Do I need a new Sky card?

[nectarine]

First of all, apologies if this subject has been done to death but, for the life of me, I still can't quite work out what I'm supposed to do.

We bought a Sky Box and free to view card off Ebay and it's been running here fine in France. In fact, if you take the card out of the box it still works fine but, in recent months, we've lost Channel 5, Fiver, Dave, etc. We only ever had the free-to-view channels which suited us.

Now I'm getting a message on the screen telling me that I need to change my card. I went on the Sky website and entered the card number and it asks for credit-card details but it won't accept that my credit card address is in France, and I don't have any other debit cards with a UK address. So I didn't pursue this.

Last night I met someone who told me "oh you don't want to bother with renewing your Sky card, just get a Freesat box because you can get more channels" but then wouldn't tell me if I needed any card, or a different dish, to get this. He said we should get an HD box - I understand that's high-def but don't you need an HD television to watch from an HD box?

I'd be hugely grateful if someone could explain to me, in plain English, just what I need to do to continue watching the box after the end of this month and whether Freesat is easier/better/cheaper than a Sky box and whether I need to retune my dish. I've done various internet searches to try to find out but am lost in a foaming sea of technical detail and bafflement!

Many thanks all.

[Maricopa]

See here.

[Pickles]

It does sound like your Sky card has expired: if you get someone with a UK address to buy a Sky "Freesat from Sky" card then it will keep you going for a while longer. The thing about Sky boxes, to me anyway, is that they are a pain in the backside if you want to add new channels or regional variations or whatever, and work at their best with some form of valid Sky card in them (I don't have one: just had to sort them out for my relatives from time to time). However, it CAN still be used as a Free-to-Air box, if you don't mind the digging around the "other channels" menu to add the FTA channels that the Sky box doesn't automatically add, and you don't mind the electronic programme guide being stuffed full of Sky offerings that you aren't getting.

If you get a Freesat box (ie a non-Sky one - Sky sells "Freesat from Sky" as a way of confusing the buyers), then this will have the advantage of automatically putting the channels into some reasonable order, and having set a couple of these up I found them to be rather more user-friendly than a Sky box without a valid Sky card. In terms of setting one up, your existing dish and LNB will be pointing in the correct area anyway, so you can just swap the incoming satellite feed from the Sky box to the Freesat box and it will be fine.

HD boxes will work "down" to the resolution of the TV that you connect to them, but as you say, without an HD TV, you aren't going to get the best out of it, but it will be there for when you eventually replace your TV. For me, I would probably not bother with HD at present.

A (non-Sky) Freesat box works without any card.

Regards

Pickles

[Gemonimo]

I have a french digibox and receive Sky without any problems.  However, the last couple of weeks I have had a message scrawled across the screen telling me to reprogramme before the 1st October in order to continue receiving Sky. I don't have any sort of card. All too confusing for my little bird brain. Perhaps if I ignore it long enough, it will go away, or should I actually do something?

[Pickles]

[quote user="Gemonimo"]I have a french digibox and receive Sky without any problems.  However, the last couple of weeks I have had a message scrawled across the screen telling me to reprogramme before the 1st October in order to continue receiving Sky. I don't have any sort of card. All too confusing for my little bird brain. Perhaps if I ignore it long enough, it will go away, or should I actually do something?[/quote]

Which Sky channel (other than Sky News) are you getting? I suspect that you are actually getting the Freesat channels (ie BBC, ITV, Ch4) as detailed on the www.freesat.co.uk site. I know that the digital terrestrial service in the UK is having a shuffle of frequencies on the 30th, and the message could be related to that, but I would have not expected that to go on the signal fed to the satellite.

Basically, if, after the 30th, you realise that you have lost some channels, just do a re-scan. Otherwise, ignore it..

regards

Pickles

(evidently doing displacement activities today ...)

[Gemonimo]

Pickles, in English I'm only receiving Sky News, BBC World and CNN.   The rest is just the regular french channels, plus, of course, the usual German porn[:-))]  I'll take your advice and re-scan if I'm not getting anything after the 30th.  Thanks.

[Tim]

To me, that doesn't sound as if you're watching the UK channels from 28 east - more likely that you're getting these from 19 east. One of my friends has this same message from their French satellite system on Sky News.

It seems as if there are also some changes going with other satellite providers. If this is the case, I don't think you'll need to do anything as your provider will make the changes for you - unless you're just using a box you bought from a shop and tuned it yourself, in which case, you'll have to manually re-tune to the new frequency.

Regards - Tim

[Pickles]

[quote user="Gemonimo"]Pickles, in English I'm only receiving Sky News,

BBC World and CNN.   The rest is just the regular french channels,

plus, of course, the usual German porn[:-))]  I'll take your advice and

re-scan if I'm not getting anything after the 30th.  Thanks.[/quote]

[quote user="Tim"]To me, that doesn't sound as if you're watching the UK channels from 28 east - more likely yhat your getting these from 19 east. One of my friends has this same message from their French satellite system on Sky News.

It seems as if there are also some changes going with other satellite providers. If this is the case, I don't think you'll need to do anything as your provider will make the changes for you - unless you're just using a box you bought from a shop and tuned it yourself, in which case, you'll have to manually re-tune to the new frequency.[/quote]

My vote goes for Tim's explanation.

Are you paying a subscription to TNTsat, Canalsat or Fransat, or does your box have logo from one of those or a similar company? (I'm guessing that the answer to that is "yes").

If you wanted to receive the other UK channels, you would have to have to point the dish towards the Astra satellite cluster at 28 degrees east.

Regards

Paul

[Gemonimo]

Pickles I'm not paying a subscription for Sky.  The box was installed by Pro&Cie who programmed it and left me to it.  I have re-jigged after a power failure, but wouldn't have a clue as to how to re-programme one of the 'chaines' not the whole lot. 

And Tim, I don't even know whether Sky is coming from north, south, east or west let alone 19 or 28!! Life was so much simpler when I only picked up TF1 and 1,2 and 3.

[Pickles]

[quote user="Gemonimo"]Pickles I'm not paying a subscription for Sky.  [/quote]

No - you wouldn't be. However, you COULD have been paying a subscription to a French provider who includes BBC World and Sky News in its bundle, but it sounds like you are not doing that either - so my guess would be that it is a "one off payment" type receiver tied to TNTsat or Canalsat.

[quote user="Gemonimo"]The box was installed by Pro&Cie who programmed it and left me to it.  I have re-jigged after a power failure, but wouldn't have a clue as to how to re-programme one of the 'chaines' not the whole lot.[/quote]

There will be a "menu" or "setup" (or French equivalent thereof) button on the handset - see what options you get. One of them will be to re-initialise the whole thing: that will do the trick.

Regards

Pickles

[Gemonimo]

Merçi mon pote...

[nectarine]

Pickles, many thanks for explaining everything so clearly!!!!

[Jay]

You will definitely need a Sky card if you want to watch Stargate Universe this Tuesday on Sky 1. Don't miss it - excellent new series!!

[cooperlola]

Well, it's finally happened and all the 5 channels have disappeared.  Typical as it's a Friday night so The Unit's on tonight and Law and Order tomorrow so I am very annoyed.  Grump.  I'll have to get on with it and source a new Sky card I guess.

However, I think I'm missing something as Channel 5 itself has also gone too, not just Five US and Fiver.  I have a Pace box and I cannot figure out how to do a re-scan, if indeed it's possible.  Any ideas you chaps?

[krusty]

You can follow Clair`s(her with the new frog avi [Www]) instructions here to get channel five only back. I have a pace box also and it does work.

[Clair]

[quote user="cooperlola"]

Well, it's finally happened and all the 5 channels have disappeared.  Typical as it's a Friday night so The Unit's on tonight and Law and Order tomorrow so I am very annoyed.  Grump.  I'll have to get on with it and source a new Sky card I guess.

However, I think I'm missing something as Channel 5 itself has also gone too, not just Five US and Fiver.  I have a Pace box and I cannot figure out how to do a re-scan, if indeed it's possible.  Any ideas you chaps?

[/quote]

Here

[Pickles]

[quote user="cooperlola"]Well, it's finally happened and all the 5 channels have disappeared.  Typical as it's a Friday night so The Unit's on tonight and Law and Order tomorrow so I am very annoyed.  Grump.  I'll have to get on with it and source a new Sky card I guess.

However, I think I'm missing something as Channel 5 itself has also gone too, not just Five US and Fiver.  I have a Pace box and I cannot figure out how to do a re-scan, if indeed it's possible.  Any ideas you chaps?[/quote]

If you need a manual, (but only if you need to go beyond the details provided by the others) they can be downloaded from HERE

Regards

Pickles

[cooperlola]

I've got Channel 5 back now, but as an "Other Channel" I don't seem to be able to pre-programme it.  This thus renders it pretty useless to me as I rarely watch live TV (the o/h thinks the box in the corner is evil![:D])  Any thoughts as to how I can manage this?

Meanwhile I've found a white card on ebay - £110 less than the European based rip-off companies want for the thing!

[Mr Coeur de Lion]

[quote user="cooperlola"]

I've got Channel 5 back now, but as an "Other Channel" I don't seem to be able to pre-programme it.  This thus renders it pretty useless to me as I rarely watch live TV (the o/h thinks the box in the corner is evil![:D])  Any thoughts as to how I can manage this?

Meanwhile I've found a white card on ebay - £110 less than the European based rip-off companies want for the thing!

[/quote]

I got C5 back too that way.

To be honest, it must be a fortnight since I've switched the tv on anyway. I live upstairs now next to the fireplace keeping warm and watch movies and stuff on my laptop in the dark. I'm very green now.

[Jazzer]

Have I got the box that Sky forgot?

To my knowledge I have not had any message to renew my card, and have just checked to find I have all the 5's.

[cooperlola]

My understanding is that this was to happen gradually through September and October, depending on the original blue house card,  and that at the end of the two months all the old cards would stop working.  I too had hoped I had escaped but today it happened and the 5s all went awol! I never had a warning message either.

[cooperlola]

Seriously, there's something on at midnight which I want to record. It follows a programme on a different channel so I can't just put the box on 5 and leave it.  Short of setting the alarm for midnight and changing channels, is there any other way of progamming Ch 5 in advance now?

I have to hope my new card turns up before the next episode of Flash Forward.....

[Anton Redman]

Famous last words I thought :

Select Channel 5 - scroll down to the time you want using the down arrows. Then press Select for reminder. Then

Oval TV guide button - green planner - programme should now appear - redbutton ste autoview.

Only works for normal channels not added channels but C5 is OK on my box which has no Sky Card. 

[cooperlola]

[quote user="Anton Redman"]

.

Only works for normal channels [/quote]That's the rub for me as I had to add it using Clair's method (thanks for that, btw).  It doesn't appear on the normal list.  But I'll give your method a go once the racing's over.[:D]  As I don't watch live TV much, especially in the evenings, I record using the planner normally, but C5 has dropped off the list of course.  Getting very grumpy about this now, but it serves me right for not having sourced a new card the moment Clair posted the original warning.[:$]

[Maricopa]

When I started getting the on screen warning message, I simply took out the card, and the only thing I lost was Sky 3, with Channel 5 being on 105 as usual.  Maybe I was just lucky?