Sky FreeSAT and Sky Plus?

[JediMaster]

I've had Sky 2yrs & last month I stoped it as I was paying £17 a month for basic TV & only for bedroom, ended up watching Sky News, ITV & C5 mostly so stoped the Sky contract.

I now fancy a Sky Plus box, but will this work with FreeSAT (or do you have to have some contract with Sky to activate Sky Plus)?

ie I can buy Sky Plus box for <£50 online. Then swap with my Sky Box & get a friend to wire it up to dish (or ask a friendly Sky installer to do a little extra paid job after work). But to pair Box & Card I'd need to ring Sky. Now I dont have an Active account (as I canceled last month).

Will it still be ok? Anyone done this with FreeSAT?

Cheers

Oh, whats best Sky Plus box to get? Pace 3000 or Thompson or are all same?

[the-cable-guy]

you can use a Sky + receiver without a subscription however the + features wont work as it costs £10 p/m or a subscription.

[Chris]

Wait a couple of months and then buy a Freesat PVR. You can wire it to your existing Sky dish, although you will need at least a dual LNB on the dish.

This will cost you a little more at the outset but as cable guy says, to get the PVR features from Sky you have to pay them a subscription - so it's cheaper in the long run to use Freesat.

[the-cable-guy]

btw if you dont already have one you'l need a dual or quad lnb as any satellite tv PVR Sky + or not requires at least two cable runs from your lnb. however you'l need to buy one that is for a Sky minidish, cuz of the oval shape it needs to draw the signal from across the dish as a standard dish is round.

[JediMaster]

Originally Posted by Chris T

Wait a couple of months and then buy a Freesat PVR. You can wire it to your existing Sky dish, although you will need at least a dual LNB on the dish.

FreeSAT PVR? is this from Sky (or just a PVR with Freeview?) I dont have a Ariel on the roof (bad spot for signal). I do have Sky dish & a 4 port LNB

You also mention not being able to use the Extra Plus services without a £10month (or Sky contract). What are these extra services?

All I want to do is view FreeSAT, Access the TV Guide & Record 1 or 2 Channels at the same time (not Live TV Pause). Then watch TV when I want to (not when its on TV). lol

Cheers

[Chris]

Originally Posted by JediMaster

FreeSAT PVR? is this from Sky (or just a PVR with Freeview?) I dont have a Ariel on the roof (bad spot for signal). I do have Sky dish & a 4 port LNB

You also mention not being able to use the Extra Plus services without a £10month (or Sky contract). What are these extra services?

All I want to do is view FreeSAT, Access the TV Guide & Record 1 or 2 Channels at the same time (not Live TV Pause). Then watch TV when I want to (not when its on TV). lol

Cheers

The ability to record, rewind etc etc etc is activated by the Sky viewing card in the box. If you are not subscribing to any Sky premium channels, then they charge you £10 a month in order for them to 'hit' your viewing card to enable it to do this.

If you don't pay them, the 'plus' features will not work.

The reason you should wait for the Freesat range of PVRs to come out is that you will not need to pay Freesat any subscription at all in order to use any of the dual recording/pausing features their boxes will have.

And when I say Freesat, I mean the new service launched by the BBC and ITV, not Sky's. You can't get any kind of PVR service to work with Sky.

[the-cable-guy]

its not just the premium channels, they active it with any subscription.

[JediMaster]

Thanks Chris T and the-cable-guy for your replies.

So to allow me to Record with Sky Plus & rewind/view the recordings I need to pay £10 PCM or subscribe to ANY Sky TV Package (£16 PCM or more).? Correct

The new FreeSAT (ITV, BBC) looks great, just saw the 4x page thread & it looks great.

[Saaf_laandon_mo]

Originally Posted by the-cable-guy

its not just the premium channels, they active it with any subscription.

I thought you dont pay a tenner a month if you take out movies or sports

So just to clarify with Freestat, will I receive these extra channels through my sky plus box now? An I dont have Sky HD as I dont have a HD telly. But if i do buy a HD telly should i go for sky HD box or just get the freestat box which will give me HD free?(i assume)

Why do things have to be so confusing! And is there a list of channels available on freestat?

[the-cable-guy]

Originally Posted by JediMaster

Thanks Chris T and the-cable-guy for your replies.

So to allow me to Record with Sky Plus & rewind/view the recordings I need to pay £10 PCM or subscribe to ANY Sky TV Package (£16 PCM or more).? Correct

The new FreeSAT (ITV, BBC) looks great, just saw the 4x page thread & it looks great.

yes thats correct. freesat gives you less channels then a FTA receiver, however it has a fancy EPG.

---------- Post added at 14:47 ---------- Previous post was at 14:43 ----------

Originally Posted by Saaf_laandon_mo

I thought you dont pay a tenner a month if you take out movies or sports

So just to clarify with Freestat, will I receive these extra channels through my sky plus box now? An I dont have Sky HD as I dont have a HD telly. But if i do buy a HD telly should i go for sky HD box or just get the freestat box which will give me HD free?(i assume)

Why do things have to be so confusing! And is there a list of channels available on freestat?

you dont pay £10 p/m if you subscribe to any package. you dont need a subscription to use a Sky HD receiver. you will get BBC HD, Rush HD & Luxe HD without a subscription & Channel 4 HD for free with a FTV card which can be a former subscription viewing card or a viewing card which you can buy from Sky for £20 or from eBay.

[Chris]

Originally Posted by the-cable-guy

yes thats correct. freesat gives you less channels then a FTA receiver, however it has a fancy EPG.

If you buy the right box, it also has ethernet. And Freesat's stated aim is to have the total number of channels up past 200 (i.e. equivalent to 'Free'satfromsky) if you think a decent satellite service is determined by quantity of channels rather than by quality.

Incidentally, you won't get ITV HD on Sky. It will be exclusive to Freesat.

[the-cable-guy]

& as we keep asking the point of ethernet is ? you keep bigging it up but then you dont explain why & 200 channels isint the equivalent to FTA at 28 East, as of two weeks ago it was 311 tv & then radio channels on top of that. plus with a FTV viewing card you get Setanta Sports News, Sky Three, five, Fiver, Fiver +1, Five US & Five US +1. Setanta Sports News will never be FTA & its unlikely that Sky Three will be either. also just cuz you dont like all of the FTA channels at 28 East doesnt mean that others wont, again ppl seem to think that everyone is the same.

[Chris]

Originally Posted by the-cable-guy

& as we keep asking the point of ethernet is ? you keep bigging it up but then you dont explain why & 200 channels isint the equivalent to FTA at 28 East, as of two weeks ago it was 311 tv & then radio channels on top of that. plus with a FTV viewing card you get Setanta Sports News, Sky Three, five, Fiver, Fiver +1, Five US & Five US +1. Setanta Sports News will never be FTA & its unlikely that Sky Three will be either. also just cuz you dont like all of the FTA channels at 28 East doesnt mean that others wont,

What are you anyway, the one-man Freesat hate club?

The point of ethernet is the ability to deliver a VOD-like service, such as the BBC iPlayer, and to have true interactivity that doesn't require a phone connection. That's a really simple concept to understand, I'd have thought.

As I've said, and as just about every news outlet in print and online has said, the Five channels will be on Freesat as soon as their rights issues are resolved. This is expected to be within a couple of months.

Why do you say Setanta Sports News will never be FTA? In fact Setanta are reported to be in talks with Freesat: http://www.joinfreesat.co.uk/index.p...n-with-freesat

again ppl seem to think that everyone is the same.

... says the person who thinks the 'average' TV viewer has any interest in buying and tuning their own FTA satellite receiver.

Hello pot, this is kettle calling!

Still, at least you're beginning to see the light. All people are not the same. I agree with you. Not everyone will want Freesat. But I reckon a lot more people will want it than you think.

[the-cable-guy]

Originally Posted by Chris T

The point of ethernet is the ability to deliver a VOD-like service, such as the BBC iPlayer, and to have true interactivity that doesn't require a phone connection. That's a really simple concept to understand, I'd have thought.

As I've said, and as just about every news outlet in print and online has said, the Five channels will be on Freesat as soon as their rights issues are resolved. This is expected to be within a couple of months.

finally you'v answered our question after asking countless times.

Originally Posted by Chris T

finally you'v answered our question after asking countless times.

... says the person who thinks the 'average' TV viewer has any interest in buying and tuning their own FTA satellite receiver.

its not rocket science & the average person can, what do you think that every FTA receiver comes with no manual ? if you can tune a standard tv then you can tune a FTA receiver.

---------- Post added at 16:03 ---------- Previous post was at 16:02 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris T

What are you anyway, the one-man Freesat hate club?

as you said:

Originally Posted by Chris T

All people are not the same. I agree with you.

[Chris]

Originally Posted by the-cable-guy

finally you'v answered our question after asking countless times.

its not rocket science & the average person can, what do you think that every FTA receiver comes with no manual ? if you can tune a standard tv then you can tune a FTA receiver.

I said 'has any interest in', not 'cannot'.

If you read my posts, you'll find I generally answer questions the first time I'm asked them. Of course, if you choose not to read them, that's hardly my fault.