

    It sounds like you have a communal aerial; if you just switch the TV on and tune it in the ordinary way, and 1 gets you the BBC, 233 gets you Sky News, and so on, it’s probably not over the internet.

    Our whole estate is fed from a communal aerial system; terrestrial (Freeview), FM/AM radio, Freesat, Sky, probably raw satellite feed as well. There’s a complicated box in the cupboard under the stairs to take the input and distribute it to wallplates all over the house, but you don’t have to think about it (unless you want Sky, which requires a subscription); you just plug in to the appropriate connector on the nearest wallplate and use it. Carries Ethernet from the router too, if we are so minded….

    And it seems you have two aerial sockets, one behind the TV and one elsewhere that you could use for the YouView box. But it doesn’t quite seem to work for that?

    If the aerial cable on your TV is long enough, you could try the TV on that second aerial socket, see if it works.

    I’m very confused by what happens when you tune the YouView box, though.
    Are the ‘pay’ channels the range 313 to 525? As those are the BT channels if your internet is from BT, or maybe PlusNet, and TalkTalk may have something similar; but I would have though the YouView Box needed to be on the internet to get those, as that is how that range is delivered.

    So, still a mystery. Who is your ISP, and what is the number range of these pay channels?

    Oh, and you might like to try the YouView box with its aerial cable connected to the aerial socket behind the TV, as a test, see if that works any better.
    ‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’ Wm Morris
  • redchizredchiz Member, Super User Posts: 5,476 ✭✭✭
    @Jud1th Just to clarify: you need to have the aerial from the wall socket connected to your YouView box and then another aerial cable from the box to the TV; you also need to have an HDMI cable running from the box to the TV, not anywhere else. That being the case make sure you have the correct HDMI source set on your TV in order to set up the box.  
  • Jud1thJud1th Member Posts: 6
    I’m back at my caravan and this time I came armed with an Ethernet cable. I have done everything as per the instructions on settings and I’m still getting the message ‘Broadband connection unavailable’. I’ve restarted the router and the box several times, but still nothing. I’ve even done a factory reset. It all worked fine at my Mom’s, so I don’t understand the problem. By the way, in an earlier message, I said I didn’t know what aerial I had. It turns out it’s underground. But the telly works just fine.
  • RoyRoy Member, Super User Posts: 17,805 ✭✭✭
    @Jud1th

    Our TV aerial signal comes to the house underground, and it’s fine. There’s a much bigger aerial at the other end of the cable than we could ever have individually, and it’s shared by everyone on our phase of the estate. I expect you have something like that feeding the caravan park.

    As regards your router, I guess it’s fine over WiFi, for all of your devices that support WiFi?

    So you need to test that Ethernet cable, with another Ethernet device. Have you got a laptop there? If so, disable its WiFi, and check this indeed stops the laptop connecting, and then plug the Ethernet cable into the laptop. Does this let the laptop connect to the internet again? (No configuration is needed for this).

    And let us know yes or no.

    If the laptop won’t connect, your Ethernet cable is likely faulty. But if it will connect, then further thought is needed here.
    ‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’ Wm Morris
  • Jud1thJud1th Member Posts: 6
    Thanks Roy. Yes, the router is fine over WiFi. I have a tablet with me but no way of connecting it with the Ethernet cable. I suspected the cable myself, I guess I shall have to acquire another Ethernet cable for my next visit (a couple of weeks time). Either that or not bother with the Youview, but I don’t like to admit defeat.
  • RoyRoy Member, Super User Posts: 17,805 ✭✭✭
    edited 26 March 2022, 9:42AM
    Jud1th said:
    Thanks Roy. Yes, the router is fine over WiFi. I have a tablet with me but no way of connecting it with the Ethernet cable. I suspected the cable myself, I guess I shall have to acquire another Ethernet cable for my next visit (a couple of weeks time). Either that or not bother with the Youview, but I don’t like to admit defeat.
    @Jud1th

    If you haven’t already, try a soft reset of the YouView box while the cable is connected between it and the router, by touching the On/Standby button for just over 8 seconds until the TV screen clears and the box reboots.

    This will encourage the YouView box to retry the connection, and if the cable is actually OK, perhaps start it working.

    But failing that, can you take the cable home with you, when you go, and try it on your Mum’s YouView box? That will definitely tell you if the cable is faulty or not.

    Ethernet cables do go faulty - I trod on a Cat 6 cable once, and though it didn’t actually stop working, it dropped to Cat 5 (100 Mbits instead of 1 Gigabit). And they must only be wound loosely, not tightly, and certainly never folded.
    ‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’ Wm Morris
  • Jud1thJud1th Member Posts: 6
    Hi Roy, the modem is miles from the TV at home, but I think I have another Ethernet cable at home. I’ll try that next time I’m here. This could end up being one of life’s mysteries.
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