Sky in Spain (Urgent help please)

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
Hi guys,

I am in Madrid and I have a PAce 2600 box and a registered sky digital viewing card (from england)
The house we are in currently has a Via digital dish on the side of the house, it is standard size.
The adapter on the dish says universal, so I have tried using that dish as I dont want to pay a fortune for a 1 metre dish.

My questions:

Have i any chance of gettign sky through this dish?
I know I wont get bbc itv etc... but will i get sky sports?

I have been told that i input some new numbers into the default trandsponder freq, is this correct? and if so which numbers?

Please reply via here, or via msn: fish4tackle@hotmail.com

P.S I am in Madrid.
 

Channel Hopper

Suffering fools, so you don't have to.
Staff member
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
35,536
Reaction score
8,554
Points
113
Age
59
Website
www.sat-elite.uk
My Satellite Setup
A little less analogue, and a lot more crap.
My Location
UK
How big is the ViaDigital dish ?
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
I havent measured it yet, but it is a standard size dish. Remember when sky first came out? its the same size as those dishes.
 

PoloMint

Super Minty Mod
Joined
Dec 31, 1999
Messages
1,588
Reaction score
1
Points
0
My Satellite Setup
1200cc with 100,000,000,000 neurons and 100,000,000,000,000 connections
My Location
Fife, Scotland
Which Via dish do you have? Around here there are two sizes, older tiny ones of 45cm or so and the newer installations (about the last couple of years) have ones of 60cm or so. The newer ones are offset (higher than wider) and have the new Via logo on them, older ones have the square blue logo on them.

If you have the newer bigger dish and move it to Astra 2 you have a reasonable change of picking up the south beam channels. Look on this list http://www.lyngsat.com/packages/skyuk.html over to the right of the table it tells you what satellite and beam the channels are on. If the channels you want are on 2A South or 2B South you might be OK, anything else and you will almost certainly need a bigger dish.

If you are using the digibox to align the dish you will not get a signal reading as the default transponder is on a north beam, if you press Services 4 0 1 Select that will take you to the installer menu, from there you can manually enter a south beam transponder from the list above by selecting manual tuning, or by changing the default transponder.
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
im afraid it is the older one (blue square logo)

Does this mean I have no chance of getting it?
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
according to that site the channels i want are on the Astra 2 south Beam (:cool:


The chart also shows that I need a 50cm dish to recieve these channels, but i fear mine may be smaller than that.
I am pretty sure mine is 45cm, which is only 5cm smaller than necessary.
 

PoloMint

Super Minty Mod
Joined
Dec 31, 1999
Messages
1,588
Reaction score
1
Points
0
My Satellite Setup
1200cc with 100,000,000,000 neurons and 100,000,000,000,000 connections
My Location
Fife, Scotland
You have less chance with the smaller Via dish, I have never actually seen anyone try and use that dish on Astra 2 anywhere in Spain. South beams are very strong so it is worth trying if that’s all you want, but don’t get your hopes up.

I wouldn’t worry about the 5cm all that much, 50cm would get you reception in most weather conditions so with a slightly smaller dish you should still get something. And the footprints are never that accurate anyway.
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
I have tried changing the default transponder to the settings required for Sky sports on the Astra south beam B.

I think the problem may lie in the positioning of the dish.

The brackets that it is sat on are able to move freely left to right, but they cant seem to get very high in altitude. I would guess at 25 degrees max. I think this may be my problem.

Does anyone know the exact direction i should be pointing the dish? I am aiming it Eastwards at the moment.

Many thanks.
 

PoloMint

Super Minty Mod
Joined
Dec 31, 1999
Messages
1,588
Reaction score
1
Points
0
My Satellite Setup
1200cc with 100,000,000,000 neurons and 100,000,000,000,000 connections
My Location
Fife, Scotland
Aligning the dish has to be done accurately, not just pointing it in roughly the right direction.

If you download the SMW link program from here http://www.smw.se/smwlink/smwlink.htm and put in your details it will tell you the elevation you need for the dish. Hopefully there will be some sort of guide on the brackets of the Via dish for you adjust it to. SMW link also tells you where to point the dish, however measuring this is difficult. Setting the elevation then simply moving the dish slowing (getting a starting point by looking at a neighbours dish if you can see one) is easier. This is made much easier by being able to see the TV while you do it, also the digibox takes a few seconds to update, so move the dish a tiny bit, wait, move it a bit more and so on until you get a signal, then be even more exact with fine tuning.

You will also have to change the skew of the LNB (how far left and right the LNB is twisted) right now for Via it should be to the right of being vertical, you will need to turn slightly it to the left of vertical (start of at about 1/6 of the way round until you get a signal, then adjust it more accurately). This is very important, here with the LNB vertical I get no signal quality at all (but quite good strength) and the settings for Via are even further off than that.
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
Pardon my ignorance, but what is the LNB?

many thanks for your help thus far.
 

PoloMint

Super Minty Mod
Joined
Dec 31, 1999
Messages
1,588
Reaction score
1
Points
0
My Satellite Setup
1200cc with 100,000,000,000 neurons and 100,000,000,000,000 connections
My Location
Fife, Scotland
The LNB is the thing on the arm of the dish, what the cable connects to :)
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
many thanks.

i will have a play around with it tonight.

P.S anyone here from Madrid?
 

dishdoctor

Hmm, now what seems to be the problem?
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
420
Reaction score
0
Points
16
My Location
Torreblanca ,Malaga
A 1 metre dish in Spain should only cost around 50 euros,a 1.3 dish retails around 150 euros,even if you get something on your small dish it would'nt be long before you wanted all the fta/ftv chanels..............brian
 

deano6410

Member
Joined
Jul 20, 2004
Messages
18
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
ok, so lets presume i buy a 1m dish.


I am not bothered about bbc1 bbc2 itv1 channel4 and channel5

but i will need sky sports 1 2 and 3

i will also need sky one

and mtv would be nice.

Would these be available on a 1m dish? and if so, does anyone know of anywhere in Madrid that would sell me one and install it for under 150 euros?
 
Top