Sky Minidish usage in France

[Katieb]

Hi,

We are due to move to France (Dept 72 - Sarthe), in the next month and we will be bringing our SKY digibox with us.  Could anyone recommend whether we should take our SKY Minidish with us or whether it would be better to buy a new one when we arrive in France.

1) Does the small black oval SKY Minidish work OK in France.

2) Are there any benefits in buying one in France.

Thanks for your advise,

Kate

 

[Baz]

Your Sky mini dish should work well in 72, in fact I successfully used one in Aude and you cannot get any further south than that. Dishes are very easy to come buy in France and you might then choose to get a larger one than the sky one which will may improve the quality of the picture in bad weather.

Baz

[Deimos]

I also live in 72 (southern part) and my Sky mini-dish works fine (in fact I have better signal strength & signal quality that I did in the UK). I don’t have any problems in bad weather (extreme thunder storms perhaps but just once or twice in the last year).

Assuming you are subscribed to Sky (with a Sky card, etc.), a few points. Your contract with Sky and Sky’s transmitting license means that they cannot transmit other than to UK geographic areas. Fine, their signal covers Europe but if they know you no longer live in the UK then they will immediately(‘ish) kill off your card. You need to have a UK address for them to send post, cards, etc. to (so they think you have just moved within the UK). Careful if you ever telephone them as well.

If your Sky contract (still) requires your Sky box to be plugged into the telephone line at all times then this can be a problem (as it wont be plugged in in France and people say Sky notice its not plugged-in). I never had this on my Sky box (as I purchased it myself at fullish price and was not subsidised by Sky). I understand that these “must be plugged-in” terms tend to last a year after which it is not a requirement (others might know more).

Installing your Sky dish in France is a pretty straightforward DIY job and you can find info re alignment on this forum or http://www.brymar.co.uk/info/info.html. Took me less than a few hours (probably quicker if I had had assistance or maybe I was lucky and happened to get the alignment quickly). Brico’s sell additional dish cable, plugs, etc if you need them.

Hope this helps

Ian

[Opel Fruit<P><BR>Opel Fruit, Dept. 53<P>]

We are in 53, same latitude as 72 and have some problems in bad weather with a 43cm minidish, a few occasional problems with a 60cm minidish and no problems with an 85cm dish bought from Leroy Merlin for about 30 EUR c/w LNB. All have been set up using a meter to peak the signal quality.

All 3 are in regular use.

[Anton Redman]

The only downside I can see is that replacement SKY LNBs ( AKA thing on the end of the arm) is not available from DIY sheds or supermarkets in France but ours is going strong five years in so I would not worry.

[Opel Fruit<P><BR>Opel Fruit, Dept. 53<P>]

Just change the dish to a parabolic one - they come with universal LNBs.

You can buy the minidish type off eBay too.

[Katieb]

Hi all,

Thanks for all your replies, think I will buy a new dish when arrive in France, at 30 euros it doesnt warrant me climbing onto my roof to extract my existing one.

Thanks again,

Kate

[Dubna]

"If your Sky contract (still) requires your Sky box to be plugged into the telephone line at all times then this can be a problem (as it wont be plugged in in France and people say Sky notice its not plugged-in). I never had this on my Sky box (as I purchased it myself at fullish price and was not subsidised by Sky). I understand that these “must be plugged-in” terms tend to last a year after which it is not a requirement (others might know more)."

Sky notice when a box is not connected to the telephone line because once a month or so they instruct the box to ring a free phone number at sky centre and pass on coded information from the box.  If the call fails a couple of times they will write to you and eventually cut off the card.  They are more keen with this when you have a mirror account at a reduced rate as I know to my cost when my son in the UK decided to plug a phone into the line instead so he could chat for hours on end to his girl friend.  Not only did I get a big telephone bill but was also invoiced by sky for one month at full rate for two boxes.

The mini dish is pushing it a bit the further south in France you are located.  The vulnerable channels are ITV and BBC2. 90cm dishes with an analogue turner and a universal LNB can be purchased for as little as 37€ - that's cheaper than buying and shipping a mini dish from the UK.

CHRIS

[Bannon]

Have to agree about the dish size. Done lots of them right across France and have found that that the 60cm works well above a line from Bordeaux to Geneve. Mind you, at that lower latitude sighting a dish of that size for the Astra 2d north beam can be a bit tricky without a decent meter. Here in the Centre of France it's easy peasy lemon squeezy!

www.uksatfrance.co.uk

[Opel Fruit<P><BR>Opel Fruit, Dept. 53<P>]

Biggest problem for a DIYer would probably be avoiding Astra1 and having to power-off reset the box.

To avoid Astra 1, start east and work south!

[Deimos]

Southern corner of 72 (borders with 37) and my mini dish works file. Both signal quality and signal strength three quarters of max (better than I got in the UK) with virtually no “drop-outs” in the last year and a half.