Freeview On PC

YoungBlood

YoungBlood

YoungBlood

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I think this is the right place to post this....

Im wondering if anyone can rec me a product for doing this....
I want to use my sky dish as a freeview reciever for my PC, basicly we have no standard roof top antenna so the signal would have to come from the sky dish.

So im after a pci/usb card that will accept my sky dish connector (sorry dont know the name, its some sort of a screw on) as a input source and then allow me to record the freeview channels that the sky dish can recieve.

Ive had a look around but what I see is standard pci tv cards for standard roof top antenna's im pretty sure these wont work.

So I need a sattalite pc freeview card? someting like that, I just realy dont wanna end up buying the wrong thing, im sure someone here has a setup like this and can rec me a good card for the job.

Thanks in advance!
 
Firstly, I think you are slightly confused over some of the channels that Sky provide.

Sky and Freeview are two completely different systems, you cannot recieve Freeview via a Sky satellite dish. Freeview is a terrestrial system so can only be received via a normal TV aerial and Sky is a completely independant Satellite system. Freeview is also free to receive the basic channel set, but you normally have to pay to receive Sky TV (thought there are some one-off payments you can make to receive the equivalent of some Freeview channels).

I suspect some of your confusion is that a lot of channels that appear on Sky also appear on Freeview. This is just the package of channels that are made available on the two systems.

Getting back to your request, there are two main ways you can go.

If you can get a decent aerial connection, go for a DVB-T digital capture card, preferably one which comes with PVR (Personal Video Recorder) software. This will probably be the simplest solution.

The next options are all based around using an output from the Sky box. The main issue here will be controlling the sky box to change channels.

You may be lucky and have a video card with S-Video input (A VIVO card), all you need to by then is a SCART to S-Video and audio lead. This will provide the physical connection, but you still have to source some software that will allow you to record video signals (though some software may have come with your video card if it is a VIVO version).

A second option, and more likely the solution you are looking for at present, is to get an analogue TV Tuner card. This can be connected to one of the aerial outputs on the Sky box and with a bit of luck the card will be able to remote control the sky box as well. It might even be worth investing in a card that does analogue and digital, so that you can move to Freeview at a later date should that become practical.

You will still have the problem that you can only watch one channel at a time on the sky box, so if you change channels with the TV capture card, then the same channel will show up on your TV.

To be honest though, I think your best solution would be to get an aerial connection sorted out and get a DVB-T card, this will be less hastle than mucking around with the Sky box. You could even get a dual channel Analogue/DVB-T card, to record from sky as well in the future.

In terms of makes and models of cards, I've had a couple of Hauppage cards that have worked well for me, and I should be receiving a HVR-1300 in the next few days, to be added to my new Media Centre PC.

Have a look at the TV cards that OcUK stock here:-

OcUK TV Cards

I hope that hasn't confused you too much. :)
 
carpmaster said:
You just need a DVB-S card. Plug the sky dish cable straight into this. Job done.
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Yep, that's that the OP seems to be after.

You won't get a lot with this though - there aren't meany FTA channels on Sky. The BBC channels, a few random shopping channels and maybe a music channel or 2.

No ITV, Channel 4, five, E4, etc etc.
 
csmager said:
Yep, that's that the OP seems to be after.

You won't get a lot with this though - there aren't meany FTA channels on Sky. The BBC channels, a few random shopping channels and maybe a music channel or 2.

No ITV, Channel 4, five, E4, etc etc.
Click to expand...

Come off it!

Almost all of Freeview is on FreeSat, including all the ITV channels and Film Four. The only one's missing of note are Channel 4, five and E4. Less of the etc. etc. because there are a lot of channels (not just shopping and game channels) on FreeSat that aren't on Freeview.

This gives an idea: http://forum.digitalspy.co.uk/board/showthread.php?t=445547
 
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clv101 said:
Come off it!

Almost all of Freeview is on FreeSat, including all the ITV channels and Film Four. The only one's missing of note are Channel 4, five and E4. Less of the etc. etc. because there are a lot of channels (not just shopping and game channels) on FreeSat that aren't on Freeview.
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I wasn't referring to FreeSat - ITV, Channel4, five are all available on FreeSat.

If you just plug a Sky dish into a DVB-S card, you only get the unencrypted channels... which are either the BBC... or rubbish. I wasn't aware ITV had gone FTA, although I remember it was supposed to happen.
 
Sorry, when I said FreeSat I meant free to air... including all the ITV stuff and Film 4 channels.

I use free to air sat, and just switch to analuge for C4 and five - don't think I'm missing out no much.
 
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Oh, ok. Just looking through the list (not completely current), there's actually a lot more FTA than I remember from the last time I had the pleasure of using it...

Missing from Freeview:
The Hits, TMF, Sky Sports News, UK History, UK Bright Ideas, FTN, E4, More4 & ABC1.

http://www.wickonline.com/fta.htm
 
In an attempt to clarify:

- Freeview is a system for receiving completely free-to-air, unencrypted channels through an aerial (excluding TopUpTV).

- Freesat from Sky can be obtained for a one off payment (£150 I believe) or by cancelling a Sky subscription and continuing to use the Sky box. It does feature many of the same channels from Freeview, but several of these (ITV, Ch4, Five etc) are not actually free-to-air, they are still encrypted using Sky's encryption system.

- Free-to-air satellite can be received using a third-party digital satellite box or DVB-S TV card and dish, but you cannot watch any of the Sky-encrypted channels, you need a Sky box to do this. You will, however, be able to tune into more frequencies and point at different satellites to pick up other digital channels that a Sky box cannot.

The key difference to understand, then, is that there are channels that are completely free-to-air, such as the BBC channels, and channels that are only free-to-view, such as ITV and Ch4. You can watch them through a Skybox, but they are not freely available to anybody who tunes in.
 
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If you already have a satellite dish installed and the equipment needed to receive the signal, eg a sky box or sky digital compatible DVB-S card etc, then you can get a Freesat card for a £20 one off fee.

www.freesatfromsky.co.uk

If you already have a satellite dish installed and the equipment needed to receive the signal, eg a sky box or DVB-S card etc, but don't want to pay the £20, then you can receive the free-to-air channels listed in one of the links above. Its generally better to just pay the £20 and be done with it, though.
 
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DJ Baz said:
In an attempt to clarify:

- Freeview is a system for receiving completely free-to-air, unencrypted channels through an aerial (excluding TopUpTV).

- Freesat from Sky can be obtained for a one off payment (£150 I believe) or by cancelling a Sky subscription and continuing to use the Sky box. It does feature many of the same channels from Freeview, but several of these (ITV, Ch4, Five etc) are not actually free-to-air, they are still encrypted using Sky's encryption system.

- Free-to-air satellite can be received using a third-party digital satellite box or DVB-S TV card and dish, but you cannot watch any of the Sky-encrypted channels, you need a Sky box to do this. You will, however, be able to tune into more frequencies and point at different satellites to pick up other digital channels that a Sky box cannot.

The key difference to understand, then, is that there are channels that are completely free-to-air, such as the BBC channels, and channels that are only free-to-view, such as ITV and Ch4. You can watch them through a Skybox, but they are not freely available to anybody who tunes in.
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The ITV channels are available free to air with any old sky box and no fee or card. Given that Channel 4 and five are broadcast on analogue, then picking up an old sky box from ebay is a pretty good why of getting lots of TV for very little money (assuming your house already has a dish).
 
dbmzk1 said:
If you already have a satellite dish installed and the equipment needed to receive the signal, eg a sky box or sky digital compatible DVB-S card etc, then you can get a Freesat card for a £20 one off fee.

www.freesatfromsky.co.uk

If you already have a satellite dish installed and the equipment needed to receive the signal, eg a sky box or DVB-S card etc, but don't want to pay the £20, then you can receive the free-to-air channels listed in one of the links above. Its generally better to just pay the £20 and be done with it, though.
Click to expand...

I wasn't actually aware of the £20 option for just the viewing card, and I was wondering how it would work if you already had all the equipment, thanks :)

However, if you take the £20 fee, and factor in that you may have to buy a 2nd hand Skybox, you're getting dangerously close to the price of a decent Freeview box.

So, a good option if you live out of Freeview coverage, but I'd still say Freeview is the best free system if you can get it.
 
If you get a DVB-S card with a CAM that accepts a Sky card you can get the PPV channels, but you'll need to pay Sky for the extra card. AFAIK it works with Windows Media Center, but i'm not sure if it's officially supported.
I'm not sure if i'm allowed to link to them , so just do a google for av forums.
 
Excuse the OT post, but would I be right in thinking that with Freesat you can get FilmFour but not E4? I have a Sky Digital dish + digibox, no sky digital subcription, but an old working viewing card, and I'm thinking about whether to go with Freeview or the £20 Freesat viewing card.
 
fish99 said:
Excuse the OT post, but would I be right in thinking that with Freesat you can get FilmFour but not E4? I have a Sky Digital dish + digibox, no sky digital subcription, but an old working viewing card, and I'm thinking about whether to go with Freeview or the £20 Freesat viewing card.
Click to expand...

Surely if you have a Sky dish + digibox, with a viewing card, you might be best just to turn it on and see what channels you get for yourself?
 
Cheers for the info :)

I thought there were some extra channels with a Freesat card beyond what I'd get with my current viewing card. After looking at the channel list there isn't so I'd be paying £20 for nothing.

My digibox does crash fairly often though and I get picture breakup when it's raining, so I'm still tempted to go with Freeview.
 
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