Sky channels

[placeinthesun]

Hi all can anyone please tell me what Sky channels we can 'reasonably' expect to be able to get in Caleta with our sky box & card from England.

[Globetrotter]

Not many since sky switched to the new satelite with the narrow UK beam, not saying you cant but you will need a whopping great 4mtr dish

[placeinthesun]

Thanks Globetrotter just trying to decide if it's ever worth bothering with as it used to be pretty good - thought we must be doing something wrong !

[Globetrotter]

Thats OK, you can get most of the UK channels from the Satback satelite in Fuerte BUT you need a special box than can handle the encryption, these channels are on the back up satelite for Sky (not Freeview), but (again) they do alter the encryption every so often then you have to wait for the new codes to be hacked and released on the net, could be the same day, next week, next month or never, you then enter these codes into your box to continue watching them unscrambled.
And heres the rub, this satelite is nearing the end of its planned life and no-one seems to know where these stations will be when that happens.
So you pay your money and take a chance, but these boxes are expensive.
Having said that a friend of our has used their box for the last year and not had to update it, they are quite happy to have had a years viewing for the price, but it could have lasted maybe a couple of months, no-one knows.

[fourthwisemonkey]

Regarding what sky channels you will get. Basically a 1.1 mtr dish will give you nearly all the subscription channels. For a complete list go to kingofsat.net and look at astra2 28.2 and basically you will see what beam each transponder is on. If it is euro beam you will get it if it is uk beam you would need a dish in excess of 5 mtr. (Note Dave/Gold etc are on the UK beam but the irish derivatives are on the euro beam so you would have to add these manually via other channels.
Regarding Satback. the satellite it is on, Intelsat 907 at 27 deg west, is technically life expired but most satellites are extended by a couple of years. Only industry news is apparently the new bird will possibly be launched 2nd/3rd quarter 2018. The UK programmes on this sat are not meant for public use. The BISS encryption is easily broken (receivers available from about 90.) This backup system is used by the UK broadcasters for uk terrestrial transmitters which have no other backup (I think there were about 5 or 6 sites initially but a couple of them now have fibre links). Will BBC/ITV still be on the new bird when it launches...NOBODY outside of the relevent contracts knows. Will the new bird have the same coverage and beams....we will only know once launched and on station. Satellite bandwidth is expensive so the UK broadcasters would like to not be on the satellite. Anybody that tells you otherwise is being very economical with the truth. I have had this system for quite a few years (probably first on the island) and so any expenses incurred have been justified. If you get it installed today (cost about 300-350 all in) then you may get 2 years, you may get 10 years but you may get 10 days. You pay your money and take your chances. At the end of the day it is an illegal sytem you would be watching so you cannot exactly complain.

[placeinthesun]

Thanks for all that info but I don't think I 'get' all that technical stuff. Will have to give up on Sky and stick to FilmOn. Thanks anyway