Sky Digital + Freeview/Freesat

SteeveeDee

Hey,
Just sussing out some TV options for my folks and thought somebody on here may be of some help.
My folks want to get rid of UPC due to the bad service they receive and are looking into Sky.

They want SKY in 2 rooms and 2 other rooms with just saorview. What I was wondering is could it be possible to use the Sky dish for 2 Freesat/Freeview instead of Saorview?

I am assuming the dish will work fine however I'm not sure how I would go about splitting or distributing the signals. What kind of work am I looking at here? I'm fairly handy with electrics and electronics but have never done any TV jobs.

Cheers

The Cush

I assume if you go with Sky for 2 rooms this installation work will be done by Sky installers, Sky+ in the main room (twin-tuners, 2 co-ax cables from the dish) and a Sky multiroom box in the other room (single-tuner, single cable from the dish). Telephone connection required for multiroom.

For the other 2 rooms if you go the Freesat route you will also require direct co-ax cable feeds from the LNB on the satellite dish. Do you require recording capability with the Freesat boxes? Freesat+ twin-tuner recorders, like Sky+ require 2 co-ax cables from the dish, basic Freesat single-tuner zapper boxes require a single cable.

The Sky dish comes with a quad (4 output) LNB I believe, this can be upgraded to an octo (8 output) LNB depending on your requirements. The Sky dish can be used for Freesat also.

Basically each tuner within a satellite receiver requires a direct cable connection to the dish. CT100 type cable - http://www.satcure.co.uk/tech/cable.htm

Note that you cannot get the Irish Saorview channels with Freesat as they are encrypted on satellite and only available with a Sky subscription.

dubrov

Sky and Freesat work off the same connection and dish. They need a direct feed from the satellite dish (no splitting). For recording (Sky+ and Freesat+) you'd need a second feed (again directly from the dish).

Saorview is picked up by an aerial and can be split repeatedly as long as the signal is strong enough.

The Saorview and Satellite signals can be transmitted down the same cable using a combiner.

Freesat and Saorview need a tunerto display the channels(like a UPC box).
Most TVs sold in Ireland have a Saorview tuner (DVB-T/DVB-T2) built in but you'd probably need to buy a Freesat decoder box. It would mean you'd have to press a button like "AV" to switch between Saorview and Freesat signals.

Free-to-air satellite is an alternative to Freesat. The main difference is that there is no 7 day EPG. The advantage is that there are combo boxes available like the Ariva 250 which have terrestrial and satellite tuners built in. These boxes can have Saorview and Satellite channels on one list (so no AV button press required to change between the two).

If your parents aren't bothered about Sky sports, I'd consider dumping Sky altogether as all the main channels (BBC HD , ITV HD etc.) are all free on Freesat/free-to-air and wouldn't require any subscription.