freesat HD

[Clair]

Oh butter!

Worth a try anyway... [:D][Www]

[tracteurtom]

[quote user="Martinwatkins"]If all you want is basic standard definition TV from the BBC/ITV/C4 and aren't fussed about a detailed electronic programme guide (EPG) then a €70 dish and terminal numerique from Bricodepot/whatever will do fine.  Also gives you all the radio channels and a host of other odds and ends (some odder than other it has to be said).

If you want Freesat itself you need to go back to the UK (or get someone to do it for you) and buy and actual Freesat box,  this will give you the same channels but with a better EPG and the interactive stuff will all work logically (which it may well not do on a Bricowhatever box).

There are some software issues with the new Freesat boxes and they seem to be in short supply in some places,   so you could always get your dish working with the Bricowhatever box and enjoy that until the dust settles.

At the moment it does look like if you want all the HD stuff then a Freesat box may be necessary but to be honest I don't think anyone's sure about  that yet.  

If I haven't covered everything then please ask!

[/quote]

Many thanks Martin.  The BBCs Free sat sounds the way to go.  I'd love a HD PVR, even if its just to skip the adverts - but it'll be a cost driven thing.!!

Dont know quite what the poster with 2 PVRs and 200 ++ hrs of recording time does with it all !!  I thought one of the reasons for moving to France was to do other things than watch TV !!

On a tech note Martin, Whats the satellite for Free sat and its angle of dangle ?  Any special needs for dish / LNB ?  Thanks

[Martin963]

Freesat is on exactly the same sat as all the UK-aimed services,  ie Astra 2 ,  28.2 deg E over the equator ,   ie over Sudan.   Specifically for most of the TV it's on Astra 2D

Your angles and elevation depend on where you are in France,  but roughly SSE and roughly low thirties for angle.  

Astra 2D's signal falls off more quickly than the rest of the fleet as you move south,  but even so a minidish will work fine in a lot of France,   better to go for an 80 cm if you're well in the midi though.

If you've already got the BBC/ITV then your dish is already doing the business.

[BeeVee]

Hi all,

Dragging up this thread thanks to a Google search to see if anyone has more info? I have a Philips HDTV with built-in TNT HD, and I've bought (not really intentionally) a Goodmans Freesat HD box off eBay. I currently have a very old Sky Box with a BBC card in it from before Freeview existed that gives me all UK terrestrial channels and a bunch more. My questions are as follows:

1. Do I *need* a Quad LNB or will my single one work okay?
2. The Sky box has that BBC card in it, do I need something similar with the Freesat box? Will I get that something similar with? (The chap who sold me the freesat box lives in Yorkshire, but I am a Southern Jessy being from London)
3. My TV has a CAM slot, if I could use that for my Freesat that would be groovy, any ideas?

Thanks all for your help, merci beaucoup !

A+B

PS. I review the TV in my blog

[Anton Redman]

1. You only need a twin or quad LNB when you have a Freesat PVR or Sky Plus so that you can record one programme while watching another.

2. As part of Set up a freesat box asks you to input your post code which choses you ITV and BBC regions/countries

3. Incrediably unlikely

[Martin963]

Anton has covered the first two points.    The "point" of Freesat was for the BBC to cast off the shackles of the Sky encryption system (Videoguard);   it's a long story as to why this came about,  but totally free to air on the main channels has made life a lot easier for folk outside Britain.

The CAM slot:   as I think yours is a French TV (you mention TNT rather than Freeview) the CAM slot would be provided so that at a future date you could opt for the few channels broadcast digitally and terrestrially that are pay-channels.     These are provided variously by Canal + and others and often are part of packages th\t come with dedicated set top boxes.

Freesat on the other hand is broadcast by satellite (obviously!) from the same sats as Sky (ie the Astra 2 cluster).    Mr Murdoch uses Videoguard for his Sky packages and flouts EU law by refusing to commercialise the necessary Videoguard CAM to go in a slot.

So in your case it's a double no-no - the slot on your TV (I'm fairly certain) is designed to decrypt terrestrial digital (DVB-T) whilst if you wanted encrypted sat programmes from Astra 2 )DVB-S) you'd be stymied because you have to use one of Mr Murdoch's own sat boxes which has the Videoguard slot built into it.     So you can't buy the CAM for Sky and the slot is in the wrong place (ie across the DVB-T stream rather than the DVB-S).     You can buy other CAM's (such as Mediaguard,  Viaccess) but increasingly people like Canalsat and Canal + are pairing cards to boxes (again,  flouting EU law) and insisting you buy or rent their proprietary box,  so you might not even be able to get your TV to decrypt the French TNT scrambled channels without resort to yet another set top box,  although I'm not certain on that point.

While the rest of us have to obey EU laws Mr Murdoch and others seem to have complete immunity.   Fair isn't it!

[BeeVee]

Thanks very much for such speedy responses Martin and Anton! I figured that the CAM slot would be a no-no, so nothing unexpected there - Murdoch has flouted more international law than just this :( Other than that, I'm guessing you don't need a viewing card like I have on the Sky box? It really is plug and play...

A+B

[Martin963]

Yes the Goodmans should just substitute the Sky box and once you've done the post code and allowed it to scan then it should be up and running.

The only things you won't have compared to Sky with your free-to-view card are Fiver and Five US (or whatever the Five spin offs are called this week,   and Sky Three I think.

Have you got an HDMI cable to get the HD pics to the TV?  

[Racerbear02]

Hi

We just bought a Humax double PVR freesat box from Argos, went to a store, they said they had none in stock but Argos Direct had !  it arrived 2 days later, cost £5 extra, no requirement for installation.

Got it home, plugged it in and it worked straight away using existing Sky dish and cable, slow to boot up but good quality.

I have just sold my Sky box, plus subscription to a French local who wants to keep his English language current

[Racerbear02]

Hi

We just bought a Humax double PVR freesat box from Argos, went to a store, they said they had none in stock but Argos Direct had !  it arrived 2 days later, cost £5 extra, no requirement for installation.

Got it home, plugged it in and it worked straight away using existing Sky dish and cable, slow to boot up but good quality.

I have just sold my Sky box, plus subscription to a French local who wants to keep his English language current :)

Came with HDMI cable in the box, much better quality than scart

OK Why did edit give a duplicate message ??

[Clair]

[quote user="Racerbear02"]OK Why did edit give a duplicate message ??[/quote]

Did you use the back button on your browser instead of the edit button on your post?

[BeeVee]

Oh yes, no problem there. I found this list of current Freesat channels are you're right no fiver, fiveus, fivesomethingorother or whatever. Bit of a problem for the better half that, but apparently the Goodmans has a passthrough so I might just be able to daisychain the old Sky box, with the new Freesat HD box?

A+B