Good morning.
We are trying to set up a Sharp LC-42XD1EA HD TV at a local french friend’s house who has a simple aerial connection. He had a small tv before which worked fine, however the set up proves to be a pain as the TV doesn’t pick up any channels. Are we missing something? When discussed with other friends yesterday, someone mentioned we would have to buy a decoder to install between aerial and tv, is this correct or does the TV have a built in decoder?
Would be really great to receive advice on this from any TV wizard 
Many thanks!
Claudia
It is supposed to come with an integrated TNT tuner, so you shouldn’t need a separate decoder. I’m assuming it was bought in France ? There is a possibility that the old antenna is no longer up to the job of picking up the signals required for that particular receiver.
Also, TNT reception is highly dependent on actual weather conditions - if it is quite sunny, for example, then you might have a problem getting any signal picked up depending on where your line of sight to the relay transmitter is.
A little addenda:
http://www.tvnt.net/forum/reception-tnt-par-beau-temps-t834.html
If you are talking about an old type aerial and not a dish, you will be receiving a terrestrial (TNT) service that only provides standard definition channels. But as Alex says, the TV should have an integrated tuner that should give you those channels.
Make sure you are navigating the setup correctly and are searching for terrestrial channels.
Hi Alex, thanks so much for your prompt reaction.
The TV was bought in the UK quite some years ago, I think it must have been 2008-2009.
This friend’s old small TV worked fine so we just wondered why the channel scanning came up zero.
Do you really think the aerial may be too old?
Hi Mike, we did. During set-up:
- ‘aerial’ was selected
- language set to french
- tv/colour mode SECAM-L (also tried with PAL-L)
It’s SECAM in France.
If it worked on the old TV it should work on the new one. But if the old one failed to work, that could have been due to a loss of signal, possibly due to displacement of the aerial or deterioration of the cable.
I have no specific experience with Sharp, but new TVs are all very similar. We have a Toshiba that is connected to French and English satellite dishes and is also connected to our old TNT aerial.
I can only suggest that you check that have meticulously followed the setup instructions and try again.
An installation professional might have his own way of testing the aerial, but the easy answer is to try it with a TV that has worked with a similar aerial somewhere else.
That is quite old if from 2008. The model I found with the reference you gave on a French web was for a current version, so if it does has an integrated digital tuner (which is one of the key questions to be answered above all else), then it could be that it is no longer functional with the new digital frequencies and video compression format (MPEG4) that were introduced a few years ago (2016 ). If the integrated tuner is MPEG2 compatible, then you won’t be able to pick up any signals, unless you happen to find a few that are still broadcasting on MPEG2 (I thought the last of these were switched in June 2019 to full MPEG4).
EDIT : this link provides more information
The old tv was working fine when we swapped so the aerial must be too.
We just want to give him this Sharp because it is so much bigger and easier for him to watch with his slowly failing eye sight. At 10 years old, the Sharp is not new but it certainly is younger than his old tv and should really pick up channels easily. Pretty sure all set-up details were correct. But we’re obviously missing something .
Claudia, found this:
https://www.lcd-compare.com/televiseur-SHALC42XD1E-SHARP-LC-42XD1E.htm
where it says that that model is not compatible with current French MPEG4 video compression format, therefore you shouldn’t be able to pick up any signals with it.
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In my experience, when things go wrong, it is almost always my fault. Usually because I assume I know what I am doing instead of meticulously following the instructions. But you could contact Sharp assistance if all else fails.
Thanks for the help, will look at getting a decoder now.
Any tips on which one to get from Amazon?
So many on offer 
Thanks again, much appreciated!
Afraid I won’t be of much use there. I bought a TNT decoder from the local Carrefour for our old TV several years ago and still haven’t installed it !
Hmm, PAL and SECAM (as Mike says the French standard was SECAM) are only applicable to old analogue transmissions, not TNT - are you sure you had the set scanning for digital channels?
Ah, I may have missed something there!
Maybe this will help - https://www.recevoirlatnt.fr/particuliers/problemes-de-reception-tnt/la-recherche-des-chaines/comment-lancer-une-recherche-des-chaines/
That’s also going to be something of an issue!
Don’t be so negative. it’s probably going to be OK. 
Yes, I just need to just believe harder and all will be well.
According to the spec I have seen, that TV has a DVB-T tuner and if an older receiver worked I can’t see why the new one wouldn’t.
France switched all broadcasts to HD (and hence MPEG4) a couple of years back.
You are correct that the broadcast standard is still DVB-T rather than DVB-T2 - but I think even that is planned for a switch over now.