Posted by: Shaun Guard Posted Date: 01/10/2018 For Oxford Aerials the early part of 2018 was dominated by work caused by the changing frequencies from all of our local TV transmitters. Changes were made in February and in May and the Oxford transmitter started broadcasting all of its TV stations on new parts of the frequency band. These frequencies had never used on this transmitter before. Many older aerials around Oxfordshire were not suited to this frequency and had to be replaced with wide-band aerials.

The reason for all of the changes is that Ofcom and the government have decided to clear all of the frequencies above 700 MHz so they can be used for mobile phone data services. The 800 MHz frequencies were already cleared of TV broadcasts for 4G data services a few years ago.

We thought that these new frequencies would now remain the same for the foreseeable future but we have just discovered that there is going to be another frequency switch-over within a couple of years. Ofcom have decided to also clear the 600MHz band for more mobile data services. Terrestrial broadcasts will be squeezed into the 400 and 500 MHz frequencies.

The suggestion is that terrestrial TV may be turned off altogether in the 2030’s.