BBC Channels to move to Astra 1N Friday 24th February 2012
The BBC channels, BBC1, BB2, BBC3, BBC4, BBC1HD, BBCHD, CBBC, CBeebies, will be moving from Astra 2D to Astra 1N this coming Friday.
There will be no change of frequencies.
The BBC channels will be using the same frequencies as they currently do.
However, this will mean that reception of these BBC channels in Spain will be much better than currently.
In some areas, they should be able to be received on a small 80cm or 1m satellite dish, where are previously they may not have been available even on a 2.4m satellite dish.
This follows the recent move of the ITV and channel 4 group of channels to Astra 1N in the last few weeks.
The BBC technical department have posted a blog about the BBC channels migration from Astra 2D to Astra 1N:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/aboutthebbc/2012/02/changes-to-bbc-services-on-sat.shtml
As some people may already be aware, the satellite operator SES Astra is making a number of changes to its fleet of satellites at the 28.2oEast orbital position over the next few years. These satellites are used for broadcasting television and radio channels (including those on Sky and Freesat) to homes in the UK.
The first of these changes will take place during February when the Astra 1N satellite, which was launched last summer, replaces the Astra 2D satellite, which is coming towards the end of its life.
The BBC currently broadcasts many of its television and radio services on Astra 2D, so as part of this replacement process BBC services that are currently located on Astra 2D will be moved across to Astra 1N. The services affected are:
BBC One (including all National and Regional variants)
BBC One HD
BBC Two (including all National variants)
BBC Three
BBC Four
BBC HD
CBeebies
CBBC
BBC News
BBC Parliament
BBC ALBA
BBC Radio 5 Live
BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra
The migration will be taking place during the early hours of the morning on Friday 24th February, between approximately 03:00 and 05:00 GMT. If you are watching or listening to BBC channels via satellite during this time you may experience some intermittent disruption to service. PVR recordings of BBC programmes made during this time may also be disrupted.
The good news for satellite viewers is that the tuning details used for BBC services on Astra 1N following the migration will be the same as those used today for services on Astra 2D. The signal strength of the new satellite will also be the same or possibly better in some parts of the country. This means that the change of satellites should be invisible to most viewers – there should be no need to update or retune your set-top box.
As usual a cautionary note. These changes for BBC channels, ITV channels and C4 channels onto Astra 1N are not expected to be permanent. Their reception may well change and be very different later in the year, when new satellites are deployed for UK satellite TV.
It is entirely possible that these channels may only be available on smaller satellite dishes (such as 80cm or 1m), as opposed to the 1.8m and 2,.4m satellite dishes used in Spain, for a few months. The exact timescale of these channels availability on such smaller satellite dishes is unknown.
These are the BBC channel frequencies affected by the change of satellites from Astra 2d to Astra 1N on Friday 24th February 2012
10773 H 22000 5/6
BBC One London
BBC One Cambridge
BBC One Channel Islands
BBC One West
BBC Two England
CBBC (08-20)
BBC Three (20-05)
10778 V 22000 5/6
BBC One West Midlands
BBC One East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire
BBC One East Midlands
BBC One East
BBC One Wales
BBC Two Wales
BBC Parliament
10803 H 22000 5/6
BBC One North West
BBC One Yorkshire and North Midlands
BBC One South East
CBeebies UK (07-20)
BBC Four (20-04)
BBC One Scotland
BBC Two Scotland
BBC Radio 5 Live
BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra
BBC News
10818 V 22000 5/6
BBC One South
BBC One South West
BBC One North East and Cumbria
BBC One Oxford
BBC One Northern Ireland
BBC Two Northern Ireland
BBC Alba
10847 V 23000 8/9
BBC One HD
BBC HD UK