Digital TV Cost Cutting Article - Discuss What You've Been Offered

Ash3G

jellynose wrote:

A friend is paying for the family package at the minute, she says that she does not watch most of it. If she cancels her package and takes her viewing card out, will she just get the free channels and not have to pay Sky a monthly fee? And if she does this will they come and take her equipment away?

Thanks in advance.

As I have said before in this thread.

If she takes out her viewing card she will get just the free channels. As long as her Sky account was cancelled with the correct notice period (i.e. fully paid-up and after original 12 months of subscribing). They will not do anything with the box/dish set-up. Its her property to do what they want with (unlike with cable tv).

Hillfly

hurdy wrote:

No, there is only one deocder in the box so it can only play one stream at a time

If you take sky+ without multiroom can you record a different sky channel to the one your watching?

Ash3G

Hillfly wrote:

If you take sky+ without multiroom can you record a different sky channel to the one your watching?

Yes.

Multiroom is for those who have another Sky box in another room. It does not affect your Sky+ box in any way.

Hillfly

Ash3G wrote:

Yes.

Multiroom is for those who have another Sky box in another room. It does not affect your Sky+ box in any way.

So therefore i could play the output form the sky+ box recording on 1 tv and watch live sky on another using my original digibox?
If i beam this to another tv in the house (use a digi sender) effectively i have multi room ?

ms2608

hunnybugs1 wrote:

I phoned to cancel my subscription yesterday and got the full Sky World Package half price for 3 months.
She also told me that they are now doing the Sky+ for £89 all in for existing customers with or without multiroom.
I checked their website and sure enough...
http://existing.sky.com/offers.asp

I have clicked on the link, but I can only see the panel which is offering Sky+ at £89 if you take out multiroom. I want Sky+ but not multi room, as I only have one TV in the house. Can you please direct me to the correct part of the site for Sky+ without multiroom for existing customers.

Apologies if I am being totally dense and have missed it!

Ash3G

Hillfly wrote:

So therefore i could play the output form the sky+ box recording on 1 tv and watch live sky on another using my original digibox?
If i beam this to another tv in the house (use a digi sender) effectively i have multi room ?

I'm not sure I understand your post.

IF you mean the following: If I have another Sky box in another room can I watch a channel different to my Sky+ box?
The answer is: Yes, but the other box wouldn't have a multiroom subscription, so you'd only be able to view free satellite channels on it.

IF you mean the following: If I don't have another Sky box can I watch a different satellite channel in another room using a video sender?
The answer is: No. You could only watch whatever your Sky+ is showing to your main TV.

If you're hoping you can have the two Sky boxes sitting together and controlling one of them via a videosender, I don't see the point. This is because the second Sky box would still require its own feed from the satellite dish.

HTH

Hillfly

Ash3G wrote:

I'm not sure I understand your post.

If you're hoping you can have the two Sky boxes sitting together and controlling one of them via a videosender, I don't see the point. This is because the second Sky box would still require its own feed from the satellite dish.

HTH

Yes this is what i was hoping. It means no wires all over the house using the digi sender - the dish is at the back but one of the tv's is in a room at the front. I was hoping that by having one subscription only i could achieve the effect of multiroom without paying the extra tenner.

What i don't understnad is how a sky+ box can record one channel while you watch another without 2 subscriptions. I assume from what you say that the sky+ box only has one output signal so you can't watch what you are recording on a second tv while watching the other channels on sky.

StickyD

Thought I'd just throw this in as it relates indirectly to Sky! Parents are on an NTL all-in package - phone, broadband, cable TV Family pack. Phoned to cancel TV as I wanted them to move to satellite with Sky+ (having been won over by the system ourselves). NTL agreed to do this............then offered half price phone line rental (5.25 monthly for the next 12 months) and free local calls (no connection charge and any landline, not just cable) after 6pm and weekends for 2 quid a month i.e. a TalkUnlimited package (but....free for first 3 months!) - also broadband free for the next two months (usually 17.99 for 1Mb).
Could I have got more.............?!!!!! Maybe I'lkl give them another call in a few weeks when I've recovered from that lot.........!

Ash3G

Hillfly wrote:

What i don't understnad is how a sky+ box can record one channel while you watch another without 2 subscriptions. I assume from what you say that the sky+ box only has one output signal so you can't watch what you are recording on a second tv while watching the other channels on sky.

Multiroom works like this.

You have two Sky boxes (they don't need to be Sky+). Multiroom gives you a second Sky subscription to another box connected to a phone line the same as the "master". You can watch two different pay channels on two different boxes.

A Sky+ box on its own. It has two tuners inside so it can record one channel, whilst another is viewed. The other channel(s) being recorded are stored on the hard disc. The box can only output what is being viewed on the television. The Sky+ boxes would need extra circuitry to provide two seperate outputs at once.

A Sky+ box can record two different pay channels without an extra subscription because Sky+ records everything (including the encryption). As you view a recording back, the viewing card decrypts it as if it were live.

Hillfly

Ash3G wrote:

Multiroom works like this.

You have two Sky boxes (they don't need to be Sky+). Multiroom gives you a second Sky subscription to another box connected to a phone line the same as the "master". You can watch two different pay channels on two different boxes.

A Sky+ box on its own. It has two tuners inside so it can record one channel, whilst another is viewed. The other channel(s) being recorded are stored on the hard disc. The box can only output what is being viewed on the television. The Sky+ boxes would need extra circuitry to provide two seperate outputs at once.

A Sky+ box can record two different pay channels without an extra subscription because Sky+ records everything (including the encryption). As you view a recording back, the viewing card decrypts it as if it were live.

Thank you - that is the info i was after about the sky+ box!
Sadly my plan wont work then. Might have to consider paying the extra tenner after all. :eek: