Hi folks, I was listening to a discussion about why Radio 4 is still broadcasting on long wave after the announcement that the service was to be shut down on the 1st April, and it was revealed that other users of this service (MI5, submarines?) insisted that the service continues until early June 2025! Huh, my needs as others no doubt in Europe count for nothing! Tried listening using a mobile device? Sound quality is substandard compared with a good quality radio. Meanwhile, on the assumption of the April closure, most shipping forecasts have been moved over (what bad planning! Sack the lot!) to other forms, shame really as I was a keen listener.
According to Peter Hennessy, if the crew aboard the Vanguard submarines determine that the Today programme isn’t broadcast on Radio 4 then they initiate the so-called Doomsday Protocol as it’ll mean the UK no longer exists. The “Letters of Last Resort” will then be followed… Although I wonder if, under Boris Johnson’s premiership, there might have been two sets of contradicting letters written 
Sadly, it looks like R4 LW is finally going to pop its clogs on June 27.
End of an era for me, as R4 or R3 are a constant companion in my workshops, though it’s been more R3 over the last few years owing to what I see as a political shift towards the right on R4 current affairs.
As I have no wi-fi, my listening to R4 in France will now be limited to how much data I am willing to use on my phone.
On the plus side, I will be listening to France Culture and France Musique on the radio instead.
The increasing reliance on digital is not a good idea in my book, it lacks resilience as times become more challenging in the world.
,
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The solution to most of these dilemmas is a satellite dish pointed at 28 E . The nice thing is that the dish can be at ground level unlike a terrestrial antenna . All the BBC radios are there as well as standard TV. Getting the dish aligned is an achievement or bloody frustrating depending on your mindset
I get the lot on my Ring doorbell Alexa from Radio 1 to 5 clear as a bell and I must live furthest away in France from the UK
These are internet data transmissions you are getting and are glial
I haven’t had a tv for over 25 years and have no requirement for that, and have never had a satellite dish, so it would be a big learning curve for me to set that up. No chance of Alexa or suchlike for me as I am not keen on giving free data to the evil billionaire tech bros….
However, my neighbour is pretty good with satellites etc so I will find out from him what’s involved and if it’s feasible chez moi. Thank you.
OK.. setting up without a TV would be very difficult and even using it would be terribly annoying .. In terms of equipment you need a dish mounted on a south facing wall ..height is no problem it can be at ground level ..but it must see the sky . A cable from it to a satellite box and then a suitable cable to the TV or Audio system. The problem is that most of these systems display their menus and lists of stations on the TV screen and only have a number on any satellite box display . Very modern Tvs might actually have the satellite box embedded in them .and uses the TV remote to assign channels.
The Dish has to be aligned with the direction of the satellite .. for the BBCs that is about 28 degrees East off due south .and can be extremely frustrating since it’s not like Terrestrial where anything vaguely in the correct direction gets a signal ..these need to be spot on .. It easy but time consuming .once aligned the dish tightened should be good for years.
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For someone in southern France, what size dish would it need to be? We happily watched UK television through the Astra satellite until it was reoriented a while back, centring more on Paris. We were advised that we’d need a new dish about a metre wide and decided to let it go.
Maybe the internet route is better for us.
Alas, that’s short term solution as the satellites at 28.2° East are expected to run out of the fuel for the thrusters that they use to hold position between 2027 and 2029.
As IPTV is far more cost effective than terrestrial and satellite TV, they won’t be replaced.
In Bretagne I have no difficulty with a 75 mm dish centred on Astra 28.3 East for BBC and similar stuff. Its fine in anything except a deluge .I recall that there was some fluff about the British channels picking a Satellite where they could narrow focus the beam so that much of France and beyond was in interference fringes .. but no evidence of that.
At present we are happy campers as we have a working internet and the RTE player ..Ireland works well on an Apple TV box and we get our daily news ..and the All Ireland Football Final (GAA ) was available on BBC NI on satellite ….and it was a humdinger ..
The problem with internet is that unless you are using VPNs ,that many streaming channels for IPTV are geolocked .. .And VPNs and national telecommunications regulators are playing. Whack a Mole .
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Down in Aude in the Montagne Noire, I have a 100cm dish with a good LNB and WF-100 cable and it’s fine from September to May but it suffers in the summer as all do in marginal signal conditions. I considered upgrading the dish to a better quality resin 120cm dish but couldn’t really justify it.
In summer ..Is it foliage ,?. Satellite TV should not care about temperature or ionosphere which affects terrestrial
The warmer weather in the summer scatters the signal from the satellite in the atmosphere more than normal, reducing signal strength. High humidity in summer can also reduce signal strength. Within the normal satellite footprint you wouldn’t notice the difference, but lots of France is outside the footprint where signal levels are very low and so these effects make a much bigger difference, causing what is called ‘summer fade’.
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Thanks for your detailed and clear advice 