Which Freesat HD box?

burgess1

I'm thinking of heading to Newry to get an HD TV and a Freesat HD box.

Has anyone here been using Freesat? If so what make of box do you use and would you recommend it?

homer911

I have a HUMAX HD box - didnt see the need for PVR given the cost and the fact that programs seem to be repeated so often, and there are only so many hours in a day..

Very pleased with it, no issues. Love the 7 day EPG, i button, red button. I found the manual left a few features poorly documented.

(Got mine on ebay for GBP99)

deffin

homer911 wrote: »

I have a HUMAX HD box - didnt see the need for PVR given the cost and the fact that programs seem to be repeated so often, and there are only so many hours in a day..

Very pleased with it, no issues. Love the 7 day EPG, i button, red button. I found the manual left a few features poorly documented.

(Got mine on ebay for GBP99)

Got my BUSH HD box in Argos in Enniskillen for £93. Only set it up a few days ago but have to say the picture is fantastic. Specially the FA Cup matches on ITV HD at the weekend. Not as user friendly as the SKY box but will take a bit of getting used to it. Well worth it if you're cancelling SKY.

burgess1

We have Sky in the living room and I want to set this up in another room. Do I need additional equipment to connect a Freesat box to the dish?

kuro_man

I have both the Humax HD and HDR. Both are excellent but I would highly recommend the PVR if budget allows. It can be used from a single cable with a loop-though but its better with a twin/quad lnb and two feeds to the PVR - you get all the channels on both tuners.

I hardly ever watch "live" TV anymore, fast forwarding through the ads/boring bits is great and some good movies are on in the middle of the night. Series-record is excellent.

kuro_man

burgess1 wrote: »

We have Sky in the living room and I want to set this up in another room. Do I need additional equipment to connect a Freesat box to the dish?

Get a quad lnb on ebay (£10 for sky one). Run coax cable (RG6) from lnb to each room. If you want to use a twin-tuner pvr, run two cables to the pvr (allows you to record one channel, watch/record another without limits)

Technically, its fairly simple but there are pitfalls:
- When replacing the lnb, don't move the dish (easier said then done)
- When replacing the lnb, you may have to skew it to improve reception. As you face the dish, turn the base of the lnb to the left slightly and tighten collar. Some LNB's have skew degree numbers on the collar, if so set it to approx 15 and then adjust slowly until signal quality is 100%
- plug out receiver when connecting cables from lnb

If your dish is accessible (eg. over a flat roof) then you can do it yourself. Take the receiver and a portable tv with you to check the signal quality. If its not accessible (e.g. on a chimney) I would recommend you get a professional satellite installer.

kuro_man

burgess1 wrote: »

I'm thinking of heading to Newry to get an HD TV and a Freesat HD box.
quote]

Have you consider the panasonic tv's with freesat built in? They also pick up the Irish Digital channels - you get all uk/irish channels together.

John mac

They also pick up the Irish Digital channels - you get all uk/irish channels together.

they wont receive Irish dtt

check the spec

burgess1

kuro_man wrote: »

Get a quad lnb on ebay (£10 for sky one). Run coax cable (RG6) from lnb to each room. If you want to use a twin-tuner pvr, run two cables to the pvr (allows you to record one channel, watch/record another without limits)

Technically, its fairly simple but there are pitfalls:
- When replacing the lnb, don't move the dish (easier said then done)
- When replacing the lnb, you may have to skew it to improve reception. As you face the dish, turn the base of the lnb to the left slightly and tighten collar. Some LNB's have skew degree numbers on the collar, if so set it to approx 15 and then adjust slowly until signal quality is 100%
- plug out receiver when connecting cables from lnb

If your dish is accessible (eg. over a flat roof) then you can do it yourself. Take the receiver and a portable tv with you to check the signal quality. If its not accessible (e.g. on a chimney) I would recommend you get a professional satellite installer.

Sorry if this is a stupid question but we used to have 2 digiboxes connected to the dish but now we only use one. Could the LNB we have be used for both the Sky box and a Freesat HD box (not PVR)?

Tony

Yes it can

burgess1 wrote: »

Sorry if this is a stupid question but we used to have 2 digiboxes connected to the dish but now we only use one. Could the LNB we have be used for both the Sky box and a Freesat HD box (not PVR)?

burgess1

Thanks for all the replies

Aepos

John mac wrote: »

they wont receive Irish dtt

check the spec

The Panasonic Freesat TV's with DTT work perfectly with RTE's Digital signal.

I have one since 27th December, a super telly.

Aepos

zagmund

Aepos - what specific model are you using ? And, for the confused among us, what cables do you have into the TV ? Is it just a feed straight from a dish ?

Thanks

z

slegs

The freesat models are the Z81 series - PZ for plasma and LZ for LCD

http://www.panasonic.co.uk/html/en_GB/711712/index.html#anker_711715

Note these models are UK models and will only be found in UK stores (unless somehow by accident they have ended up in Irish retailers)

They have an MPEG4 decoder due to the fact they are HD for the freesat and along with the DVB-T tuner means that they are also compatible for Irish DTT.

Tony

Do you have an RTE Aerial? Could also be that you are picking up the RTE signal inadvertently as you are so close to Three Rock transmitter.

Aepos wrote: »

The Panasonic Freesat TV's with DTT work perfectly with RTE's Digital signal.

I have one since 27th December, a super telly.

Aepos

kuro_man

John mac wrote: »

they wont receive Irish dtt

check the spec

There have been several confirmed reports in the Terrestrial forum that is does work on Panasonic freesat (HD) TVs, including this one which has photos of it in action!
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055401024

John mac

oops !

havnt been following that thread nice to know that they will pick up dtt.

Zonda999

Lads, what you say would be a standard installation cost of a freesat box?? Its just i've recently got a HDTV for a room in the house that previously had no tv in it and, because of that only the games consoles and HC system are currently connected to it. I would say it would be a pretty easy installation. The satellite dish is very close to the room, on the wall right outside so it would simply be a matter of bringing a cable from the dish to the box. Its just i'm not all that confident drilling holes in the house not quite sure what i'm doing!! I'd have the freesat hd box and all with the cabling the only thing required to be provided by the installer. Just a rough cost of installation??

Thanks:)

watty

€50 to €500 depending on if cowboy, expert, easy job or hard job.

If there is already an aligned dish, then it is toward the cheaper end. But still I've fitted a dish or an aerial in 15mins and then spent 2hrs wondering where the other end of the cable went.

If you aren't expert enough to do it, you probably can't accurately estimate the cost of install.

I spent €66 euro on a complete system for a friend and in the end it was nearly an all day job. Over 50m cable run from bottom of garden and then 4ft thick cottage wall

Think how much 15min with Doctor costs!

Zonda999

watty wrote: »

€50 to €500 depending on if cowboy, expert, easy job or hard job.

If there is already an aligned dish, then it is toward the cheaper end. But still I've fitted a dish or an aerial in 15mins and then spent 2hrs wondering where the other end of the cable went.

If you aren't expert enough to do it, you probably can't accurately estimate the cost of install.

I spent €66 euro on a complete system for a friend and in the end it was nearly an all day job. Over 50m cable run from bottom of garden and then 4ft thick cottage wall

Think how much 15min with Doctor costs!

Thanks

It really is a very basic job, just one wall separating the dish and where i'm planning on putting it. It'll be under 100e anyway so thats OK.