Would this work ?

[Pancake]

Would a Sky digibox work in any country for viewing free to air programs...?

[Martin963]

yes and no.  Depends on the country.   Most of the UK FTA "of interest" (ie not shopping etc) are on Astra 2D whose footprint is more tightly focussed on the UK.

A pessimistic map can be seen at

http://www.lyngsat-maps.com/maps/astra2d.html

But if you mean watching completely non UK FTA programmes say in Australia,  then you should be able to load the parameters using "add channels" and watch that way.   Although I seem to remember reading that nowadays Sky boxes spend a lot of time "searching for listings" and some of them freeze up if they don't find the Astra 2 details.

In additions,  the symbol rate is "crippled" at 27.5 and 22 and some operators use different values.

The advice has always been to buy a cheap FTA receiver to receive FTA programmes as Sky boxes are more trouble than they're worth for the purpose.

If you can give me a few days I'll test our Sky box on Astra 1;   it used to work fine for say the German channels but I haven't checked in four years and can't do so for the next couple of days.

[Tim]

Martin's right - Sky boxes are designed for Sky - they are not much use for anything else. Although you can manually 'tune' them for 'Other Channels', they are certainly not 'user friendly' when used in that way.

Tim

[Pancake]

Ok.At least it has give me something to work on...

[Dave Plumb]

I recently picked up a FTA reciever with small dish and set it up Dept 79 to Astra 28.2. there is a web site to find.  it found around 600 Tv channels, and 200 radio, not all worked or were wanted so I deleted till I remained with the ones I wanted, most of the freeview but not Ch4 or 5, the hope is they will be available in the future, it's maybe not as good a choice as with Sky but a lot less hassel, if this helps.

 

Dave

[gfplux]

Buy a cheap digital box about €50 you can then watch all free to air. BBC1, 2, 4 and 5. ITV 1,2 and 3 Sky News and a few more. This works for me with an 80cm dish in 83.

[Tim]

I agree gfplux - but I am surprised you say you are getting 5 - this is only available to Sky box owners with a viewing card.

Tim

[gfplux]

Sorry I meant BBC1,2,3 and 4.

I have also put a TV tuner card in my PC and have saved a bit of space in my office by getting rid of the TV. it was quite difficult getting the right piece of kit but the Pinnacle PCTV 400i (98€) works a treat. However still trying to get my favourates set up. Not very easy.

I also have an old Pace Sky Digibox with a card in an onther location and on that I get Channel 4 and 5