Communal Dish for Freesat/Sky

JHet

Hi Guys,

I'm sure this thread has come up a million times before but I'd be interested to get your opinion on the particular situation I'm facing.

Recently moved into an apartment in the Sandyford industrial estate, a small Development of only 39 apartments.

Currently the only service provider in the apartment seems to be UPC, they are the monopoly, it seems to be a fairly a common scenario. Now rather than pay UPC for phone,tv and broadband, i'd like to have a bit of choice.

With that in mind I'd be interested in lobbying the management company to get an independent Sat installer in to erect a communal dish and wire up all the apartments. That way if people want Sky they can have it or if they simply want freesat they can just hook a box up accordingly.

Can anyone who has been in a similar position give me some advice on the best way to attack this. I know Sky have a scheme where they install a dish, but I'd rather avoid this as you're just introducing another monopoly. It really bloody annoys me in this country that peoples choice for services provided can be limited like this. Sat dishes are banned by the way in the house rules.

Any advice on a plan of a attack would be much appreciated. Also does any have an insight into how much it would cost to install an communal dish and wire up 39 apartments?

Thanks
Jhet

zg3409

To give a quick answer it depends.

1) UPC may have already been given a legal monopoly for a number of years, depending on when the apartment was built. This was done so they could recover some of their costs. However recently this was deemed illegal if it was more than a few years.

You would need to talk to management company to see if this is the case.

2) Cabling all apartments for Sky, paid for by residents, could work out very expensive for apartments (someone else can give quotes) but it involves loads and loads of cabling, put simply two different cables to each apartment. Also make sure it has an ordinary TV aerial too for Saorview. A big factor is existing trunking, which would need to be surveyed.

3) Sky do the whole Sky in your apartment but again there is catches and a monopoly factor. One main catch is they only wire for Sat, NO Saorview, so no RTE etc without a Sky subscription. However they may do it, and leave UPC option too. Speak to them.

4) If your apartment balcony faces south east, and if dishes are banned, you could go for a hidden dish like a squish dish. Something like:

would not even be identified as a dish. Try search for squish dish, satellite dish chair etc. This route is a lot faster, simpler if possible.

5) Another thing is to consider non-Irish tenants. Some Sat systems can be designed to cater for not only English speaking channels. It adds to the cost but would add value to the apartments, think polish TV etc.

The main problem is in the recession some apartments may be empty, others may not be able to even pay the current maintenance charge. So the willpower/budget may not match. I know management companies that cannot pay insurance, let alone bin charges.

Get a few quotes too and try to determine what you want (how many cables per apartment etc) You probably want two cables to sitting room (for Sky+ record) and one cable to every bedroom. Having Saorview for non Sky customers is important if you are paying something, but less important if it is free.

Another relevant thread here:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055132609


Have a look here:
http://www.dishpointer.com

Put in you address and pick 28.2 and confirm if you can get a signal from the balcony

JHet

Great post. You've definitely highlighted some points that I seem to have overlooked. My apt does actually face south east. I actually have my own satellite dish also from a previous house. I actually erected it(temporarily) on the balcony to see if we could get signal(with the intention of buying a hidden dish down the line). Unfornunately its a ground floor apartment and while it 100% looked like I had line of sight to Astra 2 (even checked it on Dishpointer.com) I couldn't get signal no matter what I tried. I think it could have been blocked in some way by trees or perhaps that big vodafone building in Sandyford. In any event the homebrew solution was definitely my first port of call as I have prior experience in how painful it can be to deal with management companies sometimes. It failed however and I'm not pursuing this solution. The annoying thing is the apt directly above me has one of those flat discreet dish things. They are obviously able to get signal but I couldn't.
I just begrudge paying upc for something i could get for free. It just makes no logical sense. In any event I will continue to persue a solution.
Maybe the best thing to do considering what you said below is to knock on a few doors and see if I can get 3 or 4 other tenants in on it and maybe a bit of people power will convince the mgmt company its ok.

zg3409

JHet wrote: »

It failed however and I'm not pursuing this solution.

That's a pity. Are you 100% sure

The elevation of Astra in Sandyford is:
Elevation: 21.5°
Azimuth (true): 139.5°
Azimuth (magn.): 143.6°

So it is very unlikely something across the road is blocking it.

It can be very, very hard to align a satellite dish. I have a small 40cm dish and a sensitive non Sky box. If you used a Sky box, then I would try with a non Sky box.

PM me if interested and I could pop by and test again no charge. I pass that way once a week at least. A Small dish, with a sensitive receiver, and a small LCD TV makes testing 100 times quicker, which I have.

JHet

Thanks a million mate. Thats a very kind offer indeed! I actually have one of those little Satellite meter things and even when the signal was maximized still was getting zero on the receiver. I tuned it once before in a different area and was able to get signal. Perhaps it is just me though lol ....it could well be! I tried another lnb I lad lying around also and still no luck.

zg3409

JHet wrote: »

Thanks a million mate. Thats a very kind offer indeed! I actually have one of those little Satellite meter things and even when the signal was maximized still was getting zero on the receiver. I tuned it once before in a different area and was able to get signal. Perhaps it is just me though lol ....it could well be! I tried another lnb I lad lying around also and still no luck.

Cheap Satellite meters are worse than useless. They will beep when pointed on the wrong satellite. As I said you need to use a non-sky box and ideally a small dish with the TV outside beside the dish. PM me and I'll try arrange it sooner rather than later.

JHet

Mate you were so right you know that. I think it was the bloody sat meter thingy that was throwing me off. I set about having another go at it last night with what you said in your post as my inspiration and what do you know I was able to get 100% signal mounting on the balcony. I brought a little table into the bedroom and put the tv and sat box on it when tuning.

So now I've established line of sight is good, its time to figure out a way to hide the dish. I'm thinking about mounting it even lower on the balcony, perhaps on a non penetrating ground mount and maybe try and hide it with a few plants etc. Its a glass balcony so it would still be visible.

Any ideas for a ground mount lads?

zg3409

JHet wrote: »

Any ideas for a ground mount lads?

Something like this would work:
http://www.dastechnology.co.uk/shop/satellite-and-patio-mounts.php

Probably better to collect from Dublin supplier

You could use a 40cm camping dish. It won't work in very bad weather, but is far smaller. You can also paint dishes. You can buy transparent dishes as well.

You might not believe but with a 20 degree elevation on the signal, normally you can mount the dish right on the ground. It might appear as if the signal is coming from a lower angle as the dish looks vertical, but the signal actually arrives at a much higher angle than it looks.

The signal may or may not even pass through the glass balcony.

As I said the squish dishes are the smallest but very expensive.

zg3409

Rather than drilling a hole to bring the cable from inside to outside you can use a flat window adapter:

http://www.tvtrade.ie/flat-satellite-cable-coupler.html

It may not work with all modern very airtight windows, but the main thing with apartment is the landlords don't want holes drilled for cables or brickwork.

JHet

zg3409 wrote: »

Something like this would work:
http://www.dastechnology.co.uk/shop/satellite-and-patio-mounts.php

Probably better to collect from Dublin supplier

You could use a 40cm camping dish. It won't work in very bad weather, but is far smaller. You can also paint dishes. You can buy transparent dishes as well.

You might not believe but with a 20 degree elevation on the signal, normally you can mount the dish right on the ground. It might appear as if the signal is coming from a lower angle as the dish looks vertical, but the signal actually arrives at a much higher angle than it looks.

The signal may or may not even pass through the glass balcony.

As I said the squish dishes are the smallest but very expensive.

I'm actually gonna have a go a hiding my sky dish first. If people complain I'll buy something a little smaller. I have an old microphone tripod stand and I gonna try and cover it up with some fake plants and stuff.

zg3409 wrote: »

Rather than drilling a hole to bring the cable from inside to outside you can use a flat window adapter:

http://www.tvtrade.ie/flat-satellite-cable-coupler.html

It may not work with all modern very airtight windows, but the main thing with apartment is the landlords don't want holes drilled for cables or brickwork.

I'm all over that already. Have one since previous apt and another ordered. Great little cables, will go under most things, even modern windows.

SalteeDog

These are even thinner but pricier.

JHet

I actually have one of these. Bought it from satboxes aswell!