Digital Camping Satellite System - Lidl 01/02

MoodeRator

Digital Camping Satellite System €79.99 - Lidl
Just looking for advice on this Freesat system, I am new to Freesat and this seems good value - in my inexperienced eyes! I was wondering if anyone has one of these and if it serves it's purpose? Is the dish big enough to give a good quality reception?

nephster

I had it for use on my apartment balcony until my management company cut it down!

Despite the tiny size it was actually really good. One thing to note is that it came pretuned for the channels on a different satellite to the Astra one. This really confused me, as all bar one of the channels (BBC Alba, I think) were blank although I was convinced I was pointed at the correct sat. But if you are on the right satellite you then make it scan for channels and all the other UK channels magically appear.

dowtchaboy

nephster wrote: »

I had it for use on my apartment balcony until my management company cut it down!

You can use a dish "upside down" where the dish is almost horizontal - looks odd but it does work. This can be handy if you have a balcony and the management don't like to see sat dishes - this way it is not visible from the ground. There's a bit more trial and error involved as it's harder to work out where it's "pointing".

MoodeRator

nephster wrote: »

I had it for use on my apartment balcony until my management company cut it down!

Despite the tiny size it was actually really good. One thing to note is that it came pretuned for the channels on a different satellite to the Astra one. This really confused me, as all bar one of the channels (BBC Alba, I think) were blank although I was convinced I was pointed at the correct sat. But if you are on the right satellite you then make it scan for channels and all the other UK channels magically appear.

Thatnks VERY much for such a helpful reply! I know some of the Sats are pretty close, but dont mind spending time aligning so long as I know the picture quality is adequate. Anyone know if there is HSDMI connection on the receiver? I assume I just need to get a HD receiver at a later stage to avail of the upcoming HD channels?

jArgHA

MoodeRator wrote: »

Thatnks VERY much for such a helpful reply! I know some of the Sats are pretty close, but dont mind spending time aligning so long as I know the picture quality is adequate. Anyone know if there is HSDMI connection on the receiver? I assume I just need to get a HD receiver at a later stage to avail of the upcoming HD channels?

there are already free to air HD channels as far as I know, some BBC HD channel(s) and ITV HD?

nephster

dowtchaboy wrote: »

You can use a dish "upside down" where the dish is almost horizontal - looks odd but it does work. This can be handy if you have a balcony and the management don't like to see sat dishes - this way it is not visible from the ground. There's a bit more trial and error involved as it's harder to work out where it's "pointing".

Unfortunately they took the dish - big long discussion about this, concealed dishes etc elsewhere on boards.ie

MoodeRator - this is SCART not HDMI, but as it isn't HD anyway that's pretty immaterial quality-wise - it does have coax audio out if you have a surround-sound system that accepts that. It is only a tiny dish, with conventional wisdom saying you need a 60cm dish for proper reception, but as I said it worked a treat for me, and is a good and cheap intro to sat TV. One thing is that as it it isn't Freesat branded it only gives you now and next, not a week of EPG. So you might want to talk to say satellite.ie and put the 80 quid towards getting a proper dish and an HD Freesat box now. BBC HD and ITV HD (via the red button) are already available.

Damn, wish I still had TV - been without since May *cries quietly*