# BBC TV in Catalonia



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Hi has anyone managed to get BBC ITV or CH4 in Spain more particularly Catalonia where we plan to live? If so..how and what's the monthly cost?


----------



## Baldrick (Mar 5, 2012)

Which town are you in, I may be able to help


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

London UK..lol. sorry we hope to be in Calafell. Thanks


----------



## sat (Jul 20, 2008)

andyviola said:


> Hi has anyone managed to get BBC ITV or CH4 in Spain more particularly Catalonia where we plan to live? If so..how and what's the monthly cost?


Via satellite you will need at least a 1.8m dish, maybe a 2.4m dish
No monthly costs, as those channels you mentioned are free on satellite.

Or via internet, where they can be free or pay depending on what system you get them from (a free stream site & app or a paid IPTV service or a paid DNS service for the actual catch up services like iPlayer)


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

sat said:


> andyviola said:
> 
> 
> > Hi has anyone managed to get BBC ITV or CH4 in Spain more particularly Catalonia where we plan to live? If so..how and what's the monthly cost?
> ...


Thanks so much. And such a large dish will get reception? As i did hear that new Astra footprint doesnt reach as far as Catalonia? But i may be wrong...


----------



## Trubrit (Nov 24, 2010)

andyviola said:


> Thanks so much. And such a large dish will get reception? As i did hear that new Astra footprint doesnt reach as far as Catalonia? But i may be wrong...


I just use transponder.tv. it is totally legal, free ( you can pay for lots more channels) and with perfect reception.


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Cool is transponder.tv HD too?


----------



## Baldrick (Mar 5, 2012)

andyviola said:


> London UK..lol. sorry we hope to be in Calafell. Thanks


Sorry, you are a long way away from me


----------



## Horlics (Sep 27, 2011)

andyviola said:


> Cool is transponder.tv HD too?


Unfortunately it doesn't have any apps so you can't view it on a TV unless you plug a computer into it.

Looks promising though. Could be the best thing yet when they get some apps out.


----------



## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

You can get UK TV via internet anywhere in Spain. Why clutter up your roof with satellite dishes?

TV Mucho works well and is reasonably priced. Load the app onto your smartphone or tablet and stream it to your TV using Chromecast or similar device. Or get a "smart TV".


----------



## sat (Jul 20, 2008)

andyviola said:


> Thanks so much. And such a large dish will get reception? As i did hear that new Astra footprint doesnt reach as far as Catalonia? But i may be wrong...


The new Astra 2 UK TV satellites signal footprints cover all of Spain.

But within those footprints the signal varies quite a lot, and size of dish depends where you are in Spain. Here in Valencia anything from like 90cm can get the UK beam channels...proving the signals do actually "reach as far as Catalonia", but you just need the right sized dish for them for your area.


----------



## Alvarro (Dec 23, 2016)

Trubrit said:


> I just use transponder.tv. it is totally legal, free ( you can pay for lots more channels) and with perfect reception.


Having watched TV using Transponder for a long time now I am now asked to subscribe to a plan - paid for. Bronze 70 pounds a year. Silver 102 pounds per year or Gold 126 pounds per year. Then their is Annual subscription of 52 pounds per year. I am confused. Is the annual subscription in addition to one of the three above or instead of? If it is 'instead of' why would anyone opt for a monthly plan at a greater cost unless you want the additional recording time?


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

I went to https://transponder.tv/pricing and just looks to me that you select one of the 4 options and 1 quid a week option gives little recording. Recording would be a must for us.


----------



## mickbcn (Feb 4, 2013)

sat said:


> The new Astra 2 UK TV satellites signal footprints cover all of Spain.
> 
> But within those footprints the signal varies quite a lot, and size of dish depends where you are in Spain. Here in Valencia anything from like 90cm can get the UK beam channels...proving the signals do actually "reach as far as Catalonia", but you just need the right sized dish for them for your area.


If you can receikve signal from València with a 90 cm dish maybe in Catalonia with one of 60 cm is enough because is 3 or 400 km near England, no?


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

I believe the east-ness of Catalonia is an issue too sadly as footprint doesnt go so far East


----------



## sat (Jul 20, 2008)

mickbcn said:


> If you can receikve signal from València with a 90 cm dish maybe in Catalonia with one of 60 cm is enough because is 3 or 400 km near England, no?


Nope.
Not the way it works.
(difficult to explain but...)
In the beam , the signals are sent in "waves"
And reception of those signals depends on if you are in a peak or trough of the wave.
And between Cat and Val, there is a huge difference as Cat is in a signal trough, and Val is is a signal peak.

(For example - On the previous satellites UK TV Cat was good on a 80cm dish, Val needed 2m, and CdS 1.4m dish.
ON the current satellites, these waves are more compact, and so the CdS wave is now in Valencia, Valencias wave is now over Cat, )


----------



## bobley (Nov 7, 2018)

When I moved into Mallorca I was a bit bamboozled buy all the costs and complexity of signing up with Moviestar telecoms but they do have a UK TV package which bolts onto their fibre broadband subscripton but it costs about €20/month on top of the internet costs. 

So far I manage by using Tiekom internet who speak english and are very quick and helpful. That costs €45/month for 60Mbs which is plenty for a house full of tech savvy kids. Again their TV package is €25/month so I'm not using that. I watch a lot of Netflix/Amazon/Eurosport and none of those are affected by the location anyway and I listen to the news on the radio but if I must watch UK telly I plug my little £150 chromebook into the back of the telly and watch iplayer on Chrome browser using a little app called Hola which is free in its basic form. You wont get a great picture through it as the free version is limited. You can buy a premium version for £45/yr which gives you a proxy address which you type into your routers control panel and then all your traffic goes via Holas server. Onces thats set you can use BBC/4OD/ITV Player apps on your telly as if you were in the UK.

I expat I've spoke to in Pollença bought an obscenely big dish - which blew away in a storm!


----------



## butcherboy (Jan 15, 2018)

Give the guys a shout over at DublinMedia well established group selling iptv they have every country covered over 8000 channels most HD Spain Portugal France UK USA Canada covered smart phone tablet firestick android devices all covered as well as mag boxes and pc apps from £10 per month £60 per year full support via facebook 


https://www.facebook.com/groups/347779668958998/?ref=bookmarks
http://dubliniptvweb.ddns. net/index.php ( NO GAPS IN URL )


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

bobley said:


> but if I must watch UK telly I plug my little £150 chromebook into the back of the telly and watch iplayer on Chrome browser using a little app called Hola which is free in its basic form. You wont get a great picture through it as the free version is limited. You can buy a premium version for £45/yr which gives you a proxy address which you type into your routers control panel and then all your traffic goes via Holas server. Onces thats set you can use BBC/4OD/ITV Player apps on your telly as if you were in the UK.
> 
> I expat I've spoke to in Pollença bought an obscenely big dish - which blew away in a storm!


Thanks. Does it work fine still? I hear BBC are bloody clever at detecting when a VPN ip address is not actually uk residential....


----------



## sat (Jul 20, 2008)

andyviola said:


> Thanks. Does it work fine still? I hear BBC are bloody clever at detecting when a VPN ip address is not actually uk residential....


you can check yourself... whatismyipaddress.com... 

i dare say it is easy for them to see when they have 1000 connections coming in from 1 ip address, red flags on their system which checks it out


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

sat said:


> andyviola said:
> 
> 
> > Thanks. Does it work fine still? I hear BBC are bloody clever at detecting when a VPN ip address is not actually uk residential....
> ...


Oh dear i fear watching bbc and itv is going to prove a painful experience to arrange


----------



## yozzi (Aug 30, 2012)

Alcalaina said:


> You can get UK TV via internet anywhere in Spain. Why clutter up your roof with satellite dishes?
> 
> TV Mucho works well and is reasonably priced. Load the app onto your smartphone or tablet and stream it to your TV using Chromecast or similar device. Or get a "smart TV".


I also use tvmucho here in South Africa and it works very well through internet and paid 48 euros for the year


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

So SKY GO works abroad...just tested...and can hookup laptop to TV. Just need my brother in UK to login once a month to pretend im uk resident ...wont miss BBC too much. ITV seems to have tons of new drama these days


----------



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

Alcalaina said:


> You can get UK TV via internet anywhere in Spain. Why clutter up your roof with satellite dishes?
> 
> TV Mucho works well and is reasonably priced. Load the app onto your smartphone or tablet and stream it to your TV using Chromecast or similar device. Or get a "smart TV".


I bought an Android box for €40 plus a UK VPN and loaded BBC Iplayer, Netflix and some other stuff like Showbox and BBC Radio. You can also watch current TV from the Iplayer.
I also had a quite small satellite dish installed to get BBC tv and radio plus ITV and Ch4 in case I ever lose the other connection.
For some reason the Android box works better than the other box I first tried which had everything on it, Sky, BBC, films, Catch-up. I don’t have fibre optic in my new house.
I never used to watch much tv before but I find Iplayer very useful.
I inherited an antenna on the roof which provides Spanish terrestrial tv


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Help on iPlayer says doesnt work abroad and they also dont allow VPN?


----------



## sat (Jul 20, 2008)

andyviola said:


> So SKY GO works abroad...just tested...and can hookup laptop to TV. Just need my brother in UK to login once a month to pretend im uk resident ...wont miss BBC too much. ITV seems to have tons of new drama these days





andyviola said:


> Help on iPlayer says doesnt work abroad and they also dont allow VPN?


Although Sky Go will work in the EU, as that is part of the EU portability rules on subscription services being available across the EU for a limited number of days, iPlayer, ITVHub, All4, Demand Five are NOT subscription services, and so not covered by the EU rules...
which is why you will still need to use a VPN / Smart DNS service to access these services when out of the UK, even though they are listed on SkyGo
But not all VPNs are working with iPlayer as the BBC is very active in blocking them... hence why you are having issues

And of course we have no idea if the UK will keep the portability rules going after MArch...


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Thanks...my daughter is in France and watching ITV via sky go..without a VPN


----------



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

andyviola said:


> Help on iPlayer says doesnt work abroad and they also dont allow VPN?


Mine does!!!
Watching it now.


----------



## sat (Jul 20, 2008)

andyviola said:


> Thanks...my daughter is in France and watching ITV via sky go..without a VPN


ITV not as active as the BBC in blocking things on ITVHub / SlyGo....but then there is not much worth watching on ITV anyway these days, so they dont bother blocking it!


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Apart from manhunt 3 part last week which was superb


----------



## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

andyviola said:


> Apart from manhunt 3 part last week which was superb


Thanks for the tip!

Downloading it now from EZTV so we can watch it without adverts.


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Oh i love fhe beautiful young ladies in adverts mwahah


----------



## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

andyviola said:


> Oh i love fhe beautiful young ladies in adverts mwahah


I only see UK TV aderts when I go and stay at my brother's house in England. Half the time I have no idea what they are advertising!

If you want beautiful young ladies (and men) watch Spanish TV in the run-up to Valentine's Day. Every advert is for some kind of perfume!


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Hahaha thx for the tip.


----------



## Love Karma (Oct 10, 2018)

Saddened to see the BBC has decided to axe Sue Barker and her fellow team captains Matt Dawson and Phil Tuffnell from its very popular "A Question of Sport" programme. As a panel they'll take some beating, they have great on screen chemistry.


----------



## andyviola (Aug 11, 2018)

Horlics said:


> Unfortunately it doesn't have any apps so you can't view it on a TV unless you plug a computer into it.
> 
> Looks promising though. Could be the best thing yet when they get some apps out.


Hiya, app is now in beta and looks terrific! Available to install in Android.


----------



## Max Rigger (Aug 2, 2020)

The beeb is becoming less relevant in the UK as streaming channels like Netfix et al expand and offer more and more content, so is the beeb really a 'must have' these days in Spain? Yes I watch BBC news daily, some documentaries/comedy but I could certainly live without it.


----------



## MataMata (Nov 30, 2008)

There are many who would disagree with you on that!

Transponder.tv seems to pretty much mirror what's available on a Freesat box.


----------



## Max Rigger (Aug 2, 2020)

MataMata said:


> There are many who would disagree with you on that!
> 
> Transponder.tv seems to pretty much mirror what's available on a Freesat box.


Its just me, I only watch BBC news daily, some documentaries/comedy but thats only a few hours a week so given I can get BBC news on radio I'd not bother paying much to watch their content. I subscribe to Netflix/Amazon/Disney/Britbox/TVL and to be honest I don't watch a lot even when I'm on shore leave...I'm wasting cash


----------

