Sky+ on a communal/shared dish system?

Mayo Exile

Living in an apartment, with TV reception supplied by a shared TV system (satellite and UHF terrestrial). Currently have an FTA box in the sitting room plus another one in the bedroom. Diplexed wallplate supplying sat and terrestrial TV in both locations. (See picture).

Removed wall plate in the sitting room to investigate cabling. One cable linked to wall plate supplying reception there. Two further cables linked together. (See picture). I'm guessing these are supplying reception to the bedroom. Will I get Sky+ with whats there?

Since you need a second connection for a Sky+ box would one of these cables be used? Would you need a triplexed wall plate as well? (two sat, one UHF connection). In doing this would I lose reception to the bedroom?

Thanks in advance.

steveon

It loooks like the cable joined are feeding the wallplate in the bedroom so if u want sky plus you would lose tv in the bedroom.

Another thing to be taken into consideration is the manufacturer of the equipment used at the headend. They are not all compatible with Sky plus, I have encountered this on numerous occasions even where a second feed is sent to the appartments, not sure of the models but a lot of equipment made by Televes has this problem...

U could get a hd box to work more reliable on one cable as there is a new option in them to disable the sky anytime however you can only record the channel that you are currently watching...

Mayo Exile

It looks like the cable joined are feeding the wallplate in the bedroom so if u want sky plus you would lose tv in the bedroom.

Thanks for that steveon. Yes I was guessing I might lose reception in the bedroom. I rather have it than sacrifice it for Sky+. I dont want to lose my UHF reception either which includes the RTENL DTT tests.

bk

While you will lose reception in the bedroom, you could connect the cable going to the bedroom to the RF out from the Sky box and use magic eye to watch TV from the bedroom.

Also I believe there is gear that can combine two sat feeds onto one sat cable and split them again at the other end, this might leave you get Sky+ in the living room while keeping the connection to the bedroom. They are called stackers/destacker, Watty can probably give you details of the gear needed.

However if you use a stacker/destacker, you will still need a spare sat feed up on the lnb of the communal dish and there maybe no spare one up there.

Oh just remembered reading Watty in another post, you could also use a multiswitch, two feeds (the current living room and bedroom ones) go to the multiswitch which can then drive multiple boxes from there including Sky+ and your bedroom.

steveon

I have tried stackers/destacker units in this situation and wouldnt personally recommend them. You will need access to the Comm's room or to the Multiswitch location's and more than likely u wouldnt be allowed in there and its extremely unlikely that any of the cables are marked in the appartments so it can be an extremely time consuming affair. Also you then need to reinstate the equipment exactly as you found them if you decide to move on...