New Installation, ITV & Channel 4 are active

Villain

Well lads, I got the first part of my new installation done today, and when I connected my old box with my new card all the stations except the Irish ones (i.e RTE, TV3 and TNAG4) were working fine. The guy that installed sky rang them and asked him to resend the signal which takes from 2 mins to 24 hours.

After he left I went into other channels where I have ITV and Channel 4 and they are live.

So I took out my card in case the new signal would kill them, has this happened before?. I'm guessing that after a day or two rte will come back and the ITV etc will go???

Or am I lucky enough to have ITV and Channel 4?

Greenman

That happened to me, RTE etc took about 6 hours to come in and during that time I had ITV, tell us what happens!!!

Villain

will, do I'm going to leave my card out for 24 hours, although I'm pretty sure as soon as I put it back in tommorrow ITV and the others will go dead

DMC

Originally posted by irish1
Or am I lucky enough to have ITV and Channel 4?

Well, if you can get the Irish channels via aerial, then there is no real advantages having them on Sky. (Plus marks: digital pictures. Minus: no widescreen or fancy extra gubbins)

And you should have Channel 5 too. Hope you get to keep them!

watty

Unfortunately even if Sky didn't send a signal with RTE et al taking a card out makes it expire in a day or two!

The "keys" (or something) on the card are updated periodically. If you leave a card out for a week it might have to be "in" again overnight for C4 to come back.

Since mostly a good aerial will get RTE, I'd rather have the C4 and ITV!

I get as good or sometimes better off air with a massive aerial on big pole as I did when I had the subscription. NO irish TV on the Digibox, now. (Unless UTV counts as Irish)

It is a fact that the "average" quality of Digital 4:3 picture is better than an average UHF analog picture (less noise), but poorer than a best Analog picture (less artifacts, more detail on movement, i.e. football pitches have grass, not snooker table felt)

ShaneOC

I have this confused card syndrome on one of my boxes too. I was not using the card for quite a while but when I put it back in all the channels (ITV, Ch4 and 5) were back on. You will also find that if you have a family pack subscrption that you should have ITV2 available in other channels.

Good idea about taking the card out for 24 hours. The card will not expire - worst case scenario is that it may have to be left in the box overnight for all the stations to come back.

watty

Yes ShaneOC, I was blandly using the word "expire" in a loose sense. Of course you are riight, taking the card out never cancels the card, it merely needs a "fresh" update to return to normal.

Get a neighbour to plug in the Digibox a day before one comes back from holidays!

egan007

i might try tune them into mine - anyone have frequencies / link

sergeant121

Originally posted by egan007
i might try tune them into mine - anyone have frequencies / link

No chance but here you go - http://www.lyngsat.com/packages/skyuk.shtml

Villain

Ok just put card back in and there still, added Channel five as well.

So lets see how long they last?

I'l let u know when there gone, probably a few hours, but hey we can live in hope.

John R

Originally posted by LurkingIcon
Unfortunately even if Sky didn't send a signal with RTE et al taking a card out makes it expire in a day or two!

The "keys" (or something) on the card are updated periodically. If you leave a card out for a week it might have to be "in" again overnight for C4 to come back.

Since mostly a good aerial will get RTE, I'd rather have the C4 and ITV!

I get as good or sometimes better off air with a massive aerial on big pole as I did when I had the subscription. NO irish TV on the Digibox, now. (Unless UTV counts as Irish)

It is a fact that the "average" quality of Digital 4:3 picture is better than an average UHF analog picture (less noise), but poorer than a best Analog picture (less artifacts, more detail on movement, i.e. football pitches have grass, not snooker table felt)

The quality of digital varies widely from one channel to another, out of all of the sky digital package the Irish channels are close to the best thanks to there being only 4 tv and a few radio channels on the transponder. The only major flaw is the black level on the RTE channels the threshold is set far too high. You are right though a perfect analog reception will always give a better picture, quite hard to come by unless you have an unobstructed line to a nearby transmitter.

Villain

Still there, watching ITV at the moment.

But I'm taking the card out whenever I'm not watching

Villain

Still active, was watching ITV2 before I left this morning, I had the card in for most of the day yesterday watching the soccer.


How long will it last do?

LFCFan

have you got the Irish Channels yet?

Villain

Originally posted by LFCFan
have you got the Irish Channels yet?

No Don't have them and don't want them either, if they come in then ITV etc will go

maddog

Maybe you got an English card instead of an Irish one? that's why you don't have RTE...

Regards,
Maddog

Agent Smith

i think everyone would rather a uk card then i irish card afaik

sceptre

Originally posted by agent smith
i think everyone would rather a uk card then i irish card afaik

sceptre wouldn't

Agent Orange

Originally posted by agent smith
i think everyone would rather a uk card then i irish card afaik

You kidding? ITV is rubbish, and most of Channel 4's output is on E4. And let's not even mention the televisual crapper that is Channel 5.

watty

Now that BBC is FTA....

Villain

Originally posted by Agent Orange
You kidding? ITV is rubbish, and most of Channel 4's output is on E4. And let's not even mention the televisual crapper that is Channel 5.

Wednesday nights soccer highlights were only shown on ITV!!

Rte can be got by an aerial any day, so I think I'd prefer ITV and the others

Villain

Still active, very surprised do

DMC

Good one!

doh.ie

irish1, I'm guessing your box (by having the card out) "missed" the
activation of the RTE etc signals.

However, if Sky choose to resend those pulses at any point, or
run a software upgrade, or any kind of card 'refresh' signal, I'm wondering
if your card will realise its missing RTE and add those on.

For example, when my FTV cards are out of the box for a while and I put
one in, it takes a few minutes for them to come back to life, which is good.
FTV cards are handy in that they don't need reauthorisation.

The only danger with yours is my concern that a pulse might trigger its Irishness
- your safest bet is probably to keep it out of the box when you're not using it,
so it doesn't realise what it really is! (And also hope Sky don't plan to replace cards
anytime soon!)

Villain

Yea I thought it would have sent an update signal by now, but the card has only being in the box for a few hours each day, and I think most updates happen over night.

I got myself an FTV card anyway, that the bro is using while my Sky card still has the stations, so it's not the end of the world if I lose them.

Interesting do to see how long it lasts

ShaneOC

I've had mine for almost a year now. It has been in a box for almost 6 months continuously. It's hard enough to get Sky to send the signals when you want them too, they probably wont do anything unless you start complaining.

Tony

its unlikely they will send any further activation signals unless you request them to.

Tony

Originally posted by irish1
Yea I thought it would have sent an update signal by now, but the card has only being in the box for a few hours each day, and I think most updates happen over night.

I got myself an FTV card anyway, that the bro is using while my Sky card still has the stations, so it's the end of the world if I lose them.

Interesting do to see how long it lasts