# Sky on the move......



## siobhanwf

BBC, ITV, Sky, Astra 2E satellite in Spain & Portugal: News

FEB
4 ASTRA 2A CHANNELS MOVED TO ASTRA 2E
The migration of channels to the new Astra 2E European beam began last night at 2am. The first to be switched were those on the near-end-of-life 2A satellite. 

Reports across Europe indicate much improved reception in Spain, The Canaries, Italy and some eastern parts of Europe. The losers appear to be Cyprus, northern Finland and the eastern Mediterranean. 
An unexpected bonus is that the default transponder 11778, which all Sky boxes measure when a "signal test" is carried out, is much stronger in Spain. This means an end to special measures to enter an alternative transponder, and episodes of "no signal" after a power cut, common in Costa Blanca and Madrid. 
Expect more changes tonight and over coming nights.

Notable is the fact that Sky paid-for channels, including ITV 2 HD, ITV 3 HD and ITV 4 HD, are stronger in Spain than before, putting to an end the rumour started by IPTV sellers that "Sky will be lost in all of Spain".

You still need a subscription and a Sky box to view ITV 2,3,4 HD, as before. ITV ONE HD will be on the UK spot beam, yet to be activated, as will all other BBC & ITV services.

A provisional list of channels moved last night:
MTV Live HD, Lifetime HD, Sky Sports 2/1/3/4 in Pubs
Sky Movies Box Office, Disney XD UK HD, Animal Planet Europe HD
ITV 2/3/4 HD
Sky Movies Action & Adventure, Sky Movies Comedy, Sky Movies Sci-Fi & Horror, Sky Select UK, Sky Disney, Sky Movies Family, Sky Movies Premiere/Sky Anytime A, Sky Movies Premiere +1/Sky Anytime B,
Sky Movies Crime & Thriller, Sky Movies Drama & Romance, Sky Movies 007, British Eurosport HD
Fox UK HD, Sky Arts 2 HD, British Eurosport 2 HD
Sky Atlantic HD UK +1, Sky Movies Family HD, Sky Movies Premiere HD, Sky Movies Crime & Thriller HD
Sky Movies Select HD, Universal Channel UK, Sky On Demand HD 3
Dave UK HD, Alibi HD, E! UK HD, Sky 3DTV, Sky Arts 1, Sky News HD


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## canoeman

Maybe a rush for people signing up for Sky I'd wait till all moves done and true results are known, and remember Sky sign up must be done totally as if your a UK Resident,* if Sky know your not *they will refuse or cancel service


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## siobhanwf

[BBC MOVE IS TONIGHT
The planned BBC channel migration will be around 2am. (The so-called "BBC Switch-Off")
It will, most likely, be as big an event for British expats since the move to Astra 2D.
In 2003, the BBC freed itself from Sky's encryption contract. It began to broadcast free to air, with a much tighter Astra 2D footprint, badly affecting viewers in Spain. The removal of Sky's encryption reportedly saved the BBC £85 million. The BBC, along with other UK broadcasters, has repeatedly stated its intention to retrict the overspill of satellite signals into mainland Europe.

FEB
5SES Astra fleet map, predicted for 2015 ASTRA 1N BEING CLEARED, CHANNELS MOVE TO ASTRA 2A
Further changes in satellite transmissions to the UK were made last night. In preparation for the move of Astra 1N to its permanent home, serving mainland Europe's TV networks at 19.2º east. Some channels were moved to the ageing Astra 2A in the small hours of the morning. Beneficiaries are areas such as The Canaries and north Africa, which could not receive the 1N Pan-european beam. Channels which can now be received in these areas include: Sky Sports 1 and 3, Sky Sports 3 HD, Sky Arts 2 HD, Sky Sports 2 Ireland, History Channel, At The Races, Sky News, Cartoon Network HD, Disney Channel HD, TCM HD, Film Four HD
More reception reports: Astra 2E's Pan european beam cannot be received in Ukraine, but is OK in southern Finland.
Astra 2A is likely to stay in place until Astra 2G goes into service mid-year. Astra 1N will close at 28.2 east. Astra 2A will remain at 28.2º east. By 2015, it will be joined by Astra 2C.
Astra 2D, which is dark and mothballed, is still nearby at 27.9º east, possibly intended as a backup should disaster stike. SES Astra will have five satellites in place at 28.2º by 2015. Astra 2B is scheduled to move to 19.2º east by the same year. (see right, above


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## jellybean

I knew nothing of this so was mortified to find I had no BBC when I switched on this morning. Apparently we'll be losing the ITV channels tonight too. Is getting a SKY box the only alternative? Has anyone tried NET TV?


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## travelling-man

Jellybean

Noo-one yet knows what channels (if any) will be viewable in what areas so the best thing you can do is wait and see. 

In the meantime, MEO have some packages with some English language channels and there's also filmon.com if you have a half decent internet connection.


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## jellybean

travelling-man said:


> Jellybean
> 
> Noo-one yet knows what channels (if any) will be viewable in what areas so the best thing you can do is wait and see.
> 
> In the meantime, MEO have some packages with some English language channels and there's also filmon.com if you have a half decent internet connection.


Great, thanks, I'll check those both out. I'll also share any other options I find out about, if any....

The only thing saving my sanity during this terrble weather was decent tv, but now....


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## jellybean

travelling-man said:


> Jellybean
> 
> Noo-one yet knows what channels (if any) will be viewable in what areas so the best thing you can do is wait and see.
> 
> In the meantime, MEO have some packages with some English language channels and there's also filmon.com if you have a half decent internet connection.


Gosh, Film ON is brilliant - and FREE too! Can't believe I didn't know about this before. Seems to good to be true. Is there a catch? Is it all above board?


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## travelling-man

Filmon is completely free & legit as far as I know & FWIW, I've been using it for about 2 years without any problems. 

I know what you mean about the weather...... this rain is driving me nuts!


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## canoeman

Yes it's free unless you opt for the paid service which gives you HD, above board? yes and no recent UK court case on similar service referred to ECJ was ruled illegal so make the most of it.

At the moment wait and see especially as Sky has made no announcement as yet on which beam they will continue transmitting on until they do it's pointless signing up for a service that might be temporary


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## jellybean

Ah ok, thanks. Of course the people who are really in trouble are those who made a living installing satellite TV for us expats. Must be looking for other jobs.... :-/


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## canoeman

Or other ways of supplying service, looks as if for a lot of Portugal internet will be option with a UK VPN


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## MrBife

jellybean said:


> Ah ok, thanks. Of course the people who are really in trouble are those who made a living installing satellite TV for us expats. Must be looking for other jobs.... :-/


Not really as Sky signal is even stronger after the new Satellite move and looks like it will continue. Broadband via Satellite is a cheaper option than ever and will be needed if the phone base system clogs up with folks watching East Enders via Filmon.

Looks like there are some alternative Satellite options on the horizon and if a million or so people lobby BBC and offer to pay a 'European TV Licence Fee' for watching BBC outside the UK then it would certainly pay for what would be for them a simple move from a spot beam transponder to a wide beam transponder.


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## jellybean

MrBife said:


> Not really as Sky signal is even stronger after the new Satellite move and looks like it will continue. Broadband via Satellite is a cheaper option than ever and will be needed if the phone base system clogs up with folks watching East Enders via Filmon.
> 
> Looks like there are some alternative Satellite options on the horizon and if a million or so people lobby BBC and offer to pay a 'European TV Licence Fee' for watching BBC outside the UK then it would certainly pay for what would be for them a simple move from a spot beam transponder to a wide beam transponder.


Except I thought you couldn't get Sky legitimately outside the UK yet? So until that changes and/or the alternative satellite options become available, there are currently no 'above board' ways to get UK satellite tv.


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## canoeman

Interesting what you say about Sky as others are saying they've lost that as well, don't see it's up to Beeb as they have to operate within Charter and charter doesn't give them that option, the major issues they'd need to resolve is copyright which legally restricts all the broadcasters from transmitting to Europe, Beeb are in process of offering at a price via Iplayer to archive TV.

Any lobbying would need to be directed at HM Gov and can't see any likely success with that avenue


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## canoeman

jellybean said:


> Except I thought you couldn't get Sky legitimately outside the UK yet? So until that changes and/or the alternative satellite options become available, there are currently no 'above board' ways to get UK satellite tv.


There weren't any above board options before for us and most of southern Europe it was only possible to get UK TV because the footprint was so big so we could pick up UK signals, it was and never has been legal just possible which is why any Sky contract for UK or Ireland must be UK or Irish based as should Sky find out your not there will and must disconnect you.
New technology means far better beam control improving service to UK but at our detriment


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## jellybean

canoeman said:


> There weren't any above board options before for us and most of southern Europe it was only possible to get UK TV because the footprint was so big so we could pick up UK signals, it was and never has been legal just possible which is why any Sky contract for UK or Ireland must be UK or Irish based as should Sky find out your not there will and must disconnect you.
> New technology means far better beam control improving service to UK but at our detriment


Hopefully this investigation will result in better options for all of us :fingerscrossed:

EU investigates restrictions affecting cross border provision of pay TV services - The Portugal News


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## canoeman

Don't see that it will help in anyway as regarding general TV broadcasting this EU investigation is aimed at the major US film/TV programmes and studios which only form a small part of output of any broadcaster


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## siobhanwf

*ITV to go too!!!*

Additional information 
received shortly before going to press said ITV and Channel 4 will be lost during the course of this Friday, 7 February.

Bye bye BBC - The Portugal News


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## robc

jellybean said:


> Except I thought you couldn't get Sky legitimately outside the UK yet? So until that changes and/or the alternative satellite options become available, there are currently no 'above board' ways to get UK satellite tv.


Not strictly true 

There is an "affiliate" company to Sky who do above board cards, boxes etc.

See here

Sky Cards | Buy Sky TV, Freesat Cards & HD Receivers | Watch UK TV Abroad

I am in no way associated with them, I will hang on a little while before purchasing as I think it is worthwhile letting the dust settle

HTH

Rob


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## canoeman

hardly an affiliate Rob quite a number of these companies offering same service across EU but certainly look like a Sky company, as you say dust needs to settle before signing up, as yet those with true Sky accounts don't seem to be reporting one way or the other


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## Verinia

Well if any of you are contemplating watching Portugese TV, I think the news programmes are quite good and Bem Vindos a Beiras, a lovely little Portugese soap has improved my Portugese no end, followed by Quem Quer Ser Milionario...great for repetition and general knowledge...and for entertainment on Sunday, Factor X, although it's nearly over. That and the odd box set keeps us quite happy, with The Archers omnibus on Sundays over the Internet...


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## jellybean

Verinia said:


> Well if any of you are contemplating watching Portugese TV, I think the news programmes are quite good and Bem Vindos a Beiras, a lovely little Portugese soap has improved my Portugese no end, followed by Quem Quer Ser Milionario...great for repetition and general knowledge...and for entertainment on Sunday, Factor X, although it's nearly over. That and the odd box set keeps us quite happy, with The Archers omnibus on Sundays over the Internet...


It's great that you have found shows you like to watch on Portuguese TV, but none of the programmes you mention are my cup of tea. But then I don't watch soaps or reality TV shows on British TV either. Portuguese soaps I think are particularly bad, low budget with the same terrible actors appearing in all of them.

Last year there was a series called Depois Do Adeus set in the 1970s when Portuguese families were expelled from Angola after independence and that was the best thing I've seen on Portuguese TV. The storyline was great, based on real historical events and even the 70s fashion was fab. Thankfully the whole series is available to watch again on the RTP website. I recommend it - but it might not be your cup of tea! We're all different 

Other than that, I think Portuguese TV is just a constant diet of football, cheap soaps/reality TV shows, boring analysis of the economic crisis and adverts.


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## Verinia

jellybean said:


> It's great that you have found shows you like to watch on Portuguese TV, but none of the programmes you mention are my cup of tea. But then I don't watch soaps or reality TV shows on British TV either. Portuguese soaps I think are particularly bad, low budget with the same terrible actors appearing in all of them.
> 
> I don't watch soaps in England either...but Beiras is very sweet and quite well acted, on the whole.A lot of the soaps are Brazilian and violent and full of angst so I don't watch those. I have seen some good history/ cultural programmes on RTP 2 as well. But we are learning Portugese and don't get to talk to Portugese people enough as we are retired and don't go out to work and have found that listening every night to the same programmes has made a huge difference to our progress in a very enjoyable way. We are trying radio too now, but that is more difficult.
> 
> I miss English TV, especially the dramas and wildlife programmes, but we get box sets for Christmas and birthdays which gets us by. We have so much media nowadays...it's not so much of a hardship. I do feel sorry for people with slow Internet connections though, which will be made even slower by everyone watching TV on the Internet. they have lost their telly and their Internet connection.


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## siobhanwf

well at present I am happy with the reception and choice of programes I am getting on FILMON. Fortunately we changed from Sapo for out IP about two years ago to TOOWAY SATELLITE (now EUROPASAT) It wasn`t cheap but it was better than PAying out for a link with SAPO/MEO where I reckon the engineer/tecH spent at least an hour a month trying to sort out the BAD reception I got and the amount of downtime we had

We also have ZON for a TV choice.


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## canoeman

Siobhán, that gives you a UK IP address so you can access all the UK broadcasters without a problem that would otherwise reguire a VPN your only issue is your download limits, keep away from HD


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## travelling-man

I've got the MEO phone internet & TV package that costs something in the region of €50 per month. 

We hardly use the MEO TV because there's not much of interest on it...... I think I can upgrade to a better TV package but haven't bothered because the language thing makes it too complicated for me to understand what I'd get for what money...... that said, Filmon gives me most of what I need & as long as I sign out of Skype before I try to watch Filmon, it's a reasonably viewable standard.


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## jellybean

FILMON is superb. I still can't believe it's free. The cynical side of me is convinced there must be a catch 

We're lucky that they show English/US dramas here in the original dialogue with Portuguese subtitles. Apparently in France and Spain the original English dialogue is dubbed over by French/Spanish actors! Imagine that - you couldn't even go to the cinema unless/until you were fluent in the language. Watching an English drama with Portuguese subtitles is a great way to improve your Portuguese vocabulary too. I actually sit there with a note book and write down new words & expressions.

Happy to report that my satellite is still receiving ITV and Channel 4, for now...


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## Verinia

We have Tooway as well, thanks to Siobhan's recommendation :0) and as Canoeman says the only issue is download capacity. Speeds are great for our little village at 12 MBs where you normally only get 3 mps at best. With 20 GB of capacity we get full use of the Internet at good speeds, but only manage about six to eight hours of media...ie TV or Radio a month, so limited to the weekends really. We can access IPlayer etc as Canoeman says. We pay 45 pounds a month but have just upgraded to get a 10 GB more capacity for an extra five pounds (the guests stretch it a bit lol :0) ) Ypu can get unlimited download for 100 pounds, so in theory with Filmon and that we could have live TV all the time, which is not bad considering we live far from any fibre optic doodaas. We plug our laptop into our telly and away we go...plug the laptop into the speakers and voila....surround sound cinema!


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## lucy1

*HDMI cable*

Hi,

Can anyone please advise me on where I can purchase an HDMI cable in the Almancil area. Althought we do not watch a great deal of TV we now realise it is almost all BBC. I tried Faro yesterday and the large shop was sold out. The man said they had sold lots this week to expats because of the BBC move. 

Have tried filmon and it is working perfectly so thanks to whoever gave that tip. As to the terrible rain…


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## canoeman

Any of the Chinese shops sell them, supermarkets etc etc


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## travelling-man

Lucy

As CM says, many of the Chinese shops sell them but if you can't get one locally, you can look on Amazon.co.uk or ebay....... quality of the product will probably be better from the online sources.


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