Using old sky boxes to receive Freeview channels

melb

hi there we have 2 boxes and the sky dish but have since swapped to virgin. We have had wiring put into 2 kids bedrooms - one has normal sky box one has HD Sky Plus box to enable them to watch TV as opposed to just DVDs (which they've put up with for 2 years!) the normal sky box works fine in both bedrooms and can be used to watch Freeview channels so we're assuming it's not the fault of the cabling that the Engineer did. The Sky HD box won't work to view channels in either room although it can be used to watch programmes which were stored on the Sky plus memory. We get a message saying "no signal" when trying to watch TV. The installer is helpful but very busy and has suggested we ask advice as to maybe changing the settings on the Skyplus box. We've had a look at the settings but can't see anything that looks likely although there is something about InPut 2 or something ~Has anyone got any advice please? many thanks for any help

Phantom_Flan_Flinger

Try this -

* Make sure your sky cable is plugged into "Dish Input 1"
* Press Services on your remote
* Press Right-Arrow and highlight "Settings"
* Press Down-Arrow and highlight "Picture"
* Press 0, 1, Select
* The "Setup" tab will now appear
* Scroll down and select the "Single Feed Mode" option
* Press the Right-Arrow and change it from 'OFF' to 'ON'
* Press the Green Button to Save the settings
* A 'Caution' message will appear... Press 'Select'
* Your system will now switch-off/reboot
* Leave it for a couple of minutes
* Press the Sky button to bring it back to life

melb

thanks will give it a go! (think this could be a 2-man job)

Phantom_Flan_Flinger

The instructions do work as I tried them on my HD box before posting, so they should be OK on your box.

For what it's worth, the channels you now receive on the Sky boxes are called "Freesat from Sky" as the line-up is different to Freeview through an aerial.

melb

you're an absolute star! My son helped me and said "wow is that an answer specially for you?" He had to go down for tea just while I was waiting to reboot it so I'm just going down now to tell him. Thank you so so much!

casey1408

my sky subscription is up [12 month] so if i cancel the tv can i use the sky+ box to access the freeview channels

brewerdave

casey1408 wrote: »

my sky subscription is up [12 month] so if i cancel the tv can i use the sky+ box to access the freeview channels

You will have Freesat from Sky channels(not the same as Freeview available via an aerial feed) - but you will no longer have the recording facilities of Sky+ and won't be able to watch any existing recordings.