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Since Alix Pryde's departure as Director of Distribution, I've taken up the role in an acting capacity. I wanted to use this post to introduce myself and give you a heads up of the changes we're putting in place in order to make a blistering summer of sport and music available via Red Button.

Once again, the Ö÷²¥´óÐã will be making additional Red Button streams available.Ìý And for the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, as we did for the London 2012 Olympic Games, we will make Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three available 24 hours a day, in HD and in SD.

Extended Hours for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three

Following the success of Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three extended hours during the London 2012 Olympics, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three will once again be broadcasting in the daytime during the Commonwealth Games (23 July to 3 August).

To make space for this, we have to juggle how our services are configured.ÌýÌý No action should be required by viewers to receive extended hours on Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three, but to explain where the capacity is coming from:

• On DSAT SD, CÖ÷²¥´óÐã SD moves transponder (from Tp 48 to Tp 45), allowing Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three to extended into CÖ÷²¥´óÐã’s original slot.Ìý CÖ÷²¥´óÐã SD will timeshare with the part-time Red Button stream, ‘Red Button 0’.
• On DSAT HD, CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD moves to our temporary summer transponder, allowing Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three HD to extend into CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD’s original slot.Ìý While on the temporary transponder, CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD will timeshare with Red Button HD.
• On DTT SD, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three becomes 24 hours while CÖ÷²¥´óÐã shares with Red Button 301. (Unlike the Olympics, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Parliament will remain on-air for the duration of the Commonwealth Games as Parliament doesn’t rise until part-way through the Games.)
• On DTT HD, extended hours Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three HD takes over CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD’s capacity.

Ìý

Additional Red Button streams

Wimbledon and Glastonbury

Satellite and cable viewers will receive five SD and one HD Red Button stream, while Freeview and YouView viewers will receive two SD Red Button streams. These streams will be available from the first day of Wimbledon, 23^rd June.

These streams will be EPG listed on all platforms so that you can record your favourite events. The channel numbers will be as follows:

*Available to c. 90% of UK households, because we are using capacity on a commercial multiplex to deliver these services.

Commonwealth Games

Again, there will be additional Red Button streams available on all platforms. The lineup is different from that of Wimbledon and Glastonbury, because capacity is required to extend Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three’s hours in SD and HD.

For the duration of the Commonwealth Games, you will find the available Red Button streams at the following EPG positions:

* These streams share capacity with CÖ÷²¥´óÐã, so will be available from 7pm.

**Available to c. 90% of UK households, because we are using capacity on a commercial multiplex to deliver these services.

How to access the services

You will not need to do anything special to access the extended Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three and Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three HD.

To access the new Red Button streams:

• ÌýIf you have Freeview, YouView or BT Vision+ your receiver may well pick up the changes automatically but you will likely need to do a retune if you don’t have an HD receiver. Digital UK’s TV retune website gives advice on how to retune.

• ÌýIf you have Sky, you should not have to do anything. If you do have a problem receiving any of our channels, you can try turning your Sky set top box off at the mains, waiting 30 seconds and turning it back on again. If that doesn’t resolve your problem you can find more help at .

• ÌýIf you have Virgin Media the new streams should appear automatically. If you do have a problem receiving any of our channels, you can find more help at Virgin’s website. For Virgin TiVo users the broadcast Red Button streams will still appear in the 990s while the Red Button application on our TV channels will take you to additional coverage on the Connected Red Button service.Ìý

• ÌýIf you have Freesat and you do not pick up the new channels automatically, you may need to put your digital box or TV into standby for 30 seconds and then switch it back on again. If the channels are still unavailable then carry out a 'Freesat channel retune'. Full instructions can be found in the manual for your digital TV or box. Further help with retuning can be found at www.freesat.co.uk or by calling the Freesat customer support team on 08450 990 990.

For those that need it, full DSAT transponder information can be found on our .Ìý

CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD on Freeview

CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD will be off-air on Freeview from 16^th July until shortly after the Commonwealth Games, to allow us to extend Ö÷²¥´óÐã Three HD’s hours.

CÖ÷²¥´óÐã will remain on air in standard definition on Freeview channel 70. Ìý

I’m sorry for any inconvenience this causes. Unfortunately, any series links set for CÖ÷²¥´óÐã HD will not record and will need to be reset for CÖ÷²¥´óÐã SD if you want to continue to record the programme during the Commonwealth Games. Ìý

Radio on Freeview in Scotland

My predecessor, Alix Pryde, has previously explained how and why some Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio services are removed on Freeview in Scotland to make way for .Ìý When Ö÷²¥´óÐã ALBA launched in June 2011, we were able to keep three radio stations on air; we prioritised stations unavailable on FM and because we couldn’t restore all seven stations without FM coverage we gave priority to the stations which were the most listened to on digital television: Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 5 live, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 1Xtra and Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 6 Music.

In December 2013 we were able to take advantage of some spare capacity to restore some .Ìý We need this capacity back to enable our Commonwealth Games configuration to work, so I’m sorry to say that the stations which were restored in December 2013 will revert to being unavailable in the evenings on Freeview in Scotland from 16thÌýJuly until shortly after the Commonwealth Games.Ìý The affected stations are: Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 4, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 4 Extra, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 5 live sports extra, Ö÷²¥´óÐã Asian Network and Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland.

I hope that these changes to the Ö÷²¥´óÐã’s services will help you to enjoy another fantastic summer of sport with us.

Garazi Goia is Acting Director of Distribution.