• News Updates: Scotland Switch complete, mobile roaming fees reduced, plus the of the line for an awesome vehicle
• Focus: 4G Mobile Broadband is coming, but will it cripple Freeview?
• Featured: Nintendo Wii U, Sky Go, changes to SeeSaw and the laminated book’s TV channel
• Out and About: Our look at the Home Technology Show
• Your comments and questions on Freesat HD, broadband dongles, and Internet cameras

If you have an iPod, iPhone or iPad device, you should find show 65 is available now for free download – If you’ve not subscribed, go to  FrequencyCast on iTunes.

Alternatievly, you can download Show 65 direct to your MP3 player or listen online at http://www.frequencycast.co.uk/latest.html.

Links:

• Show Notes for Show 65
• Transcript: 4G and Freeview Interference
• Transcript: Show 65 Transcript Part 2

We’ve changed the format of this show everso slightly, to get more news crammed into the show. We’d love to know your comments.

Our shows are free, and we need to you to spread the word – Please mention FrequencyCast on Facebook and Twitter, and tell your friends about us.

A stack of TV and Tech news to cover, including:

• BBC slashes BBC HD bandwidth by 40%
• Channel 4 3D starts next week
• Welsh TV hits Manchester, plus a Switch update
• Happy Birthday to the Apple iPhone
• Ourkindofmusic ceases their kind of music
• Plus your emails

The show is attached to this blog entry, or you can listen at www.frequencycast.co.uk/update.html, or get us from the FrequencyCast Podcast page on iTunes.

There’s been lots of media chat about this already, but in case you’ve missed it, what we think are the three headlines are as follows:

1. Analogue Radio off by 2015: The intention here is to get national FM services and existing local services over to DAB by 2015, freeing up space for what’s being called “ultra local” stations on FM. Listeners would need to migrate from FM to digital by 2015. There are also targets proposed to get digital radio listening up to 50% by 2013, a somewhat ambitious target, and a target of DAB-only car radios in new cars by 2013. AM stations also need to shift to DAB.

2. Broadband tax: To help achive the Government’s “every home must have at least 2Meg broadband by 2012″ pledge, a stealth tax of 50p per month on all landlines is proposed to improve the infrastructure.

3. Internet piracy. The target is for UK ISPs to reduce online file-sharing and piracy by 70% within a year, with measures ranging from warning letters, speed throttling, to details being passed to copyright owners. Ofcom will be given the power to enforce this.

For the full report, see http://www.culture.gov.uk/what_we_do/broadcasting/5631.aspx

The Beacon Hill transmitter and its 23 relay transmitters serve Torbay and South Devon. They’re set to go fully digital from 08 April 2009.

Stockland Hill, serving Exeter, parts of Devon, Somerset and Dorset, is due to follow in May 2009.

If you need help getting ready for the analogue switchoff, please go to http://www.switchhelp.co.uk for advice.

The US was set to complete its switch to Digital TV next month, on the 17th of February 2009. However, with an estimated 6 and a half million homes not yet digital, the US Senate has voted to delay the turning off of analogue telly until June the 12th.

Unlike in the UK, over in the States, there’s a goverment help scheme to offer $40 towards the purchase of a set-top box (typically costing between £50 and $75).

No sign of a slowdown for the UK Switchover, with more of the country set to switch in 2009 including the Scottish Border Region, the West Country and parts of Wales. More on the UK switchover on our sister site Switch Help

On the 6th of November 2008, the BBC 2 analogue service from the Selkirk transmitter was switched off, beginning the Border TV Digital Switchover.

According to The Scotsman newspaper, 52,000 households get their telly from the Selkirk transmitter, and 97% of them were ready.

Looking for information on going digital? See Digital Switchover Help

Freeview set-top boxes from Bush, Daewoo, Labgear, Triax and Portland can’t cope with a transmitter upgrade that’s creeping across the UK. Affected boxes can’t cope with the changes made at transmitter sites, and the advice is – bin it, and buy another.

Find out more at www.frequencycast.co.uk/freeviewlandfill.html

Boxes powered by the SetPal technology, including those made by Daewoo, Labgear, Portland and Triax, lack sufficient internal memory to cope with the number of Freeview stations after a transmitter upgrade, and become useless.

More on the story, including a quote from our sister site, Radio & Telly can be found here: Daily Record 5 July 2008

There are believed to be between 200,000 and 350,000 affected boxes in the UK, and as the transmitter networks get upgraded ready for the Switchover, more and more boxes are set to become landfill fodder

More on the digital switch at www.switchhelp.co.uk

Campaigners include local TV operators, voluntary organisations and media campaigners, and has the backing of 126 MPs.

If successful, Channel 6 would launch before the end of 2012 the Digital Switchover

Here’s what we cover in today’s show:

• News Updates: An end to the High Def DVD format wars, BBC on the iPhone, the US strike’s over, we discover more about podcast listening, and we say hello to the 21st Century KITT.
• Focus – Digital Radio: After DAB has had a really rough couple of months, Carl and Pete pick up the pieces, look at some DAB technology, ask whether the future is Net radio, and read through listener’s texts and mails on digital radio.
• Neuros OSD: A new piece of kit – a gadget that converts your video, streams your content and acts as a PVR.
• Your Questions: Listeners questions on wireless V+ box connections, Freeview Series Link, video on a whiteboard, TV in other rooms, HDMI cables and Freeview in hilly areas.

You can download Show 24 direct to your MP3 player, listen online, or view the show notes at http://www.frequencycast.co.uk/cast24.html

Enjoy the show? Add a quick iTunes review: Review us.

Our “Unofficial Guide to The Digital Switchover” looks at the top ten things you need to know, and answers our listener’s common switchover questions.

 The show lasts for 20 minutes, and can be downloaded for free from our Digital Switch page

We have a new pages of notes at www.frequencycast.co.uk/analogueswitchoff.html

We’re also asking for your votes via this page… as well as your comments here on our blog – for possible inclusion in a future show…