Using your Digibox

Last updated 12th June 2009

 

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 Go, freesat, GO! 
While this site has become a useful information resource for the Sky Digibox; I plan now to turn my sights to supporting the BBC initiative called "freesat".

 

If you've been watching commercial television recently, you probably can't have failed to miss the freesat adverts. Now with more boxes being shifted, more channels and facilities being added, it's time to step up a gear.
Personally, I really hope they pull a rabbit out of the hat in the form of BBC iPlayer/ITVplayer support (and I might be inclined to add YouTube like the Neuros OSD). Now that is something a generic Sky Digibox simply can't do!

Here's my freesat information. Updates welcome.

freesat

 

28.2°E (SkyDigital) Free-to-Air

 

 

Lost your remote?
Argos it!

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This is not a sponsored link, it is just something I thought may be useful to you.

Using a non-Sky receiver

 

Technical

 

Historical interest

This section is for stuff that is no longer really relevant, but may be of interest for historical reasons, or to see "how it used to be"...

 

Miscellaneous

 

[OLD] Using your Digibox at 19.2°E (European channels)

Following firmware updates in Summer and Autumn 2005, the Digibox now asks you to "Insert your viewing card" if you try to access "Other Channels" (in the Services menu) before the box has loaded the EPG channels list. This is, of course, assuming that you do not have any viewing card!
The important effect of this miniscule change is that it is now impossible to access any channels that may be added from other satellites (such as Astra 19.2°E) until the box has initialised and loaded the channels and other information from Astra 28.2°E. You could then swap LNBs with some sort of switch, but with cheap FTA receivers running in at around £30 (50 euros) - they being more flexible and generally friendlier to use on other satellites - why on earth would you want to bother using a Digibox to watch RAI Uno, etc?
 
I have my doubts as to the entire legality of this change - after all, I'm not a Sky subscriber, my box hasn't been used with a Sky card for a number of years now, and yet Sky have dictated something I cannot now do with my box...

 
Anyway, if you are interested in looking at the old Astra 19.2°E material, perhaps to get an idea of what is available, CLICK HERE!
Note that this only covers Astra at 19.2°E. There's loads more on Hotbird (13°E) and HispaSat, NileSat, the list goes on and on!

 

If you wish to email me, please send your message to heyrick at the domain merseymail.com.
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts and comments.

Important: I get an hour a week on-line at the local library, so please do not be annoyed if I don't answer for a couple of days! For involved emails, I download them one week, write a reply, and upload them the next week. Thank you for your understanding.

 

If you are looking for parts and 'spares' for your Digibox, then you might like to visit SatCure. I don't have any personal experience of SatCure to offer; however once you finally reach the catalogue (it could be better organised (spring 2006)!), you'll see that there are loads of things that you may find useful, from entire systems to spare remotes!

 


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