Freesat from Communal Sky dish???

[alivingstone]

Hi,

My father has moved into accomodation for pensioners - it's a complex with approx. 80 appartments.
Each appartment has been wired for Sky from a comunal dish and I have been told by the Trust management to contact Sky to arrange installation of a Sky receiver.

When I called Sky they said they couldn't supply the equipment direct as it was a communal block - they could see on their system that the dish and wiring for the block had been installed but they couldn't supply a Sky box for some reason. Basically they wouldn't talk to me and told me they couldn't help me any further!

They gave me details of a local installation company who seem to have the contract for my fathers address. I've tried ringing them a couple of times today and yesterday without success...

My question is - if there is a communal dish and cabeling in place already can I just buy a Sky box off eBay and get a Freesat viewing card sent from Sky. (I suspect this would be much cheaper than going through a local dealer.)

Then if he want's to subscribe to premium channels at a later date I assume he can easilly upgrade as the Freesat viewing card will be registered to his address?

Can someone confirm if this is the case??

Many Thanks,

Anthony.

[J7MAN]

Thats correct mate. I install communal Sky systems for a living and Sky are very arkward about them, often telling customers that out equipment is not suitable etc so they can charge for an installation.

[alivingstone]

Cheers for that...

Just to clarify then - if I get a box off eBay (Amstrad DRX550?) and a Freesat viewing card from Sky - can he, a week or two later, then take out a subscription to the pay channels if he wants or will Sky complain that they haven't supplied the equipment?

Cheers!

[J7MAN]

As far as I'm aware they will just send him a new card for the premium content. For some reason they cant remotely upgrade the freesat cards even though they're exactly the same.

[alivingstone]

Cool! Thanks for your advice...

[J7MAN]

No problem. Remember as well its 2 seperate numbers for Sky and Sky Freesat. They get quite ratty if you ring the wrong one lol.

[vanman3000]

really dont no what the problem is with the communial dishes, i fit them on a weekly basis as every so called luxury appartment (flat) thats getting thrown up in in my town has them so does the council propeties and i fit them. do you need to tell sky its a communial dish???
as an engineer if i came and the dish was allready up.
happy days.

[Scott_Mac]

I got fed up with Sky and communal dishes... 90% of our block agreed, in writing, to sign up to Sky+ if Sky would cable the 2nd LNB to each apartment - we were all prepared to pay the install to, but they won't do it

I'm just hoping the new Freesat thing that launches in the Spring doesn't need 2 LNB inputs to work with the PVR element!

[J7MAN]

Depends if its a twin PVR or not.

[Scott_Mac]

Originally Posted by J7MAN

Depends if its a twin PVR or not.

From what i've read, it is

[son_t]

Originally Posted by Scott_Mac

From what i've read, it is

What have you read?

It depends on the manufacture of the device in question... Twin tuners can either feed each tuner internally (so only need one feed from the LNB) or they have a loop in/out and you use a connecting cable (needing only one feed) or you do actually need two feeds from the LNB going to each tuner...

[IAINSMITH]

Sorry to Hijack this thread a little bit...but it's a very similar question

During the week i live in an apartment which is about 4 years old and has "Sat" already plumbed in.

I've got a nice set-up with a Plasma and a Humax PVR but was wondering if i could fit one of the Humax Hi-Def Sat Receivers (cost about £200) to receive some HD content (i'm guessing this will only be BBC for the time being)

Or am i better off waiting a couple of months until freesat is properly launched just in case the technology is different?

Thanks in advance for any advise!