Saorview Freesat Apartment Block

MintyMagnum

Just wondering is it common or even possible for an apartment block to have communal aerial / dish for Saorview & Freesat?

kbell

MintyMagnum wrote: »

Just wondering is it common or even possible for an apartment block to have communal aerial / dish for Saorview & Freesat?

Yup very possible

MintyMagnum

Tks I made enquiries with the mgmt company as I noticed an aerial & dish They said the aerial was for saorview but the dish was for communal sky Anyone know if I can access Freesat UK frm the satellite without going through hoops?

The Cush

MintyMagnum wrote: »

Tks I made enquiries with the mgmt company as I noticed an aerial & dish They said the aerial was for saorview but the dish was for communal sky Anyone know if I can access Freesat UK frm the satellite without going through hoops?

Depends on what arrangement the management company has with Sky Communal, if any. Ask them.

STB.

MintyMagnum wrote: »

Tks I made enquiries with the mgmt company as I noticed an aerial & dish They said the aerial was for saorview but the dish was for communal sky Anyone know if I can access Freesat UK frm the satellite without going through hoops?

I'd imagine their use of the word Sky is a misnomer. Freesat points uses 28.2E as well.

It is illegal to enter into exclusive arrangements with one pay only service provider.

Have you tried connecting up a satellite lead to the connection in the apartment ?

Any mang company worth their salt will have a sat and aerial installer on some form of retainer.

MintyMagnum

So there's a legacy UPC wallplate with a single input from inside the wall. This has two ouputs but only the rhs has a coax cable. This cable feeds into a diplex which has what I presume is an aerial feed on the lhs and satellite feed on the rhs. I've tried to auto tune the tv, 196 channels came up but Rte1 is the only one with picture - others say scrambled service cannot be decoded.
I'd an old sky+hd box I tried also, no card in it. It said no satellite signal. Dunno if that'd work with a Freesat card have seen online.
I assume I need to get a saorview compatible receiver, the tv is 8-10 yrs old I think it had some freeview compatible sticker on it at the time, so might work in uk, not here! I've tried changing countries on tuning, no joy. I'll probably get a combi box as not v techie - suggestions welcome!
Have a sneaky dread that even if I get a comb box I may still have no sat signal.
So far Mgmt Co who recently issued a letter saying no individual dishes to be installed & Sky who supposedly own the communal dish have been no help when I rang them!

The Cush

MintyMagnum wrote: »

So there's a legacy UPC wallplate with a single input from inside the wall. This has two ouputs but only the rhs has a coax cable. This cable feeds into a diplex which has what I presume is an aerial feed on the lhs and satellite feed on the rhs. I've tried to auto tune the tv, 196 channels came up but Rte1 is the only one with picture - others say scrambled service cannot be decoded.
I'd an old sky+hd box I tried also, no card in it. It said no satellite signal. Dunno if that'd work with a Freesat card have seen online.

My guess would be that you have a Virgin Media cable connection to the apartment, I believe 1 or 2 of their digital channels are carried unencrypted. A VM decoder and subscription would be required.

MintyMagnum

The Cush wrote: »

My guess would be that you have a Virgin Media cable connection to the apartment, I believe 1 or 2 of their digital channels are carried unencrypted. A VM decoder and subscription would be required.

Tks T.C.
If I want to go subscription free tho ie saorview & Freesat can I link in with the communal aerial & dish in any way?

The Cush

MintyMagnum wrote: »

If I want to go subscription free tho ie saorview & Freesat can I link in with the communal aerial & dish in any way?

Depends on how the apartments are cabled, unfortunately only the management company or whoever looks after that side of things for them will be able to advise you.

MintyMagnum

The Cush wrote: »

Depends on how the apartments are cabled, unfortunately only the management company or whoever looks after that side of things for them will be able to advise you.

Ok. Thanks.

dubrov

Here is the likely scenario that got you to where you are now.

1) The builder was too cheap to install the TV cabling themselves so got Virgin to do it. Virgin are happy to do it as their install involves a single signal split to each TV point. This is not suitable for satellite which generally requires two cables to each TV point direct from the dish to get full view/record functionality. This is a big barrier to people moving to sky as it would need the installation of a dish and new cabling.

2) Some previous resident likely demanded to be able to get Sky and the management agent/ directors looked into it. It would require a new large communal dish and cabling along with a potential annual maintenance fee. Sky (and other companies like Conway) offer to do the install and maintenance for free but recoup the investment via monthly subscription fees. They only connect apartments that sign up to a year's subscription and generally run separate fibre optic cabling on the external wall of the block to deliver the signal (maybe have a look to see if you can see any). Most managing agents go for this option as it is easy (and very shortsighted imo) requiring no additional funding.

Sky/Conway won't disconnect your feed if you cancel after a year.

The aerial feed can share a cable with a satellite signal but generally Sky/Conway won't allow it as it encourages people to go the free route and they own the cabling. Maybe it was added without their knowledge.

All the above is guess work of course. Your management agent should be able to advise further on what exactly has been installed. If you can borrow a satellite box you can check if there is a signal or not. A lot of TVs also have an inbuilt satellite tuner (DVB-S2) or aerial tuner (DVB-T2) so check your model and you can just connect a cable directly and tune in the channels.

The Cush

dubrov wrote: »

If you can borrow a satellite box you can check if there is a signal or not. A lot of TVs also have an inbuilt satellite tuner (DVB-S2) or aerial tuner (DVB-T2) so check your model and you can just connect a cable directly and tune in the channels.

He said he tried an old Sky box but no signal. Only a single cable into a UPC wallplate.

MintyMagnum wrote: »

I'd an old sky+hd box I tried also, no card in it. It said no satellite signal. Dunno if that'd work with a Freesat card have seen online.

dubrov

Thanks Cush. I'd missed that in my skim through the posts.
Looks very likely to be a Virgin cable feed only.

OP, you need to connect to the aerial/satellite feed and the management agent should be able to advise how.
Ideally, you can pay a one off fee to get an installer out to connect.
However, the chances are they will refer you to Sky/Conway to get connected and they will insist on at least a year's subscription.
You can always cancel after a year and use your own box for free.

2ndShooter

Hi, hope someone here may be able to advise on this issue.

I live in an apartment block built 2006. At the time NTL was pre-installed, so I have one of their boxes in my living room with 2 connections - FM and TV. NTL subsequently became UPC and then Virgin media. When I moved in 2013 the only service available was UPC. I have been with UPC/virgin to date. Three years ago the management company hired a contractor to install communal saorview and satellite equipment on the roof enabling all residents a choice of virgin/sky/saorview+Freesat and presumably others. As I said I stayed with virgin.

I decided last month to cancel my virgin contract with a view to moving to saorview+Freesat. I bought a combo box (amiko mini combo extra) as I have an older TV. Virgin was turned off last Thursday. During the last month I have tried in vein to contact the installer of the saorview only to conclude, due to their lack of any response to my messages, that they were no longer in business. I cannot get anything on the amiko by connecting it to the old NTL box (which virgin had been connected to).

The management company managed to get in contact with the defunct company and passed on a message to essentially try what I had already done. I am assuming that there is a connection point somewhere in the building which I need to connect my apartment to, in order to avail of the communal equipment. The management company don't appear to have any clue about how the installation was done and I can't get any response from the guy who installed it. What do I do? Who's responsibility is it to get this sorted out?

dubrov

Pretty poor form from the management company that they don't know what was installed or agreed with the original installer.
It is likely the installer owns the dish and charges a fee to connect to it.

Given they are contactable, the best thing to do is just get a private installer out to hook you up.
Normally this will involve running discrete cabling from the satellite dish along the outside of the building to your apartment.
A small hole would then be drilled would be drilled on the outside to get the feed into your apartment.

2ndShooter

Thanks for your reply. I'd say your correct. By the way, I have absolutely no idea whether or not this crowd are gone out of business or whether they're just appallingly bad at conducting business, they're called KBO. Regarding the cabling, I don't think it could be done externally - it's a flat roof with a very wide overhang that would make external cabling impossible, I reckon it must be done internally....there must be some sort of junction box somewhere that would allow me to disconnect my apartment feed from Virgin and connect to the communal feed. I wish the management company were more knowledgeable about this because I'm guessing I could do this myself in 30 seconds if I had access to it.

dubrov

It all depends what was implemented.

KBO offered to do an install on an apartment block I used to live in.
Their proposal was to run fibre optic cable from a dish on the roof to a room in the car park in the basement.
It would then be converted to coaxial and connected to the existing UPC/Virgin cabling.

Virgin only install one cable to each apartment as Cable signals can be split while satellite can be not.
Only one feed means no watch one channel while recording another functionality.
Also, it would have involved disconnecting Virgin and so internet wouldn't be provided by them.

If the same was installed in your block you would just need access to the AV room to switch out your Virgin feed to the satellite feed.

However, I know they definitely do external cabling as well and in that case you would need to get someone to run the cable. It can be done very neatly even with overhangs. Have a look at the wall outside and see if there are any thin fibre optic cables running from the roof.

Just to add, KBO used to have a website "kbo.ie" and I can see that is gone so they are likely no longer operating.

Best thing to do is try and get the number of the caretaker from the management company and ring him direct.
He might know where the AV centre is (if there is one) and let you in.

2ndShooter

Cheers for the very helpful information and thanks for going to the trouble....much appreciated. I'll scout around and see if I can get it sorted.