Astra 19 / Sky receiver systems

[carolebox]

I am not sure whether this is the right forum for these questions but here goes. The previous owner of my house left an installed Sky satellite dish. As far as i am aware the system worked alright. As part of rewiring the electrician has provided an extra feed cable 'in case Sky Box+ was going to be installed'.

I do not need Sky Box+ nor indeed any subscription services. However, i would like to be able to receive French / German channels from Astra 19. Some years ago these were accessed via a 15 yr old Sky receiver.he quality was variable but mostly good enough to view. Should i have the existing dish realigned on Astra and forget Sky? If so, can the 'spare' feed be used? Would it be better to get another dish installed and pointed to Astra 19? What kind of receiver would i need to take these feeds? It is obviously time for an equipment upgrade - should digital reception be a factor in making the above decisions?

Apologies for the number of basic questions.

CB

 

[rolfw]

Welcome to the forum

The minidish should just about be OK for Astra 19.2 (once re-aligned), a 60/70cm would be better though, any digital receiver will suffice for free to air channels, see the forum advertisers by clicking on the link in my profile, they have lots of receivers.

 

[Robbo]

Would it be better to get another dish installed and pointed to Astra 19?
Apologies for the number of basic questions.

CB

Do you still want to watch English channels from 28E?

If so another dish would be required.

I used to use a zone1 minidish for Astra(19.2E), it was fine most of the time, but would suffer picture breakup if it rained reasonably hard.

Robbo

 

[carolebox]

Thanks for your advice. Looks like it is worth realigning the existing 60-70cm dish on to Astra19 to get the best reception. Whether a mini-dish is worthwhile for 28 E is debatable. But not being a Sky viewer, i could be wrong on this. Sky News is of course available on terrestrial Freeview....

I believe Astra 19 is a mix of analogue and digital transmissions. Not sure whether that influences the receiver decision.

CB

 

[rolfw]

Most of the analogue will disappear eventually, but there are still used analogue/digital receivers to be found on ebay, like the Technomate 5500 DACI, or Echostar AD-3000 or AD-3600 .