On arrival at site and after introducing yourself to the client, obtain readings of the current system so you can determine the appropriate levels and frequencies to use. In this case we will focus on one channel, however you will need to do this for every channel if adding more than one.

To do this :

1 : Go to the furthest TV from the headend location (known as the LR or longest run), and unplug the Free to Air cable from the TV. Insert his cable into your meter and run the spectrum analyser. When the analyser has scanned the system, you will look for unused frequencies. Unused frequencies will show no “spikes” whereas used frequencies will show spikes. In some cases with low signal these may not be very high, so its best to zoom in. Place your marker over the top of an unused frequency and take note of the frequency RF channel map number (eg 36). Always look for a frequency that has nothing either side of it if you can (this is not always possible). So for example if you have frequencies 35, 36 and 37 with no transmission on them, you would use frequency 36. You must ensure that your chosen frequency is between 2 and 12 (VHF), or between 29 and 52 (UHF) as most TVs will not tune outside of those parameters

2 : Once you have determined the unused frequency, take the meter off spctrum and read the actual frequency to double check if there is anything there. If you read MER or BER in addition to signal strength, there is already a transmission there ! If not, then you have identified a spare frequency.

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