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Satellite or Antenna

Hatter · 2005-01-10 18:22:31

I was hoping to find out what I'd need to be able to view British and European Free to Air Channels? Would an antenna via a TV PVR box to my PC be enough or would I need a satellite dish with DVB card? And indeed would an Antenna and DVB card pick up more than the mere Antenna into the PVR in the Dublin area as it seems a…

10-01-2005 6:22pm

#1

Hatter

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I was hoping to find out what I'd need to be able to view British and European Free to Air Channels? Would an antenna via a TV PVR box to my PC be enough or would I need a satellite dish with DVB card? And indeed would an Antenna and DVB card pick up more than the mere Antenna into the PVR in the Dublin area as it seems a very basic antenna only gets the 4 normal channels? Basically If I can get free to air TV from Europe and Britain and Ireland without having to put a satellite dish outside my home It'd be much better. But if not, so be it. Can anyone help me out?

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#2 10-01-2005 7:05pm

Eurorunner

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Skystar2 DVB card = €60 approx.
ct100 sat. cable
dish - minimum 80cm
diseqc motor = €66
couple of twist on connectors, a half decent lnb (the thing at the front of the dish), a sat finder (€10), and your up and running.

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#3 11-01-2005 11:33am

Hatter

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Eurorunner wrote:

Skystar2 DVB card = €60 approx.
ct100 sat. cable
dish - minimum 80cm
diseqc motor = €66
couple of twist on connectors, a half decent lnb (the thing at the front of the dish), a sat finder (€10), and your up and running.

Thanks Eurorunner? Can I ask is that the only way? And if so,where would be the best place to buy those things? I am in Dublin.

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#4 11-01-2005 11:49am

Greenman

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Hatter wrote:

Thanks Eurorunner? Can I ask is that the only way? And if so,where would be the best place to buy those things? I am in Dublin.

I did a search for Skystar 2 on boards and this is what I found.
Try http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/search.php?searchid=315144

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#5 11-01-2005 1:15pm

Eurorunner

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Hatter wrote:

Thanks Eurorunner? Can I ask is that the only way? And if so,where would be the best place to buy those things? I am in Dublin.

hmsat - their prices are good and delivery prompt.

Make sure to order everything up in the one hit - otherwise, you get stung on delivery charges if ordering the odd item...

As regards, is it the only way - I think its the only way for you to get a decent selection of channels...

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#6 11-01-2005 3:11pm

Hatter

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Thanks again Eurorunner. Just finally, I expect that link you gave me is the cheapest place around, but are there any places in Dublin that might give a good deal?

And as my PC is an AMD Athlon XP 2000+ with only 1.67Ghz and 256MB RAM would this be enough to run the skystar2? I have heard it takes a lot of memory from the PC. Perhaps a Hauppauge DVB card might be a better option? Although, as I say, I really don't know?

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#7 11-01-2005 5:54pm

Eurorunner

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I'd say your safe enough with that pc spec.
I have no knowledge of the hauppage card - maybe someone else can help with that. However, the thing with the ss2 is that because they are so popular, they are very well supported in terms of software.

If you want to buy irish, then go with satellite.ie. As regards actual shops, I'm not aware of where you can walk into for this stuff - maybe maplins - but your choice will be restricted and they can't compete with the online retailers on price cos of insurance and other overheads.

EDIT - not sure if satellite.ie do DVB-S cards though. Tony?

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#8 11-01-2005 6:00pm

Tony

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Eurorunner wrote:

EDIT - not sure if satellite.ie do DVB-S cards though. Tony?

Sorry no but thanks for the mention

Desktop PC Boards discount code on https://www.satellite.ie/ is boards.ie

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#9 11-01-2005 10:22pm

byte

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byte

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Peats.ie (Parnell St) sell Hauppauge DVB-s cards but they're €310!

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#10 11-01-2005 11:32pm

Zaphod

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Hatter wrote:

Thanks again Eurorunner. Just finally, I expect that link you gave me is the cheapest place around, but are there any places in Dublin that might give a good deal?

Maplin have the Hauppauge Nova-S for €165. The Nova-S is like the Skystar 2 in that there is no onboard MPEG2 processing. The more expensive card sold in Peats is probably the Hauppauge Nexus-S which has onboard MPEG2 processing and will run on a much lower spec PCs. It also has TV-Out.

Hatter wrote:

And as my PC is an AMD Athlon XP 2000+ with only 1.67Ghz and 256MB RAM would this be enough to run the skystar2? I have heard it takes a lot of memory from the PC. Perhaps a Hauppauge DVB card might be a better option? Although, as I say, I really don't know?

I have a SS2 running fine on an AMD 1800XP and 256MB ram. I've seen it running on lower spec PCs too. Anything above 1GHz should be fine. If you use one of the less processor hungry codecs which is matched to your graphics card, you could get it working on even older machines.

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#11 12-01-2005 11:23am

Hatter

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Thanks everyone for the help and advice!

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#12 12-01-2005 8:24pm

shinobi

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byte wrote:

Peats.ie (Parnell St) sell Hauppauge DVB-s cards but they're €310!

Elara do them for €260..Only €95 more than the Nova, & a much better spec Card.

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#13 12-01-2005 9:37pm

Hatter

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I am getting a bit confused here. This http://www.hm-sat-shop.de/22.ghtml card here is the skystar 2 and it says its a TV PVR. However, my Typhoon TV PVR box has an output for cable TV ot Antenna etc. Why then can't I merely put the dish into this and get what I want?

Or am I completely misreading things.

For those that don't know what the Typhoon is. It is exactly the same as the hauppauge WINTV PVR2USB only as an added extra the Typhoon can support MPEG 4. Discuss......

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#14 12-01-2005 10:49pm

Greenman

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Hatter wrote:

I am getting a bit confused here. This http://www.hm-sat-shop.de/22.ghtml card here is the skystar 2 and it says its a TV PVR. However, my Typhoon TV PVR box has an output for cable TV ot Antenna etc. Why then can't I merely put the dish into this and get what I want?

Or am I completely misreading things.

For those that don't know what the Typhoon is. It is exactly the same as the hauppauge WINTV PVR2USB only as an added extra the Typhoon can support MPEG 4. Discuss......

Question is do you just have a TV card or a TV and Satellite card??
If you have the latter then just plug into dish seek the satellite of your choice that you can you recieve and scan.
If the former you need a sat TV PCI card!!!

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#15 12-01-2005 11:05pm

shinobi

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Hatter wrote:

I am getting a bit confused here. This http://www.hm-sat-shop.de/22.ghtml card here is the skystar 2 and it says its a TV PVR. However, my Typhoon TV PVR box has an output for cable TV ot Antenna etc. Why then can't I merely put the dish into this and get what I want?

Or am I completely misreading things.

For those that don't know what the Typhoon is. It is exactly the same as the hauppauge WINTV PVR2USB only as an added extra the Typhoon can support MPEG 4. Discuss......

The hauppauge WINTV PVR2USB & the Typhoon only work with cable/Terresterial TV Frequencies.
The Hauppauge Nexus, Nova & Sky star2 work on decoding satellite frequencies (Much Higher than Normal Cable Frequencies).

The following are the available channels on Hispasat, as discussed earlier.

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#16 13-01-2005 1:13pm

Hatter

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Thanks for all the help. Just finally is Hispasat Free to air?

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