what satelite kit to purchase ?

smurf58

anybody know what would be the best satelite kit to get instead of sky ? what size of dish would be the best to get more channels ? can you get many free movie or sport channels in europe that are in english ?

watty

1) Humax Freesat HD. At least an HD box (All work decent ones with SCART non-HDTV or HMDI on HDTV). There is increasing HD only content and Ireland's Satellite service next year will only work with an HD receiver (DVB-S2)

2) 80cm absolute minimum. 110cm Triax ideal. If for one receiver then Motorised (Motek SG2100a). If for PVR or multiple receivers then bar with Multiple Quad LNBs and Diseqc switches, or for more receivers Quattro LNBs and multiswitch. If not motorised and more than 20 degree arc of satellites or wanting any pair of satellites only 3 degrees apart, then use Wavefrontier T90 Dish.

3) They prefer their own languages. Certain sports are not free anywhere. Polish might have English in background with Polish over talk. You might get 2nd rate US sitcom on some Arabic Channels in original sound with Arabic subtitles.

News & Current affairs has most amount of Free English.
Loads of Music Video Stations.
Plenty variety of Niche radio stations.

There is also "feed hunting". But that needs more expensive gear (422 reception, Blind Scan etc. Some €50 boxes have a "fake" blind scan which is REALLY slow as it simply tests all the options. A professional Blind scan is about 500x faster as it analyses the spectrum).

smurf58

thanks very much for all your help

smurf58

how much does a kit roughly cost ? i'm fed up paying for sky and there customer service is very bad !

Minstrel27

It all depends on what you are looking to do. Are you interested in taking out a foreign subscription? Al Jazeera for example is dirt cheap and has tonnes of football, no Premier League though.

smurf58

how much would that cost for the year ?

Minstrel27

My 12 month card cost €135. Not bad for 8 channels and most games are in English

smurf58

is that card available on line or from a satelite store ?

Minstrel27

I bought it from here http://www.techdigital.co.uk/products/Al-Jazeera-Sports-Viewing-Card-12-Month-New-Channels-with-Champions-League-%28Hotbird%29-Viaccess.html

smurf58

thanks for all the help

Doodee

watty wrote: »

2) 80cm absolute minimum. 110cm Triax ideal. If for one receiver then Motorised (Motek SG2100a). If for PVR or multiple receivers then bar with Multiple Quad LNBs and Diseqc switches, or for more receivers Quattro LNBs and multiswitch. If not motorised and more than 20 degree arc of satellites or wanting any pair of satellites only 3 degrees apart, then use Wavefrontier T90 Dish.

Are motors able to stand up to Irish weather conditions?

watty

yes. as long as the dish and pole are correct for kind of motor.

Anything heavier/larger than Triax 110 needs 36v actuator. In a very exposed situation the Triax 110 isn't strong enough even without a motor.

Ireland apart from mountain tops and edge of West coast is just wet. Not especially worse for dishes than rest of Europe. The East coast is even no wetter than many other places.

Zardoz

I stumbled across this bundle for anyone starting out in the motorised world.
A 90cm dish,motor,lnb,cable and 4 f connectors for under 80 euro delivered to Ireland.
https://www.satplace.de/zubehoer-145/antennen_bundle-254/88er_usals_komplettpaket-p1798.html

Newtown90

That is a really good deal, wonder what the quality would be like though!!

snaps

Doodee wrote: »

Are motors able to stand up to Irish weather conditions?

Mount the dish as low and as sheltered as possible, you'll get many years out of a decent motor.

Ive a SG2100 which at the time i paid 79€ for (around €49 now), its done me over 6 years now driving a 1.1m Gilbertini dish.

My dish is mounted about 1.5m off the ground.

snaps

Zardoz wrote: »

I stumbled across this bundle for anyone starting out in the motorised world.
A 90cm dish,motor,lnb,cable and 4 f connectors for under 80 euro delivered to Ireland.
https://www.satplace.de/zubehoer-145/antennen_bundle-254/88er_usals_komplettpaket-p1798.html

Or even the 1m dish set at 79€ is a good deal, 15€ delivery as well.