# Who remembers the testcard?



## Northerner (Apr 7, 2022)




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## nonethewiser (Apr 7, 2022)

Love it Northie, hard now to remember when tv wasn't 24/7.


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## Contused (Apr 8, 2022)




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## Chris Hobson (Apr 8, 2022)

I can remember having three channels, Beeb 1, Beeb 2, and Yorkshire TV. Later we upgraded our aerial and then we could get Anglia and Tyne-Tees as well. The ITV channels sometimes showed the same stuff and sometimes you had a choice. Anglia used to open up with a piece from Handel's Water Music which I really liked.


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## Northerner (Apr 9, 2022)

Chris Hobson said:


> I can remember having three channels, Beeb 1, Beeb 2, and Yorkshire TV. Later we upgraded our aerial and then we could get Anglia and Tyne-Tees as well. The ITV channels sometimes showed the same stuff and sometimes you had a choice. Anglia used to open up with a piece from Handel's Water Music which I really liked.


Do you remember he seemingly weekly visit from the TV repair man to take the back off and replace a valve?  We used to have a TV from Radio Rentals and you could get radio stations on it


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## Gwynn (Apr 9, 2022)

Anyone remember the trade test colour films?

My favourite was 'The Home Made Car'

A completely different world back then.

I was very young when that was being shown and I still hanker after a life portrayed by that film

It can still be found and watched if the internet is searched.


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## Northerner (Apr 9, 2022)

I looked up this testcard, and it first appeared when Boris Johnson was 3 years old, so I think it probably is him as the clown   It might be a different girl, but there again there have been many women in BJ's life


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## nonethewiser (Apr 10, 2022)

Northerner said:


> Do you remember he seemingly weekly visit from the TV repair man to take the back off and replace a valve?  We used to have a TV from Radio Rentals and you could get radio stations on it



We had visionhire, wasn't coin operated like radio rentals, mother paid small amount each week to hire it, she would ask us to nip in shop whilst in town to pay, thought we were millionaires when dad bought first tv, was one where you'd push button in to change channels.


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## Bloden (Apr 10, 2022)

Hahahahahaha, oops, just fell off my chair, so FUNNY, hahahahaha.


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## chaoticcar (Apr 10, 2022)

I remember when the picture started to slip that we banged it on the top to stop it !!!!!
Now you all know my age 
Carol


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## Chris Hobson (Apr 10, 2022)

At a certain time in the days of black and white TV, the resolution was upgraded from 405 to 625 lines. During the transition period we had a telly that had a switch that allowed you to swap between the two. This meant that you could compare the picture quality of the two formats. 625 was obviously much better.


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## C&E Guy (Apr 11, 2022)

We didn't have a tv until I was 4. Rented from D|E|R.

We only had BBC1 and STV. When BBC2 started, we just couldn't get it properly. The reception was so bad that, on the golf, we saw 4 golfers putting 4 balls into 4 holes! My parents' house was surrounded by high flats, a college on a hill and a railway embankment. They eventually had to get cable.

My dad and I went to a public demonstration of colour tvs one Saturday. We were amazed!


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## Northerner (Apr 11, 2022)

C&E Guy said:


> We didn't have a tv until I was 4. Rented from D|E|R.


I can't remember a time when we didn't have a telly - my earliest memory was Torchy the Battery Boy  We moved over to DER and were with them for years  My friend's dad was a TV repair man, and I remember my Mum saying how rich their family were!   We had a TV many years before we got a fridge  Tin bath in front of the fire and outside loo across the yard


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## Robin (Apr 11, 2022)

I rented my first telly from DER when I got my own flat. In those days, everyone knew where the Vertical Hold knob on the back was, and had extra long arms so you could reach round the back AND look at the picture to see how it was doing.


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## mikeyB (Apr 11, 2022)

We had all the latest telly, because my dad worked at Mullard, part of the huge Philips empire, and got great discounts, so we were the first on our street to get ITV, then a 625 line TV for BBC 2, then a colour telly.


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## Ditto (Apr 11, 2022)

I miss when you went on holiday in a caravan, usually Talacre, and you'd only be able to get foreign telly.  You really felt as if you'd travelled.


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## trophywench (Apr 11, 2022)

Mom & Dad bought their first telly for the Coronation, so had a house full of neighbours that day! Eventually Radio rentals though, although never one you had to feed with money - you just called in the shop on the High St when passing and paid it monthly.  We bought a 2nd hand TV when we got married then after colour TV became generally available, we rented from a local electrical emporium, the rental service of which was later absorbed by Radio Rentals.


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## trophywench (Apr 11, 2022)

Who, what or where, is Talacre?


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## Bedford 1 (Apr 11, 2022)

Remember well the good old days of black and white tv. The national anthem playing at the end and 
having to wait till lunchtime for programs to start. Colour when it came was amazing!


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## Gwynn (Apr 12, 2022)

Our first tv was a very small screen, huge wooden box, valve, black and white affair. I remember being allowed to stay up and watch 'Dixon of Dock Green' on my mothers lap (I was only young then). Much later on I remember our first colour tv. The colours were pretty dire but the novely of colour was fantastic. My best memory from that tv was 'Fireball XL5'. Now we have a 55" LED tv. Brilliant colours, resolution, sound and yet a bit behind the times. Some of the latest ones are incredible (and very expensive).


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## nonethewiser (Apr 12, 2022)

Bedford 1 said:


> Remember well the good old days of black and white tv. The national anthem playing at the end and
> having to wait till lunchtime for programs to start. Colour when it came was amazing!



Yes when switching box off  bright light in middle of screen would get smaller & smaller until it disappeared. Took age to start up from cold also.


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## C&E Guy (Apr 12, 2022)

When we went on holiday to a cottage in Carnoustie, there was no tv and we had to go without for 2 whole weeks.

Then, we got a caravan near Loch Long. We got a portable B&W tv but the reception was awful and unwatchable really.

When I had a long stay in hospital in 1976 (in traction with a broken leg), friends of my dad loaned me a B&W portable which I put on my locker. It was a godsend. The nurses thought it weird when I was watching hospital dramas on it!


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## Ditto (Apr 12, 2022)

trophywench said:


> Who, what or where, is Talacre?











						Talacre Beach | Clwyd | UK Beach Guide
					

The popular beach of Talacre sits just across the River Dee from the Wirral over the English / Welsh border. With miles of golden sand backed by dunes…



					www.thebeachguide.co.uk
				




I didn't know it had a haunted lighthouse, darn it, I don't think we ventured far from the caravan.  I want to go there now.


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## Chris Hobson (Apr 12, 2022)

What a wonderfully nostalgic thread this post has inspired. The odd thing is that now, when we have a really cool high def telly, I don't really watch it that much and wouldn't really miss it much if we got rid of it. If that happens it would be because I have a bit of a problem with the deep injustice of the TV licence.


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## mikeyB (Apr 14, 2022)

Given what Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Sky, BritBox charge the TV licence fee is a bargain. 40p a day and no adverts seems like a good deal to me.

 And I have no idea what Netflix, Amazon and Disney charge, because it doesn’t matter to me, but then I’ve got an excess of disposable income. Actually, with Disney I piggy back on my daughter’s subscription as an additional user.


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## nonethewiser (Apr 14, 2022)

mikeyB said:


> Given what Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Sky, BritBox charge the TV licence fee is a bargain. 40p a day and no adverts seems like a good deal to me.
> 
> And I have no idea what Netflix, Amazon and Disney charge, because it doesn’t matter to me, but then I’ve got an excess of disposable income. Actually, with Disney I piggy back on my daughter’s subscription as an additional user.



We have Sky & Netfix, Sky is expensive for full package with sport added, sure we pay about £6 month for Netfix, again depends on package you ask for.


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## travellor (Apr 14, 2022)

nonethewiser said:


> We have Sky & Netfix, Sky is expensive for full package with sport added, sure we pay about £6 month for Netfix, again depends on package you ask for.


I use Disney, Amazon, Netflix, Virgin, and Now TV. Now shows the same as Sky, but undercuts them


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## travellor (Apr 14, 2022)

Northerner said:


> Do you remember he seemingly weekly visit from the TV repair man to take the back off and replace a valve?  We used to have a TV from Radio Rentals and you could get radio stations on it



I remember someone giving me an old defunct B&W telly when I was about 12.
I bought a new tube out of Practical Wireless magazine, fitted it, and my mum made me take it into the garden to turn it on in case it exploded.
It didn't.


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## Chris Hobson (Apr 14, 2022)

My problem with the TV licence and the BBC is that you have to pay for it whether you want it or not, whether you watch it or not. Of course it is cheaper than the competition when they get to extort money from anyone who owns a television.


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## rebrascora (Apr 14, 2022)

I don't have a TV and haven't for many years but I still get hasselled by TV licencing rather more regularly than I would like despite doing the "No TV licence required" declaration. It really irritates me because it's almost like they assume you are not telling the truth. If they come knocking on my door I will not let them in because I really resent the way they approach the whole situation, as if I have to prove I don't watch TV and need to let them in so that they can check that. I really resent it.
I know there are people who just evade paying but I am not one of them and I follow the rules meticulously. 

I do however remember the test card from my childhood and I found your post funny.


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## nonethewiser (Apr 14, 2022)

travellor said:


> I use Disney, Amazon, Netflix, Virgin, and Now TV. Now shows the same as Sky, but undercuts them



Now is owned by Sky.


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## travellor (Apr 14, 2022)

nonethewiser said:


> Now is owned by Sky.


Still cheaper


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## C&E Guy (Apr 19, 2022)

One of my wife's colleagues was being chased for not having a TV Licence. He doesn't even have a tv!

But he can watch stuff on his laptop so they want the money off him 

Wonder how they prove that?


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