I'v been given a Sky plus box

souv

I have just taken out a standard Sky subscription which will be installed soon. Also I have a friend leaving the UK who has offered to give me his Sky plus box. Can anyone tell me if I can use the box without specialist installation?

Mizz_Pink

You need to pay £10 a month for sky plus to work or upgrade your standard package to one that inc movies sports etc

souv

Our standard package includes Sky Sports so we shouldn't need to pay this cost. Is it easy to install and start using the Sky plus box once you already have the standard installation?

lowbrim

Hi, As Mizz Pink says you need to upgrade or pay £10 a month to sky for sky + to work in recording mode, it will still work as a normal box without the subscription.
You also need to fit a quad LNB on your dish if you go for the sky+ functionality which you can buy on Ebay for around £16 including postage. This is a very simple operation taking the current lnb off and simply replacing with the Quad lnb (10minute job). You will then need to put another cable to the sky + box from the dish as the sky plus box needs two cables to work. The other advantage of fitting a quad (which has 4 cable outlets rather than just one) is that you can now have another 2 sky boxes in the house if you wanted them and this does not cost anything from sky. The advantage of doing this yourself rather than getting it from sky is that if you do decide to pay the £10/month you will not be tied to a 12month contract as you have supplied your own box and you will not need to subscribe to the expensive packages.

I did the above recently and would not now be without it.

If on the other hand you are just signing up for sky and are getting them to fit a dish etc and going to be on a 12month contract anyway I would suggest you upgrade now before they come and see what deal they will give you for a sky+ package you may get a sky+ box and installation for the extra £10/month and no extra for the box or installation. Then sell your sky+ box on ebay for £70'ish so you get 6 months free + save buying Quad and installation agro!! Just an idea

lowbrim

Just seen your last post. If you are having sky sports you get sky+free I believe but again if it is a new installation you should be able to get a sky + installation for the same price as a standard installation with a bit of negotiating.