Sat stuff

[master baits]

Anyone know anything about using digital sat abroad , I wish to get it installed at home then when i go abroad pop the reciever/card in my suitcase and hook it up either in the cravan or a holiday home.

so far what i gather is i need a bought outright digi box , so I dont need to connect it to the phone line....info?

[danielctull]

don't you need a dish as well? also consider that the dish needs to be near perfectly aligned and will probally take two people: one to change angle of dish and one to watch tv for signal ;)

[Forthy]

Originally posted by master baits
so far what i gather is i need a bought outright digi box , so I dont need to connect it to the phone line....info?

You don't need it connected to the phoneline unless you use the interactive stuff all the time, or have to synchronise the channels. It's a lie that you have to keep it in all the time. If you use something that requires the phone line it just asks you to plug it in.

[master baits]

Originally posted by danielctull
don't you need a dish as well?

Yeah i know that , but I emailed sky themselves they said cant be done "having it abroad", and I have the instructions to aligned to the satellites for freeview (one person involving glue a spirit bubble and compass) for bbc 1 etc but someone said to me they cancel cards so they have to be authed through the phone lines....

I am considering doing this as a business in southern spain portugal , installs for ex pats for beer tokens once i do it for meself.

What about editing bios in the thing or the card to add 44 in front of the phone number?

[Herminator]

I was out in Spain recently and I don't think it'll be worth it for you. There are plenty people doing that sort of thing already. There are a couple different companies, aswell as sky that you can get equipment for. The one I saw working relied on a card with decoding hardware attached, basicly a pcb board with a few eproms that know the latest way to decode the channels and tell your box that it's allowed to decode them. The satelite companies know it's going on a lot and they keep sending signals to ruin the cards, you normally have to upgrade it every couple of months because of this. It's still cheaper than subscribing though. You can generaly tell what direction to point the dish at but it takes a bit of tweaking, you just look at the thousands of other dishes around, and yes I mean thousands, spanish TV is terrible even if you speak the language. Although each company has their own satlelite so make sure you copy the right dish, helpfully they have big logo's on a lot of them :)

[master baits]

Nah herm im wanting to know the legal stuff seen these decoder boards before , i just want to clarify the way of doing it .

I am pretty sure as long as you own the decoder out right there is no need to use the phone line at all (and updates card auths are done via sattelite), or if not then adjusting the eprom/wafer whatever on the decoder to put the international code in , im really surprised that SKY doestn offer an expats service straight off.

After trawling through some more incoherent ramblings on another forum I have summised that they do not because they cannot offer their digital services outside of the uk.

I have also gathered if i just want the ANALOG terrestrial stuff I just get a freeview card switched on in blighty by calling skys number and giving the decoders id.So at the very least theres beeb1-2 itv(dont know if its STV) ch4 and 5 and a host of other junk (quality programming).

It was so much easier when anolog , no phone line , if i rem righlty the line is only used once a day to up the progs watched(naughty spyware) and to down the listings.

[The Pimp]

My sister has had SKY Digital for the past 4 years & not had a telephone line for 3 of them (she only got reconnected this afternoon). As someone else has already said, the telephone line is only used for certain interactive features or to synch the channels. You do not need to keep it plugged in.

[master baits]

thanks for the info lads helpful personally if not business wise , i foudn a fourm dedicated to it and its has answers to everything.

http://www.satellites.co.uk its hosted on , bit like our community here.....

[PJ Matthews]

It short, any active sky digital card is tied to its digi box. I.e once activated, it only works in the one box, it won't be a simple casr of slipping the card out of one machine, taking it t another and using it in that. Alot of freeview cards are also box tied.

[danielctull]

I just thought. i have my grandads old sky digibox and dish, no package just the free ones. They are sending out new cards, will the old card still work if its just for the free channels?

[master baits]

dcthull in the other forum i mentioned they were talking about boxes being killed , if the card or box has been dormant for x period of time.

Thanks anyway lads , i knew aboutthe tied box , hence why i would take the box with me. 8p

From what I gather your must do this ,

1 have a bought outright box and dish.
2 have a uk address to have the bill and the cards sent to.
3 depending on where you are in europe enlarge your dish , 2.4m being the optimum in alrgave a 3m motorised would be the biz , which is the furthest that the signal can really go(because of the secondary signal for sky codes)
4. never phone sKy from abroad except on a mobile , and say your back in blighty.(not really skys fault , blind eye)
5.obvioulsy the modem wont work , so no interactive gubbins or daily tv listings up downloaded and NO sky plus.

so go on touch me i rock

[BruceH]

Why couldn't you use Sky+ abroad?
As long as you have a UK billing address it wouldn't matter.

The phone connection is not required for Sky+ and I have no idea what this synchronising channels malarky is about.

I have run Sky and Sky+ boxes without phone lines for a long time.
You could even watch a few box office movies until your Viewing card fills up!! ;-)

[Forthy]

Originally posted by BruceH
The phone connection is not required for Sky+ and I have no idea what this synchronising channels malarky is about.


It's if youir service goes a complete knacker, the engineer will plug it in to the phone line so he doesn't have to manually tell the box which part of the stream is which channel. Mainly only used when the box is brand new.

[Schvetty]

i think sky digital is available in spain

other wise i would use an free view argus on-digital type box the one you can use an aerial with :)


chris:)

ps sky digital dishes do need to be perfectly aligned not like the old anolougue were it gets fuzzyier and fuzzyier

digital is a picture or no picture

you prolly new this


chris:)

[BruceH]

forthy:

Still not convinced about this channel syncing.
I installed my Sky+ box and did not connect it to the phone and it worked fine.

As far as I understand you just give it the base frequencies and it picks up the rest from the EPG app. ?

[Schvetty]

phone line is only for interactive services



software upgrades are do by the satillete

with a sequence a keypresses
i did this on on a grundig box (ofrgot wot the keys were)

and when i finished the sequences of key presses the box shut down and a little message came on the screen saying "SOFTWARE UPGRADE DO NOT TURN BOX OF FOR 20 MINIUTES" and it lasted 20 mins

turned itself back on and i noticed no difference


chris:)

[Forthy]

Dunno, 'bout any of the above, but when the engineer fitted mine he bolted the dish to the outside of the house, plugged the box in to it, then in to a phone line and pressed a couple of buttons and typed in an engineeer code. It dialled, it synchronised, all is well. He then disconnected it from the phone line and said that you only needed to plug it in after that for interactive services.

Maybe mines full of spyware! :D

[BruceH]

The software upgrade over satellite is activated by:

power off box
hold down "backup" key on box
power up box
wait!!!

This will load the latest version of the firmware (which should normally happen overnight automatically)

The "engineer" code is something like

0
1
select

He probably just did a phone line test from the engineer setup menu, checked the signal strength etc.

[Forthy]

Perhaps that was it, and I misunderstood. Either way, it don't need plugging in to a phone line afterwards, so that won't be a problem to whoever's going to spain.

[PJ Matthews]

Why couldn't you use Sky+ abroad?

Any new contract with sky requires the box to be permantly connected to the phone line for 12 months. Sky do check up on the boxes. Aparantly the boxes phone home once every 2 weeks or so to report their status ect and if they don't phone back sky take action.

[BruceH]

In theory yes.
In practice not much

Also if you get an out of contract box it's not a problem and with Sky+, you are paying for the box so I would think the contract would be different.

[The Pimp]

Originally posted by PJ Matthews
Any new contract with sky requires the box to be permantly connected to the phone line for 12 months. Sky do check up on the boxes. Aparantly the boxes phone home once every 2 weeks or so to report their status ect and if they don't phone back sky take action.

PJ, my sister never had a problem & she hasn't had a phoneline for years!!!! they only went on the phone last Tuesday :D:D:D

[PJ Matthews]

PJ, my sister never had a problem & she hasn't had a phoneline for years!!!! they only went on the phone last Tuesday

Sky have only begun seriously cracking down in the past 6 months. Check out digitalspy for more info.