Free to air Digital Question

flyswatter

Hi, I'm just wondering if I will be able to activate the BBCi (red button) service if I purchase a free to air satellite setup in Ireland?

watty

no.
You need a Sky Digibox, or Sky+ or SkyHD.

But it may be used Free To Air without a Sky Sub.


PS
Welcome to the forums.

Post moved from Terrestrial (spiky aerials) to Satellite (dishes pickup from Space)

5h4mr0(k

If you're just looking for the BBCi video streams, like the African Cup of Nations games, you can get them - you'll just have to manually go to the channel number for the stream instead of pressing the red button.

flyswatter

watty wrote: »

no.
You need a Sky Digibox, or Sky+ or SkyHD.

But it may be used Free To Air without a Sky Sub.


PS
Welcome to the forums.

Post moved from Terrestrial (spiky aerials) to Satellite (dishes pickup from Space)

Thanks. How would I go about getting a free to air Sky subscription?

Tony

flyswatter wrote: »

Thanks. How would I go about getting a free to air Sky subscription?

No such thing.

flyswatter

Tony wrote: »

No such thing.

Sky Free to air satellite? There is in Britain anyway. Not sure about here.

Tony

flyswatter wrote: »

Sky Free to air satellite? There is in Britain anyway. Not sure about here.

you said free to air sky subscription, a subscription means a payment, Free to air means just that Free. Perhaps you are thinking of the free to view cards which require a Uk address which will give you ch4/5

flyswatter

Tony wrote: »

you said free to air sky subscription, a subscription means a payment, Free to air means just that Free. Perhaps you are thinking of the free to view cards which require a Uk address which will give you ch4/5

I believe it is free to air after you pay a once off fee at the start.

Tony

flyswatter wrote: »

I believe it is free to air after you pay a once off fee at the start.

You believe what is free to air? Free to air means a particular broadcast is free to watch and does not require card or fee.

snaps

BBC is free, No card or sub required, all you need is a skybox. You can receive some interactive stuff on a non skybox (FTA receiver) you have to tune them in manually, frequencies can be found on lyngsat and BBCi is what your looking for.

christo82

snaps wrote: »

BBC is free, No card or sub required, all you need is a skybox. You can receive some interactive stuff on a non skybox (FTA receiver) you have to tune them in manually, frequencies can be found on lyngsat and BBCi is what your looking for.

I have both an Fta Receiver and a secondhand Sky Box, and personally I find getting to the interactive streams on the FTA Box far quicker and easier than going though the red button on the Sky one. I put all the streams together in the channel line-up. The only drawback is you don't have the listings for what's going to be on the streams during the week, and also other things like sky Text.

watty

The streams also change PID and frequency so you will have to keep rescanning.
Also you don't have text or any related interactive application, nor know what is on each stream.

For ordinary Free Satellite TV a FTA receiver is fine. For properly working Interactive, especially the text content, you need Sky Box. You can sign up for a year (covers dish, LNB, Install) and then cancel or else buy one.

If you are competent at DIY you can install a S/H skybox or new FTA receiver yourself (mount and align Dish + LNB) or if not then a 1 year sub to sky is reasonable value, you
own the gear from install time.

biologikal

watty wrote: »

The streams also change PID and frequency so you will have to keep rescanning.
Also you don't have text or any related interactive application, nor know what is on each stream.

Are you sure about that? I set up the 7 streams beside each other in the satellite list on 2 SL65s back in September, and I don't recall ever having duplicate entries like I would normally have when other channels change some value after a scan.

Not knowing what's on a FTA box gives plus points to the Sky box, but using the XMLTV data at the Radio Times site can give you some information, but only about the sport intended to be shown on the streams. For example, I can see that between 22.50-03.00 on Sunday 3rd-Monday 4th, there will be live coverage of the Superbowl on one of the streams, and it even tells me that there will be a choice of audio, either American TV or BBC Radio 5 Live commentry, as well as a guide to the rules of American Football. The BBC website will also have info on what's going to be on BBCi, but you'll generally have to search it out, it's not all in one place.

christo82

biologikal wrote: »

Are you sure about that? I set up the 7 streams beside each other in the satellite list on 2 SL65s back in September, and I don't recall ever having duplicate entries like I would normally have when other channels change some value after a scan.

QUOTE]

yeah, I don't think any BBC channel(including streams) has changed it's PID or other info in the last 5 months. But many other channels do.

Zaphod

Some receivers will also autoupdate the PIDs following a change.

The 28E slot seems to be unique across the entire arc when it comes to PIDs changing. In every other orbital slot, the PIDS are rarely, if ever, changed.

Does anyone know if Sky handle the uplink/downlink for BBC or indirectly lease the TPs to them? I've noticed that the transponder info for the BBC, ITV TPs are always marked as 'BSkyB'. The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if Sky deliberately dick around with the PIDs so as to make viewing the channels more difficult for (non-digibox) FTA viewers.

Tony

Zaphod wrote: »

The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if Sky deliberately dick around with the PIDs so as to make viewing the channels more difficult for (non-digibox) FTA viewers.

Would not surprise me in the least

DMC

But why would a channel like ITV do so? They've done that with in the last few weeks with UTV, STV and ITV3. The only time I recall the BBC moving PIDS or transponders was when radio moved in the middle of last year.

Tony

DMC wrote: »

But why would a channel like ITV do so? They've done that with in the last few weeks with UTV, STV and ITV3. The only time I recall the BBC moving PIDS or transponders was when radio moved in the middle of last year.

who does their uplinks?

DMC

NTL, or now Arqiva for ITV, not sure who does BBC, possibly NGW?

scath

The deal with free to air satellit is it costs €150 one off for dish, sky digibox and installation. That's it. FTA does not mean everything is free. The equipment costs, the installation costs. FTA means that the channels don't cost. I think uk have to buy a card from Northern Ireland for €150 to get C4 and Five. Dunno if that's still so or they went unecypted since.

This is likely to change in a few months so reckon not worth getting the NI card. But the box and dish, 150 yea.

St Senan

It is not available here in Ireland only to the Uk afaik

byte

scath wrote: »

The deal with free to air satellit is it costs €150 one off for dish, sky digibox and installation. That's it. FTA does not mean everything is free. The equipment costs, the installation costs. FTA means that the channels don't cost. I think uk have to buy a card from Northern Ireland for €150 to get C4 and Five. Dunno if that's still so or they went unecypted since.

This is likely to change in a few months so reckon not worth getting the NI card. But the box and dish, 150 yea.

"Freesat From Sky" is an option not available to Republic of Ireland residents. It's UK only, costs £150 (not euro) and it does include the FTV card for C4, five.

There are of course installers who install Free-To-Air systems here (occasionally they use Sky boxes, though it's rarely), but not with the UK FTV card (if they do, it'd be a lot more than €150).

The card can be bought on its own by UK residents for £22 or thereabouts. These cards seem to pop up on classifieds papers, like Buy & Sell too, though at a much inflated price.

norbert64

has there been some new update on the FTA front, or are http://www.satworld.ie/default

mistaken in there first listing on the above page

surely that €275 kit must be a sky setup, or is it the new BBC/Freesat/DVB malarkey some of you have mentioned recently.

julietomorogbe

I'm just about to put a free to air view satellite in my flat in balbriggan . please could you explain to how this works
Regards
Juliet

julietomorogbe

Hello guys, I live in balbriggan area looking to place a free to air satellite in my flat .please could you explain to me how this works.if it really works
Kind regards
Juliet

julietomorogbe

Hello guys, I live in balbriggan area looking to place a free to air sky in my flat .please could you explain to me how this works
Kind regards
Juliet

julietomorogbe

Hi, I'm just wondering if I will be able to view free to air satellite in Ireland ? i live in balbriggan

ethernet

julietomorogbe wrote: »

I'm just about to put a free to air view satellite in my flat in balbriggan . please could you explain to how this works
Regards
Juliet

Welcome to boards. I realise you're new but repeatedly posting the same/similar question in the same forum won't raise your popularity!

I found links in the 'stickies' at the top of Satellite forum. Stickies deal with frequently-asked questions or frequently-discussed topics. I suggest you follow the links on this wiki, particularly this and this.