Suggest a satellite setup primarily for radio.

my3cents

Any suggestions for what box to use primarily to get radio stations by satellite.

Just planning ahead for when we can't get BBC4 on longwave anymore.

I've a notion that I can get a satellite receiver of some kind that has a digital display built in and that I can just press whatever number the radio station is tuned into on the remote and hear the program via an audio amp.

Obviously I will attach a TV so I can tune the box in but the plan was not to leave a TV permanently attached.

Dish and feed are already set up.

decor58

Any old sky box will give you radio access, number 0104 for radio 4.

Johnboy1951

I would suggest something smaller and neater than a Sky box ..... maybe an old SilverCrest SL65 of which there must be many discarded and available for very little or free to take away. It has digital coax audio out as well as Left & Right output. There is one available on Adverts.

No HDMI on that box for setting it up, would need a Scart cable.

There are probably lots of others also, which are small and neat.

dxhound2005

my3cents wrote: »

Any suggestions for what box to use primarily to get radio stations by satellite.

Just planning ahead for when we can't get BBC4 on longwave anymore.

I've a notion that I can get a satellite receiver of some kind that has a digital display built in and that I can just press whatever number the radio station is tuned into on the remote and hear the program via an audio amp.

Obviously I will attach a TV so I can tune the box in but the plan was not to leave a TV permanently attached.

Dish and feed are already set up.

Without a TV attached you will need to provide a satellite feed to a separate satellite box, and attach a speaker to use it as a radio only receiver. I'm reading that you want to listen at the place where your LW radio is and that is not where the TV is?

Without the TV screen you won't be able to see the channel list of radio stations, but that is not much of a problem. The satellite box display will show the name of whatever radio station is being received.

There is a new generation of satellite receivers with a mini TV display. I am not certain but I think that it could display the channel list. It is a very expensive option at present, but it would have the advantage that you could watch some TV if you did not want to listen to the radio.

Don't do anything in a hurry because it will be years before Radio 4 goes from Long Wave.

St Senan

I have setup a good few FTA boxes in the past just for radio channels. Scan the FTA box just for radio then re-order the channels to what channel numbers you want, then list the channels and corresponding numbers on a A4 sheet and Laminate the sheet and connect the box to a stereo unit thru red/white audio cables or optic if its available on either the FTA box or the stereo unit.

MenloPete

I listen to radio quite a bit like this, but if I were to set up purely for radio I would insist on a box which displays station name rather than a channel number. There are thousands of stations, if you have multi-sat reception and channel numbers become meaningless.
Any suggestions with that in mind?

ZaffizaKunt

Is there any reason why you want to use a satellite for this?

There is a simple solution if you have either an Android or Apple phone? Download the free TuneIn app and you have access to thousands of radio stations from all over the world including BBC4 LW. Buy yourself a Bluetooth speaker and then listen to whatever station you please. There are hundreds of Bluetooth speakers on Amazon from €10 to €100+ so something for all budgets.

STB.

MenloPete wrote: »

I listen to radio quite a bit like this, but if I were to set up purely for radio I would insist on a box which displays station name rather than a channel number. There are thousands of stations, if you have multi-sat reception and channel numbers become meaningless.
Any suggestions with that in mind?

Be a bit overkill but any enigma box that has an led display will display the station as a picon. I use a Gigablue UE800. Come in different configs, dvb-t + dvb-s2 or just satellite on its own.



As well as those with LED Front Screen diplays, E2 boxes also have an excellent radio on screen display anyway.

PabloAndRoy

ZaffizaKunt wrote: »

Is there any reason why you want to use a satellite for this?

There is a simple solution if you have either an Android or Apple phone? Download the free TuneIn app and you have access to thousands of radio stations from all over the world including BBC4 LW. Buy yourself a Bluetooth speaker and then listen to whatever station you please. There are hundreds of Bluetooth speakers on Amazon from €10 to €100+ so something for all budgets.

For BBC radio, the BBC Radio iPlayer app is way better than TuneIn.

Available streams up to 320kbps AAC-LS. It includes full schedules and a catch up service / podcasts. If BBC 4 is your thing and you have any internet connection above 200kbps, this is a way better solution that a satellite solution. Unlike the TV iPlayer, BBC Radio iPlayer works fine in Ireland.

I listen to BBC Radio 6 Music on this app in the car over 3G and it is flawless. The streams sound way better than FM radio.

Edit: Also the satellite bit rates are 192kbps MPEG-2 versus 320kbps AAC-LS on iPlayer.
http://www.astra2sat.com/radio/uk-digital-radio-bitrates/
So in every way, d'internet is the way to go and the native app totally rocks.