Radio Times

Q I currently watch digital TV via Freesat from Sky. Can I use my existing equipment to receive the new BBC/ITV Freesat service?
Andy Bowen, Manchester

A All you need is a new Freesat box: your Sky dish should work perfectly with the new service. Freesat recommends that you check, however, when you're buying the box - and you should also know that if your Sky dish is still under warranty, you'll void that by connecting different equipment to it.

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I have recently purchased a freesat Sagem box. I currently have sky (normal paid-for sky). I am trying to use the sky dish for the freesat box, but the ariel connector in the sky box is different to the one on the Sagem. Does anyone know what I have to do to get freesat using my sky dish?

Thanks

Hi, I have been with Sky for a couple of years (just have the normal Sky Box not +) and want to cancel the subs and get a Freesat digibox. Two questions: Firstly, my television is 12 years old but still functioning fine. Will I need to buy a new HD one, or only if I want to have the HD freesat channels. In other words, will I be able to view all non-HD freesat channels on my old tv with for example a Humax digibox recorder? Obviously if I cancel Sky subscription I will also lose their channels. Second question: do all the sky dishes (mine under 2 years old) have four connectors so, in theory, I could run cable also to another room which also had either a freesat tv or freesat box on the tv?

Thanks so much for your help.

FAO JJ - The larger than usual dish could be in order to receive German satellites but it isn't necessarily so. The more northerly you are in Scotland, the more you're at the edge of what's called Sky's footprint and larger dishes can be routine.

But the fact that you've got two and the smaller one is working suggests that, yes, it was for a foreign system. I'm also not familiar with this form of cabling and LNB.

I suggest that the best thing to do is install a new dish, either Freesat or Freesat by Sky, because that will give you a modern LNB that will support four cables directly from the dish and allow you to do what you're looking for.

FAO PT - Your best bet is to install extra cables from your dish to the TV: the Sky dish should support up to four cables and will currently be using two.

I have recently moved to a new home in Scotland. The previous owner was German, from whom I was unable to get any technical information. There are 2 dishes on the roof pointing in slightly different Southerly directions. One is round and 80cm diameter, the other is oval and 70 x 60 cm. The house was built in 1998, so I suspect the dishes could be that vintage.

There is one cable coming from each dish into the lounge and I get good reception from one - the oval one - via an old Skybox (2002 date on it) that the owner had left. The oval dish has an odd-looking connection on the underside of the LNB - there is a 'window' about 5 cm long through which only 1 outlet appears. However, the numbers 1 to 5 are scribed along the edge of the window.

The round dish has a simple, single outlet but there is a plate on the topside of the LNB, which is located by 4 screws. I tried plugging the cable from this dish into the Sky box but get a 'no signal' message.

My target is to retain the Sky signal in the lounge (I presume it is Freeview but does deliver a lot of other channels) and get Freesat in another room by running a new cable if one of the dishes will accept it.

Is it possible the large dish was for receiving German Sky and, if so, could I expect to be able to use it for Freesat by adjusting the direction it points ? If not, does it sound like I could fit a different LNB to the oval dish to output more cables ?

My LCDs are both HD ready so, ideally, I would want to use this as more HD becomes available on subscription-free channels.

Many thanks

I have recently moved to a new home in Scotland. The previous owner was German, from whom I was unable to get any technical information. There are 2 dishes on the roof pointing in slightly different Southerly directions. One is round and 80cm diameter, the other is oval and 70 x 60 cm. The house was built in 1998, so I suspect the dishes could be that vintage.

There is one cable coming from each dish into the lounge and I get good reception from one - the oval one - via an old Skybox (2002 date on it) that the owner had left. The oval dish has an odd-looking connection on the underside of the LNB - there is a 'window' about 5 cm long through which only 1 outlet appears. However, the numbers 1 to 5 are scribed along the edge of the window.

The round dish has a simple, single outlet but there is a plate on the topside of the LNB, which is located by 4 screws. I tried plugging the cable from this dish into the Sky box but get a 'no signal' message.

My target is to retain the Sky signal in the lounge (I presume it is Freeview but does deliver a lot of other channels) and get Freesat in another room by running a new cable if one of the dishes will accept it.

Is it possible the large dish was for receiving German Sky and, if so, could I expect to be able to use it for Freesat by adjusting the direction it points ? If not, does it sound like I could fit a different LNB to the oval dish to output more cables ?

My LCDs are both HD ready so, ideally, I would want to use this as more HD becomes available on subscription-free channels.

Many thanks

FAO beany - I'm afraid it looks like you'll need to get a local engineer out: I suspect your dish or its LNBs, though I'd have thought you'd lose everything if either of those were damaged or out of alignment. It's a tricky one and it'll need someone on site to test it out.

I have freesat SD from a Grundig box, bought recently and connected to a satellite dish that was already here and previously used for Sky. Although it was OK at first, I now seem to be losing channels, including BBC1, although I can get it from Scotland, Wales or NI. (I live in Devon.) I have lost ITV3, ITV3+1, Ch 4+1, Al Jazeera and others. Before that, I lost all radio channels. I have done a first time install again, but no difference. Can you help?

Many thanks for your advice. I will give an installer a call this week.

Billy

FAO Billy - Yes. It's perhaps a pain but adding another cable will also mean you never have to think about whether you're recording two channels on Sky and so can't watch anything else. But fit two cables: even if your current set doesn't need it for Freesat, were you to get a Freesat PVR, it would. Since your dish should support four cables, add two at the same time.

Same question as Waddy really. I've just bought a Pansonic LCD TV with integrated Freesat. I want to continue using my Sky+ box to record programmes but also want to access the free HD channels available through my new TV. There are 2 cables going into the back of the Sky+ box. Do I need to get another cable installed from the Sky dish straight into the television for everything to work? Thanks

Have SKY+ currently and want to get a panasonic lcd with freesat, question is what (if anything) do I need to do to connect the SKY+ to the TV whilst still getting access to BBC HD and ITV HD broadcasts?? Help appreciated

Thanks for the help the reboot did the trick, the lose of bbc1 and itv was only on the free sat box thnks again

FAO Lez - Have you lost them on both boxes? That would point to your dish having been knocked out of alignment, in which case you're probably best off contacting a local engineer to realign it for you.

If you've only lost it on your Freesat box then try turning that off at the mains, leaving it for a few minutes and switching on again. It's not uncommon for oddities like this to be fixed with a full restart.

Last, if you've lost the channels only on your Sky+ box, it could be a viewing card problem and you should call Sky.

I have sky+ and an using the old sky box upstairs as a free sat Last week bbc1 and itv1 lost signal any ideas? thanks for a great site.

FAO goddie - if you're planning to replace Sky then you can just disconnect the satellite cables (there will be two) from your Sky box and connect them to sockets on the back of your TV.

If you want to keep both for any reason, you'll need to run a second pair of cables from the dish. Unless it's quite an old dish, it will have four sockets on it to allow you to do this.

i have tv with built in freesat.currently subscribe to sky+.how do i connect to dish for the freesat.

FAO Peterkins - Thanks for the compliment: much appreciated by us all.

The Sky+ box won't work with anything but Sky+; in theory it's just a hard disc recorder with a satellite input but in practice the software and hardware are just too entwined with each other and with Sky for it to be a practical proposition.

As you've probably found out, Sky checks the phone connection at random intervals. If you get error messages on screen, though, you could temporarily run a phone extension to the box. It's not guaranteed and not recommended, but my own Sky+ box hasn't been plugged into the phone line since I rearranged my furniture months and months ago.

FAO Gina - In theory, yes. It does depend on the connections and you'll possibly find that doing it this way will weaken the signal. This is one where I'd recommend getting a local engineer to examine your loft and cable connections.

FAO George - It depends on the Freesat box you buy: check the specifications online and look for "RF Loop Through".

At the moment, I share the output from my Sky Box to other TVs via the RF output socket on the back of the box.

If I change to a Freesat box, is there any way I can share the output in the same way.

Hi. Sky cancelled my multiroom contract when the STB's connection to the telephone was severed. I now have a perfectly good SKY+ box and aerial. I can watch several freesat channels but can't use the STB PVR features so I only get to watch one channel at a time. Is there any way to get the PVR working so I can timeslip.

What am I missing by not getting a viewing card?

An alternative appproach might be to reinstate the multiroom subscription but I need to reinstate the telephone connection first. Running a new telephone cable is proving impractical so are you aware of some sort of wireless telephone line extender that I could use?

Regards

BTW: thanks in advance for the time and effort you obviously spend in maintaining this site.

I already have Sky+HD in the lounge. I have just purchased a new TV for my recently decorated bedroom. This TV is full HD and has FreeSat built in. I know I can connect to my exisiting Sky dish but to avoid damaging my new decorations is it possible to run a cable from the dish and connect it to the cable in the loft space which has an outlet in the bedroom. The cable from the loft space to the bedroom is normal coaxial aerial cable.

FAO lou - There are three possibilities to check. The first and easiest, but also unfortunately not the most likely, is the digibox. Switch it off at the mains, leave it for ten minutes and try again. As I say, it's not likely but sometimes Sky boxes get in a tizzy and this clears problems up.

Next, test all the cable connections running into the digibox: just pull them out and push them back in, making sure it's as firm a connection as you can.

Last, look for problems in the cables themselves or for your dish having put out of alignment. These two are probably going to need the help of a local TV engineer, however.

i bought a bush freesat HD box about a month ago and got it working though my old sky dish with no problems 100% signal strength then on Wednesday i lost all signal and it has not come back on i have done a re scan but just comes up with no signal also check connection what can i do to restore it can you help please?

FAO D P - Even if you are certain you point the dish in precisely the right direction, and it's not blocked by your own house, for example, then you're going to hit a problem with the Sky viewing card.

You've got to have one for any Sky box you use and you can't just take one out of the living-room box and temporarily put it into the caravan one. If you don't want to pay for a second Sky installation then you could go for Freesat from Sky - but it still needs a viewing card. Sky currently sells these on their own, without a dish or box, for £20.

Note that Freesat from Sky is not the same as Freesat, the service provided by BBC/ITV and most often the service people mean when they say Freesat. If you bought a non-Sky Freesat box you wouldn't need a viewing card.

FAO Sam Da Man - Yes. So long as two cables go uninterrupted to the Sky+ box, you can connect anything you like to the remaining two.

Can I use my Sky dish with Quad LNB being used by sky+ box for FreeSAT using the spare 2 LNB on the dish? In otherwords, can FreeSAT receiver and SKY+ box use the same Quad LNB at the same time?

FAO Mr Barnes - If you just want to connect more cables to your satellite dish then, unless it's quite an old one, you should find that there are already four connectors and that Sky+ only uses two.

If you're looking to do more complex or technically tricky connections then you should check with a local engineer and also definitely be sure you're not violating the terms of your Sky+ contract.

how do u get the bottom cover off sky + LNB to put a cable on four a spear sky box to freesat

I have sky + installed currently on a basic package. I have just been given a 2 year approx Grundig sky reciever and dish. I want to use this when I go away in my caravan, I've tried to set it up in my garden but it keeps coming up with no signal. Can you help.

FAO graham - If you're happy with fitting a splitter and new cables yourself then in theory it should work but you'd be much better off running new cables from the dish to your Freesat box. If you have Sky+ then your dish can almost certainly run four cables and only two are being used for your Sky+ box.

FAO Chris - Yes. If you don't do anything to your Sky box or say, move it to another room or try to connect another Sky box without their multi-room contract, you're fine.

FAO JIM P. - Unfortunately it's a problem with all satellite TV. Digital satellite did improve things greatly, but there are still occasions when it happens. You could check that your dish is perfectly aligned, small differences will be magnified in bad weather, but that's about all you can do.

i have a sky+ box, is it possible to split one feed behind box using rf split to feed a freesat box

I have Sky HD at present and wish to have Freesat in another room. Can i continue my contract with Sky and use a spare connector on my dish for the Freesat?

Hi there. I bought a panasonic integrated freesat tv in the summer. Signal strength and quality fine but when its windy and raining most channels suffer heavy interference. What could this be please ?

FAO Brendan - It's true. There's always a chance the dish or the cable have been damaged but if both are working correctly and it was a Sky system, then yes, you can get Freesat simply by buying and connecting a Freesat box.

I have just moved into a new flat,there vis a satellite dish on the outside wall,the cable from the dish runs into my living room.I have been told that all I need to do is buy a Freesat box,connect the cable from the dish to it,and I will then get loads of channels.Is this true?Is there anything else I have to do?

FAO: Malcolm: what will definitely work is the dish and the cabling - they are the same for both Sky+ and Sky+ HD.

What you're really trying to do is mimic Sky's multiroom system where they install a second box tied to your existing subscription. Typically that only uses one cable but it does run direct from the dish to the second box. Theoretically you could split your current cables just before your Sky+ HD box and run one pair to that, another pair to your second box but in practice you're going to be better off going direct from the dish.

There could also be problems with using two Sky boxes on the same subscription without a multiroom element: Sky engineers will not install a second box unless it, too, can be connected to your phone line and thereby to whatever system the company uses to check that boxes are authorised.

If you'd be happy just watching whatever was on your main Sky box in another room, you could connect ordinary coaxial cable to the Sky+ HD box and run that to a TV in your other room. You'd see a drop in quality and you wouldn't be able to change Sky channels without a special remote, but it's an option.

I have a Sky plus HD set up in my lounge. Can I use the existing dish and cable to feed the old Sky digibox (Pacer) in my dining room (about 5 metres or so way) or do I need another separate cable from the dish or even another separate dish?

FAO sheepboy - Unless you have quite an old system, Sky requires two cables: could that be your problem?

Otherwise I'd only expect to see problems like this if you were chaining the boxes together, having the cables from one run out to the next rather than having them all going straight to the dish.

It doesn't sound like there's a fault with the dish but this one's peculiar enough that you will probably need to get a local engineer to look at it.

FAO R Stephenson - You're presumably going to keep your Sky digibox so yes, you will be able to keep Sky.

I take it that you probably want the new TV rather than wanting its Freesat features, right? In that case, you'll simply never need to notice that the set can take Freesat. If for some reason you wanted to watch Freesat you'd have to check your TV manual for how you switch between the different sources going into it; there's usually a button on your remote that will swap between digibox, DVD player, Wii and so on.

FAO Martin - So you have cables running into your living area? How far is that from your room? Electronics stores such as Maplins will sell you any length of cable you need if you're able to fit the connectors yourself and they'll also sell pre-fitted cables in lengths such as 2m and 5m.

If it's a long way to your room or the cabling would have to go through walls then you're probably better off getting a local engineer to fit new cabling direct from the dish to your room.

I have one sky dish supplying a sky reciever which is on subscription. I recently had a 4 way LNB fitted, so one to sky and other 3 to seperate freesat box boght from Argos (not sky freesat). When the cable aerial is plugged into the sky receiver the signal for bbc1 itv etc are lost, but when disconnected from the sky receiver all freesat boxes work perfectly. Is there a fault with the sky dishos do I need to fit a another dish to supply the freesat boxes Thanks in advance

At present my Tv is capable of receiving Sky & freeview programmes.I am considering purchasing a tv with FREESAT installed.Will I be able to continue watching Sky on this type of tv set?

I've just bought myself a freesat box just for my room, i have sky so a satellite dish is installed and working. However i do not have the co-axial F cable from the dish in my room so the freesat box will not work, what is the easiest and cheapest way around this?

FAO Frankie - The BBC's and other channels are encrypted so that viewers outside their territory can't watch: these channels will have the rights to broadcast shows only to the UK while Sky's Freesat can be received across parts of Europe.

If this is Freesat from Sky you should have been told this and been given a viewing card that will allow you to watch.

We have just got a Freesat box connected to a SKY dish. Most programmes are received ok except BBC3 and BBC4 - we get a message saying the programme is encripted. Why is this?

FAO Steve - Short answer: yes.

Longer answer: it depends what the connectors are on your TV set but they should be what you need and you can just compare them to your Sky box's ones to check.

FAO ron fowles - You're probably confusing Freesat with Freeview.

Freeview comes via terrestrial aerials; Freesat uses satellite dishes.

So the answer is that no, your Sky dish won't do anything for Freeview but in fact it will run a Freesat digibox.

Two years ago i had sky+ in the living room and in the bedroom, now i only have it in the living room, so i have two LNB ports free. I've just bought a Panasonic Freesat TV and was wondering if i could run the two cables from the LNB Sky dish into my sky+ box has normal and then run another cable straight from the 3rd LNB on the dish, straight into my Freesat Panasonic TV. I would like full HDTV, but will not pay the £10 a month at this time.Thanks

will my sky dish work a freeview box

FAO adel - You can connect cables together without necessarily having any problems at all: the tricky parts are in how well connected they are and what the overall length of each final cable is. Unbroken cables will always be better simply because they remove one potential problem but if your existing coax is quite new and you can make a solid connection then in theory this should work.

If your connections were outside the loft, by the way, you would need to watch for water getting into the connections: that not only affects your signal very badly but it can also short out the connection.

FAO hugo - ESPN is available through Sky Digital. Prices vary depending on the package you already have but you can choose to add ESPN as a single new channel. If you have Sky+ HD, the same upgrade will also get you ESPN HD.

See Sky's ESPN page for details and current pricing.

FAO hugo - ESPN is available through Sky Digital. Prices vary depending on the package you already have but you can choose to add ESPN as a single new channel. If you have Sky+ HD, the same upgrade will also get you ESPN HD.

See Sky's ESPN page for details and current pricing.

i have skybox & dish how do i get football on espn

FAO Paul - You don't need a viewing card for the version of Freesat produced by BBC and ITV; you do for the version produced by Sky.

However, currently ESPN is not available on either service.

FAO Bruce - The satellite dish won't get you Freeview but it will, almost certainly, get you Freesat. You'll need a Freesat digibox and the reason it isn't entirely certain to work is purely that you presumably haven't seen the dish working. Possibly if it's not been used for a long time it may be out of alignment or the cabling may be damaged.

But if all's working correctly, you will be able to use it to get Freesat.

I am not very well educated with regards to electronic goods so ignore my ignorance in lack of knowledge.

I have recently moved into a new house that has a sky dish but I haven't subscribed to sky. I have set my tv up which has freeview built in. I have a free standing aerial which has a poor signal. There are two sky connectors coming in from outside and i wondered if i can plug one of them into the back of the tv and therefore get a better signal thus getting rid of the poor free standing aerial.

Please advise on what is best and if i need a box etc. Many Thanks

Do you need a separate card to watch freesat as ihave a card for sky but don`t pay anything.Last year i received setanta without having to set up a sky subscription will this be the same with espn.

FAO slonk - It seems most likely that your mum has quite an old Sky system that may only have the facility for a single cable running from it to her Sky digibox. Conceivably there might be a way to attach a second cable and you could replace the LNB, the receiver part of the dish, with a newer one. But the most practical answer is probably to get a new dish and have its second cable wired to a new socket on your wall.

FAO Howard - If all you really want to do is to be able to carry on watching Sky in the bedroom, you can connect coaxial cable to your Sky box and run it through your house. The quality won't be as good as a SCART connection to the TV set but it will be good enough and co-ax cable is not very expensive.

However, if you want to be able to control Sky from the bedroom or have it so that you can watch one channel there while someone else watches a different one in your living room, you'll need what Sky calls a multiroom subscription.

FAO NickyBoy Floyd - You'll need to check with a local engineer exactly how to wire the cables but the theory is correct: you can use the other two ports on the Sky dish and route cables from those directly to your Freesat TV set. As the Sky cables will go to the Sky box and then through a different connector to your TV set, when everything is cabled in correctly then swapping between Sky and Freeview will be the same as changing to DVD. Your TV remote will have a button for changing between inputs and you'll typically just have to keep pressing the same button to go round from Freesat to Sky to terrestrial to DVD and so on.

Hi,I brought Panasonic TX-P50G10 with built in FreeSat HD,i already have a Sky boxs in the sitting rooms and one in my son bedroom,my sky dish has 4 ports but two in used.How do i connect the FreeSat?.When i have connect to FreeSat can i watch normal sky without changing cable over? i think that sound right, Many thanks

my mum has sky but only one cable socket on wall and she cant record and watch another skyh channel...any ideas

I currently have sky and a sky dish and just bought a digital freeview TV for bedroom. Can I connect to my sky dish without interupting sky service? I have a seperate annolgue aerial that I can use if needs be.

FAO tom - It's possible you've got both an aerial cable and a SCART lead or similar coming out of the box but the TV should have sockets for both of those. There must be some confusion over which cables are meant to go where, in which case the short answer is that twin cables go into Sky boxes but only one comes out. You route the cables from the satellite dish into the Sky box and then there is a separate cable that runs out from the box to your TV set.

my sky box has twin cable but my tv has only one conection. do i need an adapter or just connect one side of the sky cable

FAO Chris - In theory yes: if the dish you have is a Sky one then physically there shouldn't be a problem. Your greater issue is the communal nature: are several people already using the one dish? If yes and you're really just swapping out your own Sky digibox for a Freesat TV then it should be fine.

If you aren't already all using the dish there will be limits to how many people can connect but that's down to whoever manages your building.

I live in flats with a communal satellite dish and aerial. I want to buy the Panasonic Viera with freesat, will this work off the existing dish

FAO Ken Underwood - Your neighbour can't still have Sky+ then, so the question I'd be asking is whether they're likely to ever want it back or any PVR that can use a second feed.

Otherwise, the only technical issues are to do with the state of that connection so it's certainly worth trying.

Yes it is a twin LNB that has been there for a very long time.

It has two outputs and only one is connected the other having the cable cut off some 5 years ago.

So are you saying that i can use it for Freesat without causing any problem to my neighbor's Sky reception??

Regards

Ken

FAO Ken Underwood - Is your neighbour certain about this? Sky+ requires two lines from the LNB. Quad LNBs are common, though, and if there are spare connections then yes, you can connect.

My next door neighbor has a twin output LNB and only uses one output for there Sky+ box.

They have said that i can connect to the spare output,so my question is if i do can i connect it to a Freesat box and not cause my neighbor any problems??

FAO mali - Do you also have a standard coaxial aerial cable running into your TV? Most likely your set's Freeview tuner is simply looking at that. It's unlikely that you'd have a Freesat box without knowing about it but then it's also unlikely that you'd manage to get the dish and cables installed without also buying a Freesat box. Could you be replacing an old TV set for which someone had already bought a Freesat digibox?

So long as the reception is fine, you should be quite happy with Freeview: there are issues over HD channels but otherwise there's no really significant difference between Freeview and either version of Freesat. But you should find out what's connected where before you try plugging in a hard disc PVR to record programmes.

I purchased a Technika lcd tv/dvd yesterday from Tesco, and plugged it into the mains , then sat dish aerial cable. The tv has built in freeview tuner and auto set up gave me loads of programmes. Are these freesat or freeview?, but whatever it looks good to me.

FAO Neil - Did you have a standard pay-monthly Sky deal before this? The pay-once Sky Freesat deal does not include the key Sky channels. Or are you swapping from Sky's Freesat service to what can only be called the other Freesat? Very confusingly, there are two Freesats and while most of the time it doesn't really matter, they're sufficiently similar, it's possible that you're seeing a difference in the channels they each have.

I'm not clear on what your apartment block provides: do you mean there's a communal satellite dish? There must be or you wouldn't be getting any Freesat from either provider, the best you'd be getting is Freeview. You're also not going to be able to get Sky HD without a dish so I'm not clear how that's an option.

FAO Steve - Channel 4 HD is free to air but viewing cards are not only for making you pay a subscription: they're for limiting who can see a channel. Many or even most programmes are sold to Channel 4 under a licence to broadcast them in the UK which was always fine when we were on analogue transmissions but not when stations use satellites. No satellite is purely aimed at the UK; they all have what's called a footprint that covers the UK and parts of Europe. So in theory that means Channel 4 is broadcasting outside the UK.

Since you can only get compatible viewing cards within the UK, requiring such a card means Channel 4 is complying with its licence agreements.

I have a fortec star inovation hd receiver and although i can get bbc hd and itv hd from astra 28 i cant get channel 4 hd unless i put my sky card in the trex cam i have, why is this as channel 4 hd is fta isnt it?. cheers Steve

If the cables are as old as the aerials, the best answer is yes: you'd be better off replacing them. Even if you're still getting strong, uninterrupted signals through them you're likely to find that the outdoor connectors are weather-beaten and it's the connectors you'll need to change.

Modern co-ax cable is likely to be better able to cope in difficult signal areas too.

I intend to get rid of my thirty year old aerials and put up a new 43cm dish to feed my new freesat box and freewiew built into the tv. My worry is whether I will need to replace the old cables.

Hi DD, I have bought a panasonic freesat tv and also have a standard sky box (pay once watch forever). I can receive freesat channels ok, however i have lost some Sky channels. I read your comments on another post about running seperate cables to the dish, however i live in a groundfloor apartment with a communal aerial. Is there any way of getting the Sky channels back (apart from hooking up to the dish or taking sky HD) thanks Neil.

FAO ang - It's not the years, it's the mileage. There can't be any guarantee but in all likelihood the worst that will have happened is that the dish may have been knocked out of alignment. You can fix that yourself but it'd be easier and faster to get a TV engineer to do it for you. He or she could also then check the LNBs on the dish, the part that actually receives the signal, and you need to check that you still have cabling into your home. Lastly, just for true thoroughness, have a look out of your window: if a giant tower block has been built in the last six years, there's a chance it sits between you and the satellite entertainment you desire. But while all this is possible, the odds are that you'll be fine.

i have a satalite dish but it hasnt been used for over 6 years would i be able to use it for freesat or wouldi have to put my own up

FAO Jonathan - You've presumably split the cable just before it reaches your Sky box, is that right? The way to do it is to run cables directly from the dish to your Freesat box; you should find that a standard Sky+ dish has four connectors and that only two of them are actually in use.

I am a Sky subscriber. I recently purchased a Panasonic Freesat TV with the idea of keeping Sky and also accessing Freesat HD. The shop suggested I connect both the Sky box and Panasonic Freesat by means of a F-Connection splitter. Unfortunately, this does not work, so that I can only receive a poor Freesat signal and no Sky signal. How can I access both Sky and Freesat on the same Skydish, without having to transfer thw cable from one piece of equipment to another?

FAO Double T - The clue is in the channels you're getting: you're not seeing limited Freeview, you're getting Freesat. There is a lot of overlap between the two but BBC HD is not on Freeview and it is on Freesat. It's not the only HD channel on Freesat but it often seems that way: the only other one is ITV HD which broadcasts considerably fewer hours per week.

Your Sky HD subscription gets you all Sky's HD channels but only via the Sky digibox. To get Sky onto your other set you need to talk to Sky about multi-room subscription.

I currently have a subsription to Sky HD & everything is fine & dandy, i have a quad LNB and have just connected up the 2 spare ports, 1 cable i have run into my bedroom and connected a pace DS810XE HD reciever up & to my tv, could you please tell me why i can only recieve limited freeview channels and only 1 HD channel which is BBC HD, many thanks.

Yes. If there are unused ports on your dish, you can connect other cables to them and run those to Freesat boxes to get exactly what you want. You do have to be okay with climbing up ladders and dishes do have to stay pointing at the same spot in the sky so it can be a fiddly job.

Do it straight from the dish's spare ports to your Freesat box: don't try to split the existing cables, though.

i currently have sky+ and want to know if i can have free sat in 2 bedrooms using sky dish at the same time. lmb has 2 other ports not in use.will i have to run new cable or can i connect free sat cable to existing coax?

FAO janey - Yes. There has been confusion over this with firms selling TVs as being digital-ready, which just means they'll take a digital signal. Panasonic describes some of its sets as being "Freesat enabled" and they mean it has a digibox built in. I'd check your manual just in case but yes, you've got everything you need on the TV side, now you just need a dish installed.

You can arrange to have a new dish installed by a Freesat-approved retailer, from a cost of around £80 (it may well be simplest to contact the retailer who sold you the TV).

If you have an existing dish you could decide to adapt it for use with a Freesat receiver - see my post below [12:55pm on 24 March 2009] for more details.

FAO leigh - This is one that's hard to diagnose from afar but for you and anyone else getting similar problems, there are some things you can look at first. In your case I'd expect your Sky engineer to have tried at least most of these but the problem is going to lie within one of them.

1) The aerial cable may be faulty

Coaxial cable isn't the most reliable thing in the world, so it could've broken internally. But fortunately it's one of the easiest to test: you just try a different aerial cable.

2) The TV's internal digibox may be faulty

Any digibox can go wrong and this is one case where having an internal one is a disadvantage. See if you can borrow an external one and test that. Is your TV within its warranty?

3) Group aerial problems

You do mean that your neighbours share the same aerial as you, not that they happen to each have the same model? If it's a group aerial, the signal is always more delicate plus at some stage between you and the actual aerial there will be connections that could have loosened.

Thanks, I've checked the aerial and it's still plugged straight into the back of the tv from the wall socket!

I have also tried all of the tv/av channels and the message showing is "Please check aerial or local DVB service"

None of my neighbours are having problems so it's got nothing to do with the availability. Sky engineers came out yesterday and said that it must be down to having an old analogue aerial however strangely enough there was no problem before and all my neighbours have the exact same aerial!! I'm at a complete loss.....

Two reasons, neither permanent and both easy to check. The first is you may no longer have an aerial going into the back of your TV set: possibly it's been routed into the Sky+ box, or perhaps one has just not been plugged back in after the Sky box was installed.

There may be a chain of these: depending on your set-up there can be one aerial cable going into, say, your VHS or DVD recorder and another from there to the TV. Since you're going to be watching Sky via a SCART cable, you only notice the absence of the aerial when you try Freeview.

The other reason could be that you are getting Freeview correctly, your TV set is just not looking at it. Look for an input button on your remote; often it's got an icon of a TV screen with an arrow pointing into it. Pressing that steps you through every input that your TV could have: if you've got two SCART sockets, for instance, it'll look at the first, then when you press again, the second. And so on around the aerial, any DVD connections and so on. If your Freeview box is on and you do this, you'll see the current Freeview channel appear at some point in the cycle. It's a cycle because if you keep pressing, you end up back at Sky+.

This is more likely when you have external digiboxes but it's what I have to do when I go from Sky+ or especially my infernal Wii Fit to Freeview.

I have recently had sky + installed and now none of my integrated freeview tv's are picking up a signal. Do you know of any reasons why sky would affect the freeview signal??

FAO moojoo: Yes, the signal from a single dish can be tuned into different channels simultaneously via separate tuners (in this case your integrated Freesat TV and the Freesat box you're considering buying). But unless you already have more than one socket in your house connected to the dish (which is unlikely) you'll need to split the signal. This means changing the LNB (Low Noise Blocker) - the signal receiver on the arm on the satellite dish - to a dual or quad output and running separate cables to your existing socket and into the room where you're intending to have the new digibox. It might be worth getting a Freesat-approved installer to do this.

just bought a panosonic plasma with intergrated free sat, if I buy a free sat digi box could i watch on two seperate tv's through one dish ?

i have bought a panosonic freesat tv do i just need the dish to get it set up

FAO oliver - Yes, you can just plug in a freesat box and it will work, but see above for mild caveats.

It's much the same answer about reception: so long as you had good Sky reception and nothing has changed - the dish hasn't been moved or knocked - then yes, you'll get Freesat without doing anything to the dish. The satellites for Sky and Freesat are effectively co-located, meaning they appear to us to be in the same spot in the sky.

hello, im a customer of sky but leaving, so i would like to know if i will be able to just plug in a free sat box and it will work using the old sky dish. Also will there be any problem with reception. thanks

FAO barry e white md - BBC America remains your best bet: what's perhaps not widely realised is that the station airs programmes from all UK channels, not just the BBC, so its programming is more mixed than most channels. So it's worth looking through the schedule more closely and you can always be sure that the news programmes it airs are BBC.

There is a certain amount of video streaming on US-facing websites such as bbcnews.com, though, and you are also able to buy a wide and regularly updating range of BBC TV programmes via iTunes.

living in the usa i find american tv pretty nauseating and miss bbc greatly. apart from bbc america, which eexports junk from the bbc does anyone know how i can access bbc tv.

FAO toni - You've got legal and technical issues here that could each thwart the other. Your best bet is to check out the legal side first: talk to whoever manages the flats overall. It's possible to install satellite dishes on listed buildings but you need specific planning permission to do it: find out the details of what the local council will allow and what they will require from you. As part of that, look at the whole site of the listed houses; there may be a position where a communal dish system will make the least impact.

But that's where you start hitting the technical issues: satellite dishes have to be pointed directly at the satellites, you may have little choice what side of the building they could go on. The easiest way to figure that out is to just look at any Sky dishes on houses near you: both Sky and Freesat dishes point to the same position.

Is this a new 15-storey building? You're unlucky that it's interrupting the terrestrial signal from your nearest transmitter but it could also very easily be in the way of your satellite dishes too. If that's the case, you could look at cable if that's in your area.

Who advised you to get Freesat, though? They may well be correct but you need to know why, for instance, they're recommending against Freeview. While your terrestrial and Freeview signals may be blocked now, the Freeview signal will be boosted when analogue TV is switched off in your area so you may find things improve.

Also, there are two Freesats. One is just called Freesat and that's the newer one, the one people tend to mean when they use the term. It's got nothing to do with Sky so Sky engineers will not install the dishes and you would have to get an independent contractor. That said, there is also a "Freesat by Sky" system that Sky will install. Check the Sky and Freesat websites for the channels that each has.

I live in a flat in a block of 3 listed houses,we have a communal 32ft mast and aeriel on the roof but our signal is being block by a 15 storey development on the next street,we are advised that we need freesat but how can we get the wires into our living rooms when we are not permitted trailing wires on the outside of the properties,also who is the best to install-independant or sky?

I have been watching freeview for sometime now but sometimes have trouble with the red button for bbci with a message appearing saying that it's un-available, with the moto gp season starting soon i'm wondering if i need a new aerial (i had a new one fitted 5 yrs ago when i moved in)

FAO Michael - Yes, your existing dish should be fine. You'll then need a Freesat HD box, a TV with Freesat HD built in or a Freesat+ HD digital TV recorder to receive the free HD channels. For more information on all of these options visit the Freesat site.

FAO Moulder Boy - you also need a dish. You can either have a new one installed or adapt your existing dish for use with a Freesat receiver. In principle, your current dish should be fine but it will need realigning. Sky analogue and digital signals come from different satellites so you will need to realign your dish from the Astra 1 to the Astra 2 satellite. In practical terms, this simply means turning your dish to face south-east (with an unhindered view of the sky), but since the dish is probably several years old, you could well find that it's rusted where it connects to the mount and that you're unable to realign it without the whole thing coming apart.

Assuming you get past that, you will also need to fit a suitable LNB (Low Noise Block Converter) to your dish. An LNB is a device attached at the focal point of the satellite dish that converts the frequencies for use by a digital receiver (in this case, the Freesat box). The LNBs designed specifically for your old-style round dish will be more expensive than those for the new Sky mini-dishes. The latter will usually do the job too, but note there can be interference issues when the dish is mounted parallel to a wall behind it. If you do buy a Sky LNB make sure it fits directly into the standard 40mm collar on your dish, or that it comes with an adaptor. You should be able to pick up a suitable LNB for around £10 online.

And if all that sounds more trouble than it's worth, you can arrange to have a new dish installed by a Freesat-approved retailer when you buy your box, from a cost of around £80.

I have sky, i am out of contract and would like to watch the free HD channels supplied by free sat, can i use my existing dish, and what new box would i need to buy. Thx

I am still watching analog satelite (eurosport mainly) & would like to know what i need to do to get freesat apart from purchasing the receiver? Many thanks

Do you definitely mean built-in Freeview? If so, the answer is that yes, your old dish ought to be able to tune in to Freesat but you will need to buy a Freesat digibox.

my tv has built in freeview, will i be able to use an old sky dish to receive a signal??

The block's satellite dish - if there definitely is only one serving all six - probably does have an octo LNB: that is, the dish's receiver probably has eight connections. But you can't presume there are any spare because a basic Sky Digital and Sky+ package will use two LNB connections: that's part of how you can record two programmes at once.

You'll need to check that with whoever manages your block - and there could well be other, non-technical issues such as sharing the costs that you'll need to know about. Plus depending on the age of the dish and the deal with Sky, it's likely that there are conditions: individual users who swap from Sky to Freesat, for instance, do invalidate their Sky warranty.

So there are several non-technical reasons that will probably make this inpractical. But if you can get past those, if you can get the agreements and the LNB connection you need, all the theory says you just have to buy a Freesat box and it will work. In practice, we've not seen one dish being shared for the two services, though, so you're probably best off checking with whoever installed the Sky dish.

i live in a block of 26 flats. 5 or 6 flats have sky from a communal dish. can i just plug a cable in to get freesat if it has an octo? my tv is only a freeview one so do i need a free sat box too?

So long as you intend to leave Sky and not run them both for any reason, you can almost certainly just buy a Freesat digibox. The Sky dish and wiring should work perfectly with a Freesat box. You'll also need to think about the connections between the Freesat box and your TV but if you currently have Sky plugged in there, you're unlikely to have any difficulty.

Where you might conceivably have a problem is if your dish is slightly out of alignment. You might want to consult a local dish engineer to check that.

I am currently with sky on there basic package, what is the best(cheap) way to get free sat

There is an argument that having Freeview or Freesat integrated into your television limits you. The idea is that if there's later a better box, with more features, you're stuck: you can't change the insides of your TV. That is quite true, but there's nothing to stop you adding a separate digibox, an external one.

You'd effectively have two, the new external one and the old one in the belly of the telly and that does seem like a waste. But then if you had bought a separate digibox and later upgraded to a flashy new one, you'd be throwing away your old box.

hi i have freesat and want to upgrade to hd tv what problems with built or intergrated freeview in new tv.cheers dr.

There are many ways to tell. Possibly the easiest is a bit of a cheat: look for Freeview or Freesat labels on the frame of the TV or read the fine print on the "no user serviceable parts inside" panel on the back. If it doesn't explicitly say Freeview or Freesat, it will say something about the set being an integrated one.

While you're round there, look at what connector sockets you've got. There will be many, from SCART to a normal TV aerial socket, but if you have Freesat built in then there will also be a socket for connecting the satellite cables. These tend to be a push-in and twist-to-lock cable, like a BNC connector: very distinctive, especially if you have satellite cables handy and can try.

Do you have the original remote control? It will have clues on there: there will definitely be a button marked Guide or EPG and there's almost certainly also a button marked Digital or DTR. This switches on the Freeview or the Freesat tuner so go ahead and press it: even if you don't have anything connected, aerial or satellite, pressing Digital for the first time will bring up an installation menu on screen. Every manufacturer does these differently and some are considerably easier to follow than others, but they ought to mention Freeview or Freesat. You may find they say DTT or Digital Terrestrial Television: that's Freeview.

Last, if everything else has failed, go back to the panel on the back and copy down the exact make and model number. Then Google it and you'll find stores currently selling it, all of which will boast about what it comes with.

how can i tell if my television has built in free sat or free view? thankyou for your time.

The short answer is that you can probably get away with using the same LNB: if you had one of the smaller Sky Digital dishes then no, but a 60cm dish and its original LNB could be fine. But did you buy this dish for this purpose or is it what you already had?

Sky installs larger dishes for people living at the edge of the satellite's footprint, the area that its signals can be received in. If the German satellites footprint is similar, you could find that the dish isn't adequate. So we'd recommend checking with a local TV engineer - who will also be able to advise you on compatible LNBs for your digibox.

I have an old Sky analogue dish 60cm and a Technomate 5600 I wish to watch FTA German tv do I need to change the LMB, if so which would fit.

You need to either connect the Freeview box to a normal roof aerial rather than a dish, or swap the Freeview box for a Freesat box. Old Sky dishes should work with Freesat boxes: http://www.techradar.com/news/television-md-use-old-sky-dish- for-our-service-471784

I have a sky dish, but am not subscribed anymore (now with virgin) I connected the sky aerial to the tv in the spare bedroom via a freeview set top box, but can only receive BBC,BBC3,CBEEBIES, Why is this? what do I need to do to get all the free channels

Unfortunately this is an area which Freesat can't comment on without seeing the equipment concerned. They advise that you contact the retailer about this particular problem.

I too inherited a satellite dish (I assume ex-Sky) when I moved house, and have just bought a Freesat box to try to use with it. However, the box cannnot find any channels. It reports good signal strength (70%), but zero quality.

Any ideas? Do I need to replace the LNB, or is it simply pointing the wrong way? Can I fixed this myself, or do I need to get someone in?

In the vast majority of cases, Freesat will work with your existing satellite dish, so you should be able to simply connect the cable running from the satellite dish straight into your TV.

I have just moved into a propery & there is a sky satellite dish believed to be about 3 years old. I do not subscribe to sky or anything like that. Having bought a new tv with built in freesat will I be able to use this to receive freesat? If so, what adjustments do I need to make? Jimmy of Leeds