Freesat or Freeview 18 September 2015 at 10:54AM in TV MoneySaving 22 replies 2.9K views

LushesFaith

I will be cancelling my sky sub in a few weeks. It is marked in my calendar when I can cancel.

I have no digital aerial although all TV's in the house have freeview built in. I almost picked up freeview for a day but no luck and no booster aerial works either.

I enquired about Freeview and Freesat with an engineer who was recommended to me. He says that Freesat is for people who can't get freeview. Yet I technically have sky freesat in my room as I had cancelled multiroom when I downgraded.

As I have no digital aerial I was quoted £200 for freeview install plus tv points in 4 rooms front room diner & 2bedrooms

I understand I need freesat boxes for freesat but could I buy 2 freesat boxes for the rooms that do not have it and pay to have cabling done from the sky box or should I get freeview set up for those rooms and continue using the sky box in the other two rooms until I have no choice to replace

I was hoping by making use the satellite dish that we already have I would save a little bit

SO hopefully not confusing - freeview or freesat?

MoneyMate

Will they be taking your Sky dish, if left you could use with free-sat ?

Cornucopia

Normally, when a Sky sub is cancelled, the box and the dish remain and can be used for Freesat-from-Sky (which is different to Freesat). An old Sky dish can also normally be used with a Freesat box.

The channel line-ups on Freesat-from-Sky, Freesat and Freeview are similar.

You say you want TV in four rooms - what do you have in those rooms at the moment? Do all 4 rooms need to be the same? How many rooms will be in use for watching/recording different things at the same time? How many rooms need recording?

If you don't need for the rooms to have independent TV reception, you can save money by mirroring one set-top box into the other rooms. The Sky "magic eye" always worked well...

LushesFaith

MoneyMate wrote: »

Will they be taking your Sky dish, if left you could use with free-sat ?

sky box and dish will remain

LushesFaith

Cornucopia wrote: »

Normally, when a Sky sub is cancelled, the box and the dish remain and can be used for Freesat-from-Sky (which is different to Freesat). An old Sky dish can also normally be used with a Freesat box.

The channel line-ups on Freesat-from-Sky, Freesat and Freeview are similar.

You say you want TV in four rooms - what do you have in those rooms at the moment? Do all 4 rooms need to be the same? How many rooms will be in use for watching/recording different things at the same time? How many rooms need recording?

If you don't need for the rooms to have independent TV reception, you can save money by mirroring one set-top box into the other rooms. The Sky "magic eye" always worked well...

its basically - my bedroom has a sky box and the front room. The kids use the dining room as their spot which at present just has a roku streaming stick which lets them watch youtube and netflix. They have a TV in their bedroom with built in freeview but no digi aerial so can only watch dvds in their room.

how much is the sky magic eye?

LushesFaith

probably only 2 rooms would have tv's on at the same time for the majority.

almillar

I have no digital aerial

Me neither - there's no such thing!

I take it you mean you've no aerial at all on the roof, and that's what your quote is for, and wiring the rooms.

So for freesat - no, MoneyMate, Sky won't remove the dish, and they won't remove any equipment. It's all yours once you've served the minimum contract.

So Freesat will work with your current dish and wiring.

If you've a Sky recording box working properly, you'll have 2 feeds from the dish there. A freesat recorder (consider 'freetime' if you want on demand stuff too) will plug straight in here.

For other rooms, you'll need 1 cable to each room from the dish for a normal 'viewing' box, or 2 for a 'recording' box - you can make do with one but don't if you've to get it installed.

You've probably got a quad LNB in your dish (the bit in the middle of the dish, has 4 outputs. 2 of those will be going to the living room, leaving 2 free. That could serve a recorder in 1 room, or viewer in 2 rooms. Or you can quite cheaply have it replaced with an octo LNB, giving you 8 outputs and a lot more options.

Your installer should be on top of all this anyway.
I like Humax Freesat boxes FWIW.

LushesFaith

Ok thanks. I will probably find another engineer or get another quote for the additional cables then.

I always thought that freeview required a digital aerial now I know it just needs an aerial

teddysmum

LushesFaith wrote: »

Ok thanks. I will probably find another engineer or get another quote for the additional cables then.

I always thought that freeview required a digital aerial now I know it just needs an aerial

'Digital aerial' was a term used by unscrupulous aerial installers to con people into thinking they needed a new installation when digital tv went live, but ,actually, they just needed a good aerial.

Cornucopia

Sky Magic Eye: £9.99 on offer at Argos.

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/1088289.htm

Based on your current installation, I would probably set it up like this:-

- Use the existing wiring to put a new Freesat recording box in the Living Room.

- Keep a Sky (non-recording) box for your Bedroom.

- You could extend this using a Magic Eye to the Dining Room, which would require a single Coax cable from point to point.

- Upgrade the Roku stick to a Roku box (£45 - or a Now TV box £10) for the kids' bedroom. That will get them a broader range of channels on catch-up, and probably one or two live via internet ones, too.

Basically, with a Now TV box costing £10, I don't think there's much point spending £200 on an aerial and wiring.

LushesFaith

I had considered getting the kids a Now TV box but last time I enquired the currys rep said I needed to pay a subscription so I am guessing that is not the case. I have seen some for 14 quid with 3months entertainment pass