Geren

This has all been discussed on AVforums too. One member there quoted LG's response, which confirms that it's Freeview and the channel providers who got it wrong. The quoted response is: "I have had a look into this for you and from what I can see, as you are only having issues with two channels, this is not a fault with your TV and is down to the format of the channel. Many channels are in the MHEG format, however our TVs support HbbTV format channels. We were advised that all services would be updated to support both formats however some channels have not done this causing this issue to occur. I would recommend that you contact the provider of these channels to see when they are updating these channels as our TV’s are no longer compatible with these." Freeview told LG that all MHEG channels would also broadcast in HbbTV , so only HbbTV was needed for mainland UK. The TVs are fit for the purpose Freeview said was required, but the channel providers just didn't get their act together. If Freeview updated LG to say that Freeview made a mistake, and nicely asked LG to enable MHEG reception in mainland UK, LG could fix it. This involves Freeview actually admitting that it made a mistake. The chance of that happening is slightly less than me going for a skiing holiday in Hell.

The companies that produce these channels are the ones that have let the side down. Poor old LG was only following advice from Freeview that only HbbTV would be required, With all the interruptions to businesses caused by the pandemic, I would guess that there will be even more excuses for delays before the channels are switched to HbbTV. A quick google for "LG firmware hbbtv" showed that LG might (I'm guessing) be looking at the issue. For example, the latest firmware for the 49UF770B includes "Improve the MHP’s no working with HbbTV & MHP stream" which might translate into something meaningful in English. It would be nice if they managed that, but I wouldn't bet on it. I've got an old Panasonic freeview recorder (DMR-PWT655EB) which shows the channels OK so that's my workaround. Shops look like they're raising prices of these boxes because of the pandemic, which is thoughtful of them.

@David38 Thanks for passing that gem on. So VOD365 say there is an LG hardware fault that their TVs can't receive signals now which aren't being transmitted until later in the year. We need LG to upgrade the software to fix this issue quickly. Then, when we can receive the RacingTV results from a few months in the future, we can all clean up at the bookies! The problem I've always had with communications industry companies is that they don't understand questions. You ask "Is there a fault?" and they answer the question "Is there a fault we can let you know about without admitting that we are in any way connected with the fault?". Hence, the customers are frustrated and the company keeps its little faults to itself as a matter of National Security. At least we know now. Cheers

For channels being provided on, what they claim is HbbTV, my old LG TV (a 24MT57S) receives them loud and clear in MHEG. Maybe the providers mean they are on MHEG now, and will also be on HbbTV somewhere in the future, once they've been tested. Most of these channels say they can be accessed on t'Internet as well as telly, so perhaps people who need them could go that way. Meanwhile, I wonder if the service platform company is now searching for the plug that's come loose. If things suddenly start working, well done to the person who prodded them!

I've been browsing adverts for the 49UM7400PLB in other countries and they say it supports MHEG in Ireland only ! For example, https://www.lg.com/ro/tv/lg-49UM7400PLB (LG's own specification in Romanian) says "MHEG (Numai Irlanda)" which is "MHEG (Ireland only)". It may be worth seeing what LG say about other models in Romania, since they're telling everyone except the UK about them. The DTG people, who are pushing the switch to HbbTV in the UK made an announcement in 2017 about it https://dtg.org.uk/mheg-hbbtv-transition/ but somehow these channels haven't moved since then. I think they were more interested in getting TV receivers ready for HbbTV rather than the channel providers. Maybe the channel providers need prodding, since their business is looking a bit slow to join the party.

I've recently bought a 49UM7400PLB and noticed these invalid service channels, which led me to this thread. As you appear to have found out, the invalid service channels are 'MHEG' ones which haven't been updated to 'HbbTV' yet, but I noticed that this set does support MHEG in some other countries which haven't switched to HbbTV yet, one of which is Ireland. So I tried a quick experiment, and changed the TV's location (in the General settings menu) from 'United Kingdom' to 'Ireland'. It did some resetting and wiped the channels out, but also changed the 'Programmes' menu to show the 'MHEG' option instead of HbbTV. I did a full retune, which arranged the channels in some fairly random order, but I was able to view '365 Travel' and the racing channel with no problems at all. So that's an ugly work-around, but I don't know if it breaks something else. Unfortunately, this seems to have disabled all HbbTV channels, but things like BBC's Red Button work like the old teletext service instead of the new graphic version. Afterwards, I switched the location back to 'United Kingdom', re-input my postcode and retuned again, and got most stuff back with no trouble. I don't use the MHEG stuff myself, but I've got a DMR-PWT655EB freeview play recorder which still supports MHEG in the UK, so I can see them on that if I want. Hope this helps someone get round LG's premature MHEG withdrawal problem. It would be nice if they just gave us the option to turn it back on in the UK.