Bigger dish or IPTV?

[Menorca Man]

Intend waiting until Astra 2G is operational later this year before deciding which way to jump, just in case Sky decide to go the route of BBC and ITV. In the meantime I'll make do with fuzzy reception of those channels via a free streaming service.

Makes me wonder though if the BBC and ITV will clamp down on these IPTV re-broadcasters. I'd be reluctant to pay a subscription for HD IPTV knowing that there was a likelihood of the UK channels being removed.

 

[washoris]

iptv is crap if you dont have a good provider it's benefitial yes.. but its no near satellite... on satellite you get a downlink of 42 mbps on some HD channels.. also for full HD channels you need a good internet line of about 9 mbps and up so that it does not glitch.and be aware that if your iptv provider is not paying for sufficient bandwidth you will be glitching. its no near the hd quality of satellite but if iptv its the only way to go then you're stuck with that. I guess if we lived in a world that all the houses had FTTH (fiber to the home) iptv would be the way to go but since its not we are stuck.although its the future.. sadly it is :/

 

[dvdfilm]

I agree iptv is not good. Tested one provider and quality was so bad,I suspect they don't even use a satellite feed as signal source,probably they just re-stream the bbc iplayer

 

[washoris]

I've tested many of which they are of a great quality but comparing it with satellite feels cheap and bad.but again if is the only option go with it but you have to find good quality provider


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[skomedal]

Best of the freebies ive tried without a proxy server

http://schoener-fernsehen.com/

Some uk channels but german based.

Enjoy

 

[Menorca Man]

Yes, SD streaming is pretty dire. However, my actual measured download speed is 4.8mbps and the short HD test stream via FilmOn,com seems not too bad.
However, the big question regarding these streaming services is, are the BBC and ITV channels likely to be shut down due to the illegal rebroadcasting of copyright material? After all, I would hate to go to the expense of purchasing a nettop box and HD IPTV subscription only to find a few months later that the UK FTA channels have been pulled.

 

[skomedal]

Yes, SD streaming is pretty dire. However, my actual measured download speed is 4.8mbps and the short HD test stream via FilmOn,com seems not too bad.
However, the big question regarding these streaming services is, are the BBC and ITV channels likely to be shut down due to the illegal rebroadcasting of copyright material? After all, I would hate to go to the expense of purchasing a nettop box and HD IPTV subscription only to find a few months later that the UK FTA channels have been pulled.

Y not just stream from ur pc/lappy?

For the time being

 

[Archived-1]

Have a look into slingbox sharing if you could give 24hr access to your local channels someone would share with you,

I used to do it with great results from the usa,

 

[Menorca Man]

Y not just stream from ur pc/lappy?

For the time being

Hi,
I'm already streaming to a large-screen TV via my laptop's HDMI output as a stopgap measure. If I were to go the IPTV route on a permanent basis then obviously a nettop box would be a better (both technically and aesthetically) solution.

Would still be worried about the long term availability of the UK FTA channels though!!

 

[Menorca Man]

Have a look into slingbox sharing if you could give 24hr access to your local channels someone would share with you,

I used to do it with great results from the usa,

Hi Martin,
No can do I'm afraid. I permanently reside in Spain and therefore don't have access to UK accommodation in which I could install a Slingbox.

 

[Archived-1]

Hi Martin,
No can do I'm afraid. I permanently reside in Spain and therefore don't have access to UK accommodation in which I could install a Slingbox.

No you would share your Spanish fta tv with someone who can get the channels you require. slingbox sharing google it.

 

[dvdfilm]

I've tested many of which they are of a great quality but comparing it with satellite feels cheap and bad.but again if is the only option go with it but you have to find good quality provider


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Where have you tested them? My experience so far has been of pixellating picture quality..

 

[Captain Jack]

It really does depend on your internet speed. I have Russian IPTV and the results are acceptable and video quality is generally on par with that on satellite in SD. I do get the occasional freezes, which does my head in... The advertised minimum is about 2Mbit for the service I am on but you clearly need around 6Mbit for freeze-free operation. And even then...

I would never choose IPTV over satellite unless I had no other way at all.

 

[tothbros]

i saw iptv and was unimpressed.
unstable, poor picture quality, and to put it mildly, questionable legality.
bandwidth at the receiver end is one thing...often the issue is at the provider's end - which is probably due to the "not so professional" infrastructure that is used - again, what can you expect from a service with shady legality.
if sky became unavailable to me, i'd go for torrent to get the content i'd like to watch - which is legal in my country, and several other western european countries (i know p2p file sharing is illegal in the uk).
torrent is certainly not an ideal solution by any means, but as a last resort, and as long as it's legal, i'd go for that, rather than pay for an illegitimate iptv service.

 

[interested newbie]

This may not be the right place but I think here in Algarve it's fair to say that almost everyone is going for IPTV as a solution, very few for the other satellite. Is this true all over Iberia?

 

[dvdfilm]

It really does depend on your internet speed. I have Russian IPTV and the results are acceptable and video quality is generally on par with that on satellite in SD. I do get the occasional freezes, which does my head in... The advertised minimum is about 2Mbit for the service I am on but you clearly need around 6Mbit for freeze-free operation. And even then...

I would never choose IPTV over satellite unless I had no other way at all.

Well, on a 20 mb broadband I didn't find iptv comparable with an SD satellite picture,too bad the picture particularly with moving images

 

[Captain Jack]

It largely depends on the provider. Some are better than others. As some have mentioned here, the upstream speed is the important bit at the provider end.

If I was realllly desperate for UK TV abroad, I would try to find a friend here with a fibre internet service and a Slingbox... The only way to guarantee decent enough quality streaming without paying tons of money to questionable sources.

 

[timo_w2s]

For me the catch up services are the best way to watch UK TV, you can choose when to watch and quality can be pretty good really. I suspect the problem with many dodgy IPTV streams are they are just reencoding low quality SD streams so everything looks even worse after it's passed through an encoder again.

 

[Menorca Man]

I would never choose IPTV over satellite unless I had no other way at all.

The problem for me is that I live in a large apartment block with seven stairwells. Each stairwell has its own small Spanish satellite dish and TV antenna feeding 10 apartments i.e. 7 dishes and 7 antenna in total for the block. Needless to say, the community were a bit sniffy when I asked their agreement for me to add a 1.3 mtr dish to the existing forest of dishes on the roof!!
I could probably get away with upgrading to a 1.5 mtr but very much doubt I would be allowed to mount anything bigger. Anyway, I wouldn't risk anything larger than that as Menorca isn't known as the "Windy Island" for nothing!! So, unless a 1.5 mtr dish (approx 900 euros according to a local installer) can provide me with reasonable reception of the 2E UK spotbeam, I'll be looking for an alternative solution for my regular fix of BBC and ITV programmes. The rest of my appetite for UK TV is currently satisfied via a Sky Entertainment Extra+ subscription (fingers crossed that Sky don't migrate their channels to a UK spotbeam anytime soon!).

 

[Mark Hargrove]

I sent my father who lives in Spain one of those IPTV boxes a few weeks ago, now he only has 6mbps broadband but the picture quality on a 32inch led tv is very watchable and seeing as he can not put up a large sat dish, its the best of a bad option, He gets all the usual British channels as well as some sports and some adult. In case someone is interested its a Medialink Black Panther Combo HD , not sure if posting a link is allowed maybe someone will let me know ?