Dongles and TV signals

I was sat down in my van logging onto the internet via a dongle. The mrs was watching tv (jungle celebrity * Inappropriate Word *). As my dongle connected to the internet the digital signal went on the tv. (Screen pixelated). Disconnected dongle and picture returned to normal.
Any thoughts?

Ahh one of my pet subjects!

Yes “EMC” (Electromagnetic Compatibility). The dongle is a mobile phone and effectively a low power transmitter. The radiation is interfering with the TV system.

Now that we all live in a soup of electromagnetic radiation it’s a major issue for product designers who have to meet defined and legal standards that limit radiation from equipment and the immunity of that equipment to interference from other sources. Have a look at the link for some examples of what can go wrong.

http://www.compliance-club.com/archive/old_archive/Bananaskins.htm

Brodco is correct in what he says.

You could try moving the position on the dongle in the van. I am a radio amateur and transmit on most bands in the van with no problems but with the same rig if I go on 10m I give grief to the TV and the vans Control Panel.

I have found the 3 MiFi unit better than the Vodafone dongle on the performance and interference issues the dongle is being ditched due to poor performance. In fact if I get rid of its credit this weekend its bibi vodafone for good

When we are away I have my phone on silent but with vibration switched on so I don't miss a message left for business purposes. I'm on O2 if that makes any difference. You can guarantee if we are watching TV, just at a crucial moment, the phone will vibrate and destroy the TV picture for what seems an eternity much to the annoyance of Carol but if I'm playing on my laptop on the Vodafone dongle then there is no interference at all. Not that the dongle works in that many locations, like Roli I think it's pretty useless. I'm often better getting internet on my phone.

I’ve carried both a Vodaphone dongle and a 3 dongle for several years. The idea being that I’d have access to two networks so hopefully when I was in a bad area for one of them the other may work.

In practice I found that away from the major cities the Vodaphone was about as good as the proverbial chocolate teapot! The performance of the 3 dongle was (is) far superior. Not once did the vodaphone dongle work where the 3 dongle didn’t. As far as I’m aware the MiFi unit is simply a dongle with a built in Wifi transceiver so I’d expect similar performance.

I’d be interested if anyone knows that this assumption is wrong because I’m thinking of upgrading to MiFi.

Incidentally I have the dongle on the end of a 5m USB lead. Not because of any interference problems but so that I can find the best signal. Moving the dongle on the end of a 5m cable may solve Skyrake’s problem – or it may not EMC’s like that.

Brod.

Out of interest ( I know its away from main topic-rapped knuckles) I am building one of the 3mifi units into an aprs system for the van. Could be of use to you Paul tracking where the vehicles are

Bleeding hell. Sounds complicated. I hope i aint going to frazzell my brain.

Thanks to all who answered. I think I will go and sit in the middle of the field next time I want to log on.

Sorry for posting in wrong forum. Tried to delete and re-post but got muddled up.

Tried several dongles in the van, all were 'iffy' to say the least, dropping out etc. but since I got the mifi, everywhere we've been sofar has been spot on,

the things simply velcro'd up high & always had sufficient signal.

Funny thing when I was acaravaner I never had this problem Good TV signal good BB signal