FTA using magic eyes & Saorview box

jgbyr

Hopefully someone can answer my query. My tvs are not suitable for saorviw.Currently I have a sky box which I use as FTA, signal going to 4 tvs with the sat & aerial signals. Each tv has a magic eye to control the FTA box. I want to put a saorview box at one tv but also want to keep the sat signal to it & still control the FTA with the eye. I cannot add another coax cable so could I achieve this? Thanks in advance.

John mac

use scart or hdmi for the saorview box. and rf for magic eye sky connection.

jgbyr

Sorry to appear stupid, but how do I do this with only one coax cable?

steveon

You can add any saorview box u wish to the scenario by wiring it to the room with the skybox already in it, however no saorview or fta box has the magic eye faciity u wish built in so you will need a product to do this.

However there is a product you can get to allow you to do this. And its called a Triax Trilink(There are others available) however I have used this and it works perfectly.

http://www.tvtrade.ie/triax-trilink-kit.html

You will either need to scart connect the Saorview box to the trilink and then run it's output cable into the skybox input at the back of the box. This will carry both the skybox and saorview box on an rf frequency to each room. Next position the sensors on the trilink over the rought area of where the box receives the remote signals when u press the remote.

The disadvantage however is you will only have 1 extra channel viewable at the secondary and third tv's etc as the saorview box can only show one channel at a time in the same fashion your sky box does.

Hope that helps..

jgbyr

Thanks for the information Steveon. I don't want to send the saorview picture to the other tv's though. I only want to change the channels on the sky box using the magic eye.The box is actually upstairs in a spare room so I can distibute it downstairs(a cabling solution). Will it work if I put the eye on the coax cable before it enters the saorview box which would be at a downstairs tv , giving me one sat channel & the saorview channels at that tv(other tvs with only the sat channel)

steveon

Ah yes if you have the rte going down through yopur sky box and split it before it goes into the tv then you can have the saorview there and the sky channel .

You should get yourself a 2 way powerpass splitter. Use the power side to connect to your magic eye and the other end to the saorview box.

http://www.tvtrade.ie/power-pass-2-way-tv-splitters.html

jgbyr

Thanks for your help Steveon. Will give it a try as soon as I can.

steveon

Glad to have helped let me know how you get on..

jgbyr

Got the saorview working & magic eye still functions. The magic eye is connected to the end of the rf out feed from the sky box & I connected this to aerial in on the mpeg4 dvb-t reciever. I then connected the aerial out from the receiver to the aerial in on the tv. The receiver has a hdmi connection so I view the saorview channels through its menu & the tv still carries the standard Irish channels & the FTA channel. The magic eye still controls the box upstairs so I can change the channel.

Macer123

Hope the OP doesn't mind me hijacking this thread, but I have a similar situation where I need help. I not so hot on these matters and don't really understand the solution to the OP original question. However here's my set up - have sky box in main room, in 2nd room I can receive this sky signal and have a magic eye plugged into the TV to change the channel. The 2nd room TV is Saorview ready and I have a spare coax cable running to this TV from attic. I had hope to purchase the Saorview aerial in Aldi (starting today) and put in the attic, but how do I connect to the TV if the magic eye is already connected. Hope I'm making myself clear. Thanks.

firemansam1

Say if someone had asetup with several magic eyes running of a sky box(positioned in attic, ie. not at ant TV), would it be possible to run a saorview box on these magic eyes somehow???

Thanks

Stinicker

Macer123 wrote: »

Hope the OP doesn't mind me hijacking this thread, but I have a similar situation where I need help. I not so hot on these matters and don't really understand the solution to the OP original question. However here's my set up - have sky box in main room, in 2nd room I can receive this sky signal and have a magic eye plugged into the TV to change the channel. The 2nd room TV is Saorview ready and I have a spare coax cable running to this TV from attic. I had hope to purchase the Saorview aerial in Aldi (starting today) and put in the attic, but how do I connect to the TV if the magic eye is already connected. Hope I'm making myself clear. Thanks.

Option 1) The best option is when you install the aerial in the attic would be to make two cable runs one to the room you have the Sky box and leave it there unconnected for the future and then connect up your spare cable to room two and use a powerpass as highlighted earlier to combine both cables into the tv, you can then watch saorview in the spare room and down the road when your TV in the main room gives up you will be ready for Saorview there too.

Option 2) You can run a cable to the Sky box and this will route Saorview back to the TV through the pre-existing cable to room 2.

Option 3) If you were sure you never wanted Saorview in the Main room you could just run the spare cable to the aerial and combine it and the cable from the Sky box behind the tv.

Option 4) Again if you are sure you never wanted Saorview in the main room you could just T in the Aerial feed to the pre-existing cable in the attic.

See my MS Paint schematics!

Stinicker

firemansam1 wrote: »

Say if someone had asetup with several magic eyes running of a sky box(positioned in attic, ie. not at ant TV), would it be possible to run a saorview box on these magic eyes somehow???

Thanks

If you are in quite a strong signal area then by connecting your aerial to the Skybox in the attic would see Saorview piped down to the bedrooms using the same cable as the Sky feed, and then you'd either need a Saorview box with a UHF loopthrough or if you have Saorview MPEG4 Ready TV then you'd only have to tune in the specific Sky channel on UHF. However there would be quite a bit of signal degradation and if you were in a weak signal area you'd probably need something like a loftbox.

firemansam1

Stinicker wrote: »

If you are in quite a strong signal area then by connecting your aerial to the Skybox in the attic would see Saorview piped down to the bedrooms using the same cable as the Sky feed, and then you'd either need a Saorview box with a UHF loopthrough or if you have Saorview MPEG4 Ready TV then you'd only have to tune in the specific Sky channel on UHF. However there would be quite a bit of signal degradation and if you were in a weak signal area you'd probably need something like a loftbox.

Thanks for that, I knew I could do that all right but what I was asking is, could I put a Saorview box in the attic space with the sky box and run both of the same eye(s)

Thanks

Stinicker

firemansam1 wrote: »

Thanks for that, I knew I could do that all right but what I was asking is, could I put a Saorview box in the attic space with the sky box and run both of the same eye(s)

Thanks

It would really defeat some of the benefits of Saorview, you won't enjoy HD and your picture quality over RF would be vastly inferior to that of Scart or HDMI by having a seperate receiver in each room. You cannot use the Sky magic eye with any Saorview box that I know of.

You could get a remote control extender like steveon said above, basically what it does is it receives the remote control command in the bedroom and sends it down the cable back to an infra red eye which then duplicates the remote control signal infront of the Saorview box as if you were standing in front of it with the remote control. The Sky Magic eye by comparison takes the remote command and sends it straight into the box as it was designed to this.

However remote control extenders ain't that cheap and you will still only be able to watch the same channel across all your tvs, the same as your Sky system. You be far better off getting a cheap Saorview receiver or a scart MPEG4 micro receiver for any non-HD televisions you have because you won't be able to enjoy the HD on them anyway.

A Scart MPEG4 receiver might even be cheaper than the Remote control extender, you'd also then have to get a universal remote for each room as I don't think there is a standard Saorview remote control like there is with the Sky remote, when you'd add this and the cost of a remote control extender together you'd probably be spending almost the same and you'd have a far worse system by having a Saorview box feeding several rooms than if you put a new receiver in each room.

jgbyr

As I mentioned earlier I got the saorview & magic eye working. I have the aerial feed going to the sky box,which I use for FTA, & then I run the RF out2 to the attic into an F140 amplifier.From this box there is one cable to each tv with the sat channel & the Irish channels.I can change the Sat channel in each room with a magic eye. As each tv has the aerial signal the dvb-t receiver picks up the saorview & is connected to the tv with a hdmi cable(or scart). The aerial out feed from the box goes to the tv giving me the sat channel which I can still change using the magic eye. Works fine for me.

Macer123

Stinicker wrote: »

Option 1) The best option is when you install the aerial in the attic would be to make two cable runs one to the room you have the Sky box and leave it there unconnected for the future and then connect up your spare cable to room two and use a powerpass as highlighted earlier to combine both cables into the tv, you can then watch saorview in the spare room and down the road when your TV in the main room gives up you will be ready for Saorview there too.

Option 2) You can run a cable to the Sky box and this will route Saorview back to the TV through the pre-existing cable to room 2.

Option 3) If you were sure you never wanted Saorview in the Main room you could just run the spare cable to the aerial and combine it and the cable from the Sky box behind the tv.

Option 4) Again if you are sure you never wanted Saorview in the main room you could just T in the Aerial feed to the pre-existing cable in the attic.

See my MS Paint schematics!

Wow - top answer. Option 3 would seem the easiest for a novice like me, but if both cables are coming to a splitter behind the TV and combining so that only one cable is plugged directly into the TV - how would you switch between the sky signal & the saorview ? Again Apologies I am not familiar with a powerpass and how it works.

Stinicker

Macer123 wrote: »

Wow - top answer. Option 3 would seem the easiest for a novice like me, but if both cables are coming to a splitter behind the TV and combining so that only one cable is plugged directly into the TV - how would you switch between the sky signal & the saorview ? Again Apologies I am not familiar with a powerpass and how it works.

The two signals are combined; imagine combining two water hoses into one. The magic eye works on the cable because 12 volts are sent from the Sky box back along the cable alongside the TV signal to it, what the powerpass device does is make sure that the 12 volts continue on to the magic eye as some simple T-Splitters/Joiners do not do this.

On your TV it will have a few different modes with DVB-T which will utilise its Digital tuner and tune in the Saorview channels, then you will select Analog which will tune in the feed coming from the Sky box and any Analogue channels you pick up on the UHF aerial for saorview, most likely TV3 & TG4. You switch between Sky and Saorview using the remote control, there is no manual switching of cables or switches needed as the signals are combined using the power-pass combiner.

Dave F

jgbyr wrote: »

As I mentioned earlier I got the saorview & magic eye working. I have the aerial feed going to the sky box,which I use for FTA, & then I run the RF out2 to the attic into an F140 amplifier.From this box there is one cable to each tv with the sat channel & the Irish channels.I can change the Sat channel in each room with a magic eye. As each tv has the aerial signal the dvb-t receiver picks up the saorview & is connected to the tv with a hdmi cable(or scart). The aerial out feed from the box goes to the tv giving me the sat channel which I can still change using the magic eye. Works fine for me.

Hi, new to this so please bear with me !
Have I got this correct ..... Sat and Aerial feed joined through combiner, down to viewing room and split again with combiner, both going into Sky box. Feed from RF out2 to attic into amplifer thus spreading the signals around the house. Saorview connected to tv using scart or hdmi cable and aerial out from Saorview box to tv. What about aerial 'In' feed ? Maybe a stupid question but would appreciate a reply, thanks !

Peter Rhea

The 'aerial in' feed will go to the Saorview box (or idtv) 'aerial in' at each remote point.

The 'aerial out' or loopthrough from the box carries the analogue RF output from the Sky box (& analogue aerial signal) to the tv's analogue tuner.

jgbyr

Dave F wrote: »

Hi, new to this so please bear with me !
Have I got this correct ..... Sat and Aerial feed joined through combiner, down to viewing room and split again with combiner, both going into Sky box. Feed from RF out2 to attic into amplifer thus spreading the signals around the house. Saorview connected to tv using scart or hdmi cable and aerial out from Saorview box to tv. What about aerial 'In' feed ? Maybe a stupid question but would appreciate a reply, thanks !

My setup has the aerial & sat feed going into the sky box. RF2 goes to f140 amplifier. This feeds the other tvs. The magic eye is on the cable which takes the feed from the combiner. This goes to the aerial in on the saorview box (then hdmi to tv for saorview). The aerial out is connected to the tv (to view the sky channel). (Didn't see Peter's reply before posting )

Dave F

Ok .... but sorry am still confused by The magic eye is on the cable which takes the feed from the combiner. This goes to the aerial in on the saorview box.
If I explain my set up or what I was thinking this may help !
Sat and aerial feed in attic connected to combiner, through one cable down to sitting room and then using another combiner I split the signal both going into the sky box.
Take another cable from rf2 back up to attic to amplifer thus feeding other tv's around the house where I can change stations using sky eye.
Aerial out from sky box to tv but still am lost with regard to aerial 'in' ?
Any help is really much appreciated

jgbyr

Dave F wrote: »

Ok .... but sorry am still confused by The magic eye is on the cable which takes the feed from the combiner. This goes to the aerial in on the saorview box.
If I explain my set up or what I was thinking this may help !
Sat and aerial feed in attic connected to combiner, through one cable down to sitting room and then using another combiner I split the signal both going into the sky box.
Take another cable from rf2 back up to attic to amplifer thus feeding other tv's around the house where I can change stations using sky eye.
Aerial out from sky box to tv but still am lost with regard to aerial 'in' ?
Any help is really much appreciated

So are you saying you use the rf2 out and the aerial out from the sky box.

Dave F

Yes that's the plan, but please correct me if I am incorrect, thanks.

Peter Rhea

Dave F wrote: »

Aerial out from sky box to tv but still am lost with regard to aerial 'in' ?

Aerial in to what?

Dave F

Aerial in to Saorview box

jgbyr

Dave F wrote: »

Yes that's the plan, but please correct me if I am incorrect, thanks.

Put the aerial out cable from sky box at the main tv to aerial in of saorview box. If you have hdmi connect this to tv to view saorview channels otherwise connect the aerial out from saorview to the tv. If you want the saorview on the other tvs then you need a box at each if the tv isnt saorview compatable.

Peter Rhea

Dave F wrote: »

Aerial in to Saorview box

The setup you quoted in your 1st post will send the Saorview signal to seperate decoders located at each tv. It won't modulate the Saorview channels onto an analogue UHF carrier like the Skybox RF outs.

jgbyr wrote: »

If you have hdmi connect this to tv to view saorview channels otherwise connect the aerial out from saorview to the tv.

Aerial out won't carry the output of the Saorview box, use scart if there's no HDMI.

Dave F

Thanks guys for all your help ..... has anyone came up with a solution to change Saorview channels on a different tv using a sky eye or is this simply impossible

steveon

Dave F wrote: »

Thanks guys for all your help ..... has anyone came up with a solution to change Saorview channels on a different tv using a sky eye or is this simply impossible

You can use a Tri-Link modulator made by triax to do this, it comes complete with a magic eye and works perfectly. Have done this a few times.

bryaner

jgbyr wrote: »

My setup has the aerial & sat feed going into the sky box. RF2 goes to f140 amplifier. This feeds the other tvs. The magic eye is on the cable which takes the feed from the combiner. This goes to the aerial in on the saorview box (then hdmi to tv for saorview). The aerial out is connected to the tv (to view the sky channel). (Didn't see Peter's reply before posting )

Hi

This sounds exactly like my setup, aerial and sat into bypass amp in attic feeding all bedrooms with magic eyes down the one coax line, could you post a link to the type of saor view box that you that you have please..

Cheers Bryan

jgbyr

Bryan,
I may have mislead you with my previous post. The boxes I use are not official saorview boxes but are digital tv adapters. The pictures quality is excellent but they do not support MHEG5 so therefore no digital teletext. The particular unit I got are no longer available but here is the link if you want to have a look.
http://www.adverts.ie/tv/digital-tv-adapter-stb-for-irish-digital-service/523973

bryaner

jgbyr wrote: »

Bryan,
I may have mislead you with my previous post. The boxes I use are not official saorview boxes but are digital tv adapters. The pictures quality is excellent but they do not support MHEG5 so therefore no digital teletext. The particular unit I got are no longer available but here is the link if you want to have a look.
http://www.adverts.ie/tv/digital-tv-adapter-stb-for-irish-digital-service/523973

Thanks jgbyr

They look like the perfect solution for my situation as I was at a loss how I would keep my magic eye's working in combo with DTT, teletext I can certainly live without.

Thanks for the help..

jgbyr

bryaner wrote: »

Thanks jgbyr

They look like the perfect solution for my situation as I was at a loss how I would keep my magic eye's working in combo with DTT, teletext I can certainly live without.

Thanks for the help..

Don't know where you would get one of these now though.

bryaner

jgbyr wrote: »

Don't know where you would get one of these now though.

Would the likes of this be similar?

http://www.dipol.ie/tv-sat-tv/dvb-t-receivers-1/dvb-t-receiver-signal-hd-507-mpeg-2-4-pvr-ready.html

jgbyr

Looks similar allright. Have a read here : http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056216337

Should give you more info.

nigmc04

Can anyone help with this problem? I am using Sky with £20 ftv card for UK channels. Analogue aerial input to sky box for RTE1+2 +TnG+ TV3 with good pictures. Extra TV in bedroom connected to R2 of Sky STB. Can I connect input of Saorview STB to analogue aerial input of TV or do I require a modulator of some sort?

steveon

Do you mean u want to put a Saorview box in the second room or in the first room to watch in the second room as well..??

If you only want the Saorview box in the second room them put the cable from the rf2 into the input of the saorview box and the loop out back to your tv to give you the sky picture.

If you want to put the Saorview box in the first room then you will need something like a tri-link modulator to watch and control it in the second room.

nigmc04

Thanks for prompt reply.
Main Tv, Sky stb and Uhf aerial (RTE) and sky dish feed all in one position on ground froor. Use one sky remote to change from SKY to RTE. Output from R2 used to feed two tv's in bedrooms- NO magic eyes just power fed amp in attic. After Digital C/over the input from aerial to Sky stb is redundant- but should be OK for use with Saorview stb. So far so good! How can I connect o/put of Saorview stb to sky stb and leave erything as before? Is it possible? thanks again.

zg3409

Hi nigmc04. Please don't post the same question in multiple threads. I can help you here but this thread is not really about Sky boxes.

My understanding of your current setup is

1 Sky box with no subscription. 2 TVs, neither with an inbuilt Saorview tuner. The current TV aerial is fed into the "aerial input" of the Sky box.

How is the TV beside the Sky box connected to the Sky box? Is there a SCART lead, HDMI lead or RF lead?

I assume the 2nd (& 3rd?) TV is connected to RF2 of the Sky box. On the second TV how do you change channels currently on the Sky box, Do you need to go to the main room to change BBC channels etc?

If so this is a bit of a bodge as it is. Will you EVER have a need to watch one channel in one room, while watching another channel in another room? If so I would recommend a proper Saorview box for EVERY TV, and a Sky eye for the 2nd and third TV. This would allow any TV to watch any of the Irish channels, and one TV to watch the UK ones. Each Saorview box would be connected to the TV using SCART of HDMI leads.

This would require least rewiring and allow reasonable choices.

You could use one Saorview box, and a triax tri-link, but the cost of the tri-link basically is the same as another Saorview box. It would be better value to just buy two boxes.

The Cush

nigmc04 wrote: »

After Digital C/over the input from aerial to Sky stb is redundant- but should be OK for use with Saorview stb. So far so good! How can I connect o/put of Saorview stb to sky stb and leave erything as before? Is it possible?

It won't really be possible to leave everything as before as no Saorview STB has a modulator onboard to convert the decoded Saorview signal into an RF frequency that can be tuned by an analogue TV.

The aerial out on a Saorview receiver is a loop-through and only carries the undecoded Saorview signal and for the moment the terrestrial analogue signal. The decoded Saorview signal/channels are only output thru the scart and HDMI.

You could, as Stevon said above, attach a modulator such as the Triax Trilink, to convert the output from the scart to an RF frequency which could then be combined with the with the selected Sky channel from RF2 to the various TV points. The downside of this is only the selected channel on the Saorview box is fed to each TV point but the channel can be changed via the Trilink.

A Saorview TV or STB at each bedroom TV point would restore flexibility after analogue switchoff by leaving the aerial attched to the Sky receiver and looping the undecoded Saorview signal together with the selected Sky channel thru RF2.

If you use a Saorview TV in the bedrooms it'll tune the Saorview channels and the selected Sky channel. If you use a Saorview STB at each TV point the selected Sky channel can be looped thru to the TV's co-ax input but the Saorview channels must be fed to the TV via scart or HDMI as no Saorview STB has a modulator onboard to feed the Saorview channels with the selected Sky channel to the TV's co-ax input.

nigmc04

Dear The Cush,
Thanks for your civil and non techy and prompt reply. Since I live alone in the house I do not require Magic Eyes Or outer switching apps. I set the main Tv to Sky channel, retire to bedroom, and there can watch either RTE1+2+TnG+TV3 or the selected Sky channel on main TV down stairs using TV's remote control. In the winter time I move to smaller bedroom over the all-night burner in living room and do the same as in larger room.( Programs are still rubbish- but it passes the time till I fall asleep)
So even though my setup is, what was the expression , doopy, its my doopy system and it suits my situation.
Now that I know that my proposed use of Saorview box will not work since I need a modulator- I noticed somewhere in Boards.ie - a suggestion to use an old VCR as modulator but cant now find the location of the item! What would you think of this?

zg3409

doopy

Didn't mean to insult.

I noticed somewhere in Boards.ie - a suggestion to use an old VCR as modulator but cant now find the location of the item! What would you think of this?

Yes you can use one Saorview box and a VCR. This will allow all channels in all rooms. Feed the Saorview box from the aerial in. Feed the aerial out of the Saorview box into the RF in of the VCR. Feed the RF out of the VCR into the RF in of the Sky box and then on to the other TV's as before.

So its:

Aerial --- Saorview --- VCR ----Sky

You then need to connect a Scart from the Saorview box into the VCR (if there are two SCART conenctors on VCR try both)

Set the VCR to channel AV1 or AV2

You then need to tune every TV in the house. You should find two channels. One channel will be the Sky's the other channel will be Saorview.

It's quite complicated to setup but it will work.

Ask here if having trouble. It might be helpful to play a tape in the VCR while tuning the TV's to be sure you are getting the right signal.

nigmc04

Hi' zg3409,
I'm in error too!Sorry. I think after reaching AOP I have become very thin skinned, in fact my grand daughter says that I overdose on the ugly pills and the nasty medicine. But I cant give off to her she will be doing the job after she has printed your instructions! (That means I'm the goffer!)
I'm not too clear about your instructions after the point
"tune all tv's in house
"You will find two channels SKY and Saorview


What remote controls will be used at each location ?

zg3409

nigmc04 wrote: »

I'm not too clear about your instructions after the point
"tune all tv's in house
"You will find two channels SKY and Saorview

What remote controls will be used at each location ?

With you existing system you set the Sky channel using the Sky remote in the main room. To watch the RTEs you currently change channel on the TV itself.


After the change over you set the channel in the main room on either the Sky box or the Saorview box.

Then retreat to the bedroom. In the bedroom, using the remote for the bedroom TV

Channel 1 will be the Sky channel (whichever you set earlier)
Channel 2 will be the Saorview channel (whichever you set earlier)
You will also have the old RTE's until end of October.

The actual channel numbers will depend on how you tuned the TV. You may need to sort them how you wish.

In order to change channels in the bedroom you need to walk to main room, unless you happen to want to switch from Sat to Saorview and the box happens to already be on the right channel.

The Cush

nigmc04 wrote: »

Now that I know that my proposed use of Saorview box will not work since I need a modulator- I noticed somewhere in Boards.ie - a suggestion to use an old VCR as modulator but cant now find the location of the item! What would you think of this?

Further to zg3409's reply, the VCR in this setup acts a modulator just like the Triax Trilink mentioned above but without the option of changing channels on the Saorview receiver remotely. See the first diagram on the attached page.

Your current setup will work until the early hours of Oct 24th so lots of time to get sorted.