Sky & Free sat

[gselectrical]

Evening all.

Am I right in thinking that if I was to replace my current sky box with a HD freesat tuner that this will work? Even though its a SKY dish. I assume they use the same satellites?

Cheers.

 

[bengie]

yeah it'll work fine, its not a "sky" dish as such, its just a satellite dish that sky supplied.

 

[Robojin]

^ what he said, just swap over the box and connect cables

 

[PC Electrics]

You'll need a twin downlead for an HD box.

If you change your LNB for one with 4 or 8 outputs you can put freesat in more rooms. Something like this:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BRAND-NEW-8WAY-OCTO-LNB-SKY-FREESAT-HD-SKYPLUS-LMB-/330450926427?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_ConEle_SatCableFreeview_RL&hash=item4cf068fb5b

 

[gselectrical]

Cheers lads. Thaught i'd double check b4 bying the Humax.

 

[tom1]

http://www.screwfix.com/prods/98603/Electrical-Supplies/TV-Range/HDMI-Digital-TV-Range/Labgear-HD-Complete-Satellite-Kit

see this the other day, seems cheep compared to some of the hd free sat box. says in the review that it can record and pause tv if you plug in external hard drive

dont know if its any good, has anyone used one?

 

[Sparky_Chris]

You'll need a twin downlead for an HD box.If you change your LNB for one with 4 or 8 outputs you can put freesat in more rooms. Something like this:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BRAND-NEW-8WAY-OCTO-LNB-SKY-FREESAT-HD-SKYPLUS-LMB-/330450926427?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_ConEle_SatCableFreeview_RL&hash=item4cf068fb5b

You'll only need a twin downlead if you are using a Freesat PVR.

 

[Robojin]

You'll only need a twin downlead if you are using a Freesat PVR.

However you can find loads of quads cheaper than twins

 

[PC Electrics]

You'll only need a twin downlead if you are using a Freesat PVR.

So, HD only requires one downlead for each tuner?

I thought (perhaps erroneously) that HD required two signals (downleads) per channel because the extra signal was split over two channels. This not so, then?

 

[aptsys]

Nope.

 

[bengie]

^ HD uses the same cables as SD, its only the recording that requires two, sort of.

you don't actually need two cables to be able to record, what you need two cables for is so you can record one channel and watch another, my parents have SkyHD with only one cable and its works fine as long as you don't try and watch a channel whilst recording another, the new epg has a "single cable mode" or something in the setup menu

 

[tom1]

i always wonded if you could just split one cable, like you could for an arial, but i am not a sky wiz so would it work?

 

[bengie]

nope, the decoder has to control something in the LNB as far as i know which is why you need extra "channels" in the LNB. basically split cables don't work.

 

[ianmacd]

nope, the decoder has to control something in the LNB as far as i know which is why you need extra "channels" in the LNB. basically split cables don't work.

Indeed it does. The receiver tells the LNB whether it wants High or Low bands and Horizontal or vertical polarisation. If you split the cable between 2 boxes then you will have all sorts of fun when they are not watching the same polarisation and band frequency range (and probably bad signal degradation if they are watching the same channel).

I currently use a Quattro LNB at home with a 16 port sat switch. Only need 4 cables from the dish then (+ one to carry the combined UHF/VHF for terrestrial TV and radio (FM&DAB)). I then have a cable (or 2 for sky+(hd)) to each receiver and each one thinks its talking to an LNB when it asks for the channels it wants but its really the sat switch just supplying the requested feed.

 

[Robojin]

nope, the decoder has to control something in the LNB as far as i know which is why you need extra "channels" in the LNB. basically split cables don't work.

However you can use a Stacker/De-Stacker if you only have one feed, basically it pushes one of the LNB feeds high and one low on the single cable. These are used in flats, but if you can't route another feed back to the STB then this will solve your problem

 

[Robojin]

Indeed it does. The receiver tells the LNB whether it wants High or Low bands and Horizontal or vertical polarisation. If you split the cable between 2 boxes then you will have all sorts of fun when they are not watching the same polarisation and band frequency range (and probably bad signal degradation if they are watching the same channel).I currently use a Quattro LNB at home with a 16 port sat switch. Only need 4 cables from the dish then (+ one to carry the combined UHF/VHF for terrestrial TV and radio (FM&DAB)). I then have a cable (or 2 for sky+(hd)) to each receiver and each one thinks its talking to an LNB when it asks for the channels it wants but its really the sat switch just supplying the requested feed.

Does this work like a Stacker?, can you post a link Ian?

 

[bengie]

sounds interesting robo, if this would make my dads skyHD would exactly like a normal install as he is in a flat with a communial satellite dish then this would be awesome as he sometimes gets it wrong and misses recordings.

 

[Robojin]

sounds interesting robo, if this would make my dads skyHD would exactly like a normal install as he is in a flat with a communial satellite dish then this would be awesome as he sometimes gets it wrong and misses recordings.

You/He would need access to the point where the LNB feed is distributed to his flat, also a free LNB feed, as this device squirts the two feeds down a single coax, if no spares then it will not help

http://www.satelliteonline.co.uk/stacker_destacker_unit.htm

usually

 

[bengie]

i'm gonna have a chat with him next time i down there, thanks!

 

[ianmacd]

Does this work like a Stacker?, can you post a link Ian?

Not really as they have 4 connections to the LNB still one for each different channel group.

http://satellitesuperstore.co.uk/multiswitch.htm