More channels FTA this morning

[Martin963]

With the imminent arrival of Freesat,   I can report that

More4

4Music

E4

have all now shed their Sky encryption shackles and are free to air.

A quick rescan on 10729 MHz  22000 kbps 5/6 FEC   V Pol

should find them.

I must say it IS rather fun watching these channels draining away from Sky's control.

We should remember that - for all its faults - it was the BBC who first bravely pioneered the route to free to air digital satellite on national British channels.   Five years on and we're seeing some real progress.

[Jacqui Too]

Hi Martin

We only have Freeview with an outside aerial on our house here, although I have a sky box with a viewing card I do not have a satellite dish (well only a portable caravan one). Now I am a complete novice when it comes to sky, freesat, HD! so my question is if you were putting in a brand new system what would you buy? I ask this because we will be converting a barn to live in this year and I would like to know what is the best system for the future, HDtv with inbuilt freesat?? we are not into sky, but maybe we should!

Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated

[cooperlola]

[:D]  Well spotted Martin.  Ends months of frustration over More 4 which seems to have loads of stuff on which I want to watch.  More programme clashes now, I guess.[blink]

[Cat]

Yippee!!!   Thanks for telling us Martin [:)]

[Martin963]

and the +1's went FTA about an hour after the main feeds,   so maybe you won't have any clashes Coops!

[Martin963]

I don't think yuo can GET a TV with inbuilt Freesat (yet!).

If you've got the Sky box you may as well stick with that for the moment (assuming we can get it working properly!) as the launch of Freesat doesn't ultimately make any difference to the way a Sky box already functions.  

But we'll talk about it when you're over,  when you'll discover I'm such an old fuddy duddy that I stil prefer cathode ray tubes!

[Bob T]

What freesat will give you that sky doesn't is Hi Def TV for free.

[Jacqui Too]

See I said I was a newby to these techy things! I must have seen 'built in freeview' then [:$] 

[Jay]

http://www.freesat.co.uk/help.php gives you all the info you need.

[Martin963]

Perhaps again worth stressing that you DON'T NEED a new "Freesat" receiver to benefit from these channels that are going free to air.

Your EXISTING FTA box (if you have one) will pick up all these newly liberated channels if you do a rescan.   What existing non Sky FTA boxes will NOT do is to give you interactivity or the full weekly EPG.

So NO PURCHASE NECESSARY to watch ch 4/More 4/E4 etc

[Keith CHANNING]

Certainly works fine on my Sky box. Somone give the man a bonus for spotting it.

[Cjlaws]

Thanks for that Martin.

[Tim]

[quote user="Bob T"]What freesat will give you that sky doesn't is Hi Def TV for free.

[/quote]

Yes, a freesat box with HD facilty should give you the BBC HD channel without forking out to Sky - and perhaps more to come.

It should also, eventually when they are launched, enable to you to buy a Sky plus type box - also without subscription.

Tim

p.s. Keep forgetting, they like to spell freesat with a lower case 'f'

[Jacqui Too]

[quote user="Jay"]http://www.freesat.co.uk/help.php gives you all the info you need.
[/quote]

Thanks I followed your link and found this: http://www.freesat.co.uk/index.php?page=hd.HdReady

According to them built in freesat will be available soon [:)]

My problem is I have to many TV accessories, freeview box and separate dvd/cd player recorder and I have three remotes which drive us mad[:-))] I just want to get a system that is easy to use and is relatively 'future proof' well 10 years anyway! Everytime I want to record something I have to get the instruction book out and then I can't remember which line the ****** program is on[:-))]

[Martin963]

Then my dear Jacqui I'm the worst person to ask.   I think there were 15 remotes on my shelf in the UK last time I looked

2 x CD burners

2 x Minidiscs

2 x Sky

4 x other satellite receivers

3 x DVD recorders

1 x TV

2 x VCR's

1 x DTT box

That's 17.  Oh dear.

And the signal routing is a nightmare.    Even I can't get it to work sometimes.....

[cooperlola]

Blimey, Martin, I thought my 10 were something of a record![:-))]

[Martin963]

....and I forgot the remote for the DAT recorder!

[Mr Coeur de Lion]

Wow, thought we had a lot of remotes!

We have remotes for:

Surround sound system

TV

DVD player (rarely used)

Computer

Sky box

A French sat box

and

an all in one that doesn't really work well as an all in one.

All those confuse the crap out of me!

I predicted years ago that soon everything will be controlled by one system or computer, and it seems that is proving right. You can record tv, watch tv, listen to music, watch movies, dvds etc all on the computer and with ever impoving sound cards, decent surround sound will be possible there as well.

But back to the original topic, I've never heard of these new channels available to us, so will have a peak later.

[CBC]

Hello everyone

Here in deepest, darkest Hautes Pyrénées (65) these channels appear to be FTA, but our Sky box is giving the "no satellite signal" message on all of them.  Do we perhaps need a bigger dish to receive them (we have no problem with ITV, though it's the first to go in bad weather)? 

Thanks in anticipation.

CBC 

 

[Ron Avery]

[quote user="CBC"]

Hello everyone

Here in deepest, darkest Hautes Pyrénées (65) these channels appear to be FTA, but our Sky box is giving the "no satellite signal" message on all of them.  Do we perhaps need a bigger dish to receive them (we have no problem with ITV, though it's the first to go in bad weather)? 

Thanks in anticipation.

CBC 

[/quote]

Even weirder, I have two boxes with a dual LNB, I can get a good reception on some of the more obscure channels like True movies and Zone Romantica but as CBC, "no satellite signal being received" on the other box for the same channels....... and before anyone chimes in about being a big  softy, I like Ally Mc Beal[:P]

[Clair]

I don't know if this is relevant, but this morning, I could not bring any of the Sky channels up and theere was a "technical problem" with them

I disconnected the satellite receiver and let it reboot itself and all is well now...

.

[Ian]

Martin, a big "thank-you" for this.

Your posting encouraged me to search for Channel 4 and its variants using co-ordinates, rather than just "Autoscan". Lo and behold, there they were - C4, More4 and the rest - my wife's favourite channels (and sadly missed they've been). She's now a happy little bunny.

All I need now for the set is Channel 5....

Thanks

[Tim]

There are rumours about Five coming soon - how soon I don't know. Last year, when asked, Five replied that they were already broadcasting 'in the clear' but I think their attitude has changed a little recently - so, who knows?? It will probably happen - sometime[Www]

[Martin963]

@ CBC

Difficult to say,  as you will probably have worked out the ch 4 group of FTA channels are on the same satellite (2D) as ITV,  so it could just be that 10729 MHz is a gnat's crotchet below the required strength as received on your set up.

If they still don't work when the sky is clear then the first thing to try is a very small adjustment to the skew of the LNB -  ie how far it's twisted round in its holder.   2D does seem to favour a slightly more than usual clockwise twist (as veiwed from the front of the dish) but having said that I got ch 4 to work on someone's set up by twisting back towards the vertical recently.  

If you can't reach the dish easily,  or if that doesn't work,  I'd try borrowing someone else's box (Sky or otherwise) that DOES get ch 4 when it's at home,   and see if it works on your dish.  If not then it might be time to consider a bigger dish,  the extreme south of France is getting to the edge of 2D's footprint.

@ Ian -  glad to have done something useful for you!

@ Timco -  even in analogue days ch 5 were unable to grasp the distinction between FTA (which they assured me during the tests transmissions that they would be) and FTV (which is what they actually are).   So when the Spice Girls loop went so did my picture.    But I know you knew that already!

[Tim]

I've read many posts on several sites where people have written to Five (some might describe these people as sad with no lives) asking when they will be going FTA and as has been said, they thought they already were. The latest rumour is sometime in the summer ( I like to be as precise as possible).

My goodness, yes - the analogue days - when receiving Five , or Channel Five as it was then, was an art it itself - still is in some places.

I remember thinking at the time that is was a strange game they were playing with their satellite transmissions, although I never had the problem as we were just about line of sight to the transmitting mast in Croydon.

Spice girls loop? Heard about it, but never saw it. Being in Surrey I never bothered with satellite for Channel Five - my dish was normally pointing at something completely different. I expect you can find the clip on Youtube Martin and re-live the moment all over again.

Tim