19.2 digital

Jayw

Hi Guys,
Last weekend I tried to get the 19.2 East digitial Astra satellites on my old Panasonic Sky digibox and their LNB. I used a solid 80 cm dish. After about 2 hrs of torment I gave up in despair. I'm sure the neighbours thought I was mad! Any advice?

watty

It's possible, but you need a sat meter (even a €15 model). Also A Sky Digibox is not relable for more than about 10 "other channels".

Much easier with €70 to €200 FTA receiver.

Jayw

Thanks Watty. I thought maybe the Sky digibox software would not allow me to receive other satellites. I found 5 other satellites on the Sat Finder but I could not receive any picture or sound. I'll try again weather permitting. Thanks again.

Frisian

Or try to get an old analogue satellite receiver (for a tenner) and use a portable tv and you'll have no problems tuning in the german channels on 19°e pointing roughly in the same direction as all them sky dishes.
Then you could think of purchasing a digital free to air box for more variety.

Zaphod

If your digibox firmware is remotely recent, it's practically impossible to use it for 19E.

[OLD] Using your Digibox at 19.2°E (European channels)
Following firmware updates in Summer and Autumn 2005, the Digibox now asks you to "Insert your viewing card" if you try to access "Other Channels" (in the Services menu) before the box has loaded the EPG channels list. This is, of course, assuming that you do not have any viewing card!
The important effect of this miniscule change is that it is now impossible to access any channels that may be added from other satellites (such as Astra 19.2°E) until the box has initialised and loaded the channels and other information from Astra 28.2°E. You could then swap LNBs with some sort of switch, but with cheap FTA receivers running in at around £30 (50 euros) - they being more flexible and generally friendlier to use on other satellites - why on earth would you want to bother using a Digibox to watch RAI Uno, etc?

I have my doubts as to the entire legality of this change - after all, I'm not a Sky subscriber, my box hasn't been used with a Sky card for a number of years now, and yet Sky have dictated something I cannot now do with my box...

http://www.heyrick.co.uk/ricksworld/digibox/index.html

watty

Yes, I had a manual switch. So I could start on 28.2E.

Don't bother with the Sky Box at all on 19.2E.