Freesat Dish Install

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  • Nebulous2 wrote: »
    Could still do the lot for under £200, with a cheap decoder
    OP wants additional cable runs to 2 bedrooms...
  • Nebulous2
    Nebulous2 Posts: 5,071
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    OP wants additional cable runs to 2 bedrooms...

    "Depending on cost"

    Okay to clarify. You need a dish, lnb, mounting system, cable, connections and a means to decode the signal. The lnb which is the bit in the centre of the dish, needs a cable for each decoder box. It needs two cables for each box if you intend to watch one channel and record another at the same time. You can get all you need for one TV to watch only for under £200 if you can fit it yourself or get a friend to fit it free.

    Any additional equipment or work such as cabling another room with a decoder, adding a recording box or several of these, or paying for installation is likely to cost more, possibly substantially more, depending on the options you choose.
  • kev2009
    kev2009 Posts: 1,038
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    Thanks all.

    My main TV has 2 freesat connectors so i believe it has freesat built in so no additional box. TV is a 49" Panasonic 49fx650B. the 2 bedrooms I would need to get a box for as smaller tvs and no freesat but I'm happy to run the cables to the rooms and get the freesat boxes at a later date.

    The issue i have is, i'm in a Bungalow, no trees near where the aerial is but there is a hose next door which is the direction the aerial needs to point which causes it to not get quiet a few channels.

    So plan was to look at getting freesat disk that I can mount on the wall at the back of the Garage (like my neighbour the other side who has Sky has done) and I shouldn't have any issue getting the signal required.

    Glad it will come in under £200, couldn't get any real prices, saw some from several years ago online but not current.

    Thanks

    Kevin
  • Enterprise_1701C
    Enterprise_1701C Posts: 23,409
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    edited 3 January 2020 at 8:32AM
    Is there another transmitter you can point the aerial to (the TV would need to be retuned too)? Just wondering if a change of direction might help? How close is the house to the aerial?

    Alternatively, have a good phone round and get a few quotes for freesat dish installation, it is actually fairly simple to do anyway, and not hard to get leads to three locations, just simply need an appropriately sized LNB.
    What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare
  • kev2009
    kev2009 Posts: 1,038
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    Hi,

    sorry for delay in replying.

    It is pretty close to the house next door. At the side is 2 side gates and that's it (mine and neighbours) and as my property is a bungalow and the property next door a house, it ads to the issue. I can get some channels no problem at all, but others even though it detected them upon tuning in, when i select the channel, its just a black screen.

    I'm a bit reluctant to give it a go myself as I tried to install a dish at my parents place and no matter what I did, the TV just wouldn't pick up any signal at all, despite having the dish pointing in the right direction and having nothing blocking. So not sure where the fault lied but it still doesn't work, I've left the disk up but never got it to work. So i'm reluctant to give this install a go as i fear i'd run all the cables etc and have the same outcome, no signal on the TV so figured i'd get someone in who is more familiar with it. In my property, they have actually put plastic conduit in the walls and run cables down, which is great news but i'm going to have a look in next couple of weeks and check as I think the conduit in the wall by main TV might not be able to take the cable down it as I've already run some network cables down it so I can wire up some devices as opposed to wireless as the wireless tends to get a poor signal at the back of the bungalow as my main socket is right by the front door so hence that's where the router is.

    Worst case may mean chopping a bit out the wall, adding a conduit and then plastering over & repaint (So glad I never went for wallpaper!).

    Kev
  • Neil_Jones
    Neil_Jones Posts: 8,840
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    Were you using a signal meter when aligning the dish? It has to be near enough bang on otherwise you won't get anything from Astra 28.2. The signal beam from the satellites is so narrow that just pointing in the dish in what looks like the right direction won't work.

    Basically the dish has to be looking just "below" the signal from the satellites so it can bounce off the dish into the LNB, the microphone looking bit on the bottom. You won't be able to align it by eye seeing as the satellites are like 36,000km up in the sky.
  • almillar
    almillar Posts: 8,621
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    edited 14 January 2020 at 12:49PM
    I can get some channels no problem at all, but others even though it detected them upon tuning in, when i select the channel, its just a black screen.

    This suggests that you're 'nearly there' with your signal, so if you get an aerial person out, they may be able to elevate your aerial or give you a better one, if you want to stick with Freeview (possibly cheaper and less work).


    Or if you go with a dish, a very rough guess would be £150. Bungalow helps as you don't have to go so high to install, but going against that, the dish is more easily blocked. You'll also need a Freesat box. I guess you would want a recorder, and if you want catch up services built in, you want a 'FreeTime' recorder. You will also need two feeds from dish to box for recording, like Sky+, so you would be using 'shotgun' cable.
  • kev2009
    kev2009 Posts: 1,038
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    Hi all,

    Just to update, since looking into this, I've since read that lots of people had issues with freeview over the xmas period and I've now re-tuned the TV and it seems i can now get quiet a few of the channels that were not showing so not sure whats changed as I've not moved the aerial or changed TV or cabling etc so all a bit odd so for now, i'm going to see how this goes and if it goes wrong again, i'll probably then re-look at the freesat dish. I did have a look today and getting another cable down the conduit in the wall for the satellite is impossible so would mean more work if i went this route in future but at least now.

    Many thanks all

    Kev
  • Rodders53
    Rodders53 Posts: 2,108
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    Before Christmas we had a rather unusual and prolonged period of 'enhanced propagation' due to the High Pressure weather over the UK.

    This meant that distant transmitters were being received as well as the main ones tuned to... When that happens strongly enough the distant transmitters interfere with the wanted ones.

    It was a mistake to retune back then (but an understandable action). Having retuned and restored things all is well.

    The same issue may re-occur but it's not normally as prolonged and widespread as happened recently.

    The local TV weather forecasters will usually issue warnings when it is likely to happen.
  • goral
    goral Posts: 78 Forumite
    Instead of put more cables and more sat receivers to other rooms, better idea is to buy cheep enigma2 boxes and share tv on WiFi.
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