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All UK main channels are now free: Of the five UK terrestrial channels, all are now transmitting free-to-air (FTA) on the Astra 2 satellite. ‘Five’ finally went ‘free’ on the 18th November, so it’s now possible to receive all these main BBC and ITV stations on the sort of digital FTA satellite receivers that you may see in the French ‘brico’ shops. Times have changed since the days when you could only receive mainstream British TV through a Sky Digibox and all the associated subterfuge that was necessary to get hold of, including payment for such a viewing card. As John Sidwell of Bigdishsat writes, there are a lot of folk out there who don’t realise just how much British television they can receive without the need of a Sky Digibox and card. What is even more worrying is the number of people who still believe that they have to pay Sky in order to receive the BBC and ITV channels.

Now, unless you more specialised channels, you really don’t need the Sky Digibox anymore. For the record, if you have a Sky Digibox and the freesat-from-sky viewing card (often wrongly called the free-to-air card), then your viewing card is now only necessary to watch the following channels: Some ITV1 regional variations on channel 103: these include regional versions for Meridian Sussex, Thames Valley South, Anglia West, Yorkshire East, Tyne Tees South and Central South West. If your viewing card was issued to an address within the catchment area of those regions, then you still need the viewing card inserted in order to view them. All other ITV1 regions are free-to-air. No card is needed.

Five on 105:

There are two versions of Five transmitted from the Astra 2 satellite. The first is the one beamed to the whole of western Europe destined to be received by Sky Digiboxes (that transmission is encrypted). The second is the free-to-air version which is transmitted on the tightly focused UK beam of the satellite. It’s this latter beam which can be picked up on freesat and FTA boxes here in France.

Five US and Fiver:

These two Five siblings are still encrypted and so can only be received on a Sky Digibox with the necessary viewing card. Sky Three: again, this channel is not free-to-air. It is only available via a Sky Digibox with the necessary viewing card.

How to save some money:

We have been getting calls from people who have Sky subscriptions and have heard about the new Freesat system where the reception of UK domestic channels is free. Often, it transpires that the caller is paying for a Sky subscription which, in this present financial climate, can be ill-afforded. Some of those Sky subscriptions are being paid to satellite installers who provide and maintain highly dubious accommodation addresses and have recently elevated their ‘administration’ charges.

Even though my own company would love to take their order, we have to tell them that it’s absolutely not necessary to replace their Sky box and card with a new freesat or free-to-air receiver. All they have to do is cancel their Sky subscription. They will lose the pay channels like Sky One but retain the five main UK domestic channels along with all other free to air channels. We often suggest to callers that they should remove their viewing card from the digibox and see just how many channels they can still receive . If they are happy with what they get without a card, then why not cancel the subscription and save some money?

Recent Software Upgrade:

Has your Sky Digibox started to go into standby recently? That’s probably because Sky have started to issue a software upgrade which has introduced a new ‘Auto Standby’ feature. This is where the Sky Digibox will automatically switch itself off if it thinks you’ve fallen asleep while watching it. The feature has been added to the ‘Services’ menu as a new option and the default is set to ‘enabled’. To get rid of this feature, you just have to select ‘Auto Standby’ in the menu and switch it to ‘disable’.

This software upgrade caused problems to certain digiboxes and many of us experienced breaks in Radio transmissions and interactive services. It was some Pace digiboxes that reacted badly to this upgrade and Sky have withdrawn it and those boxes have reverted back to the previous software version. Once Sky have ironed out the bugs on Pace digiboxes, the Auto Standby feature will be downloaded again. Software upgrades like this are rolled out slowly according to the Version number of the Sky digibox, so not everyone has this feature added … yet.

Freesat Plus:

The new Freesat Plus service has started in the UK. This is the free-to-air version of Sky Plus HD which allows you to watch one channel while you record another, pause live television and record a TV or radio series automatically. Freesat Plus has a massive 320 Gb built in hard drive where you can record and store 200 hours of standard definition programmes or 60 hours of High Definition programmes.

Unlike SkyPlus, you don’t have to pay any subscription for this service. Once you’ve bought the box, you don’t pay a single penny to anybody. To get the full benefit of Freesat Plus, you are going to need a small modification to your satellite installation. The receiver needs two independent satellite feeds from the dish. That means fitting a Twin Output or Four Output LNB to the satellite dish, replacing the existing single output LNB. By fitting a four output LNB, the new Freesat Plus box will use two feeds while the old satellite receiver could be deployed into another room. It’s not absolutely essential to have two separate satellite feeds but there will be restrictions to the channels that you can watch and record at the same time if you don’t have them.

In France, with the one hour time difference, this product is going to make so much difference when the good stuff comes on in the UK and it’s time for bed in France. This is a genuinely long-awaited product and, unusually, we already have a waiting list. Even more unusually, I’m number one on that waiting list. If you would like to add your name, just drop us an email.

I should add that the Freesat+ receiver is extremely hard to get hold of at the moment. Only Humax is making this product and nearly everything they make is going to the large UK multiples like John Lewis, Comet and Argos. The fact that a complete lorry load of receivers was stolen near Northampton hasn't exactly helped the supply chain, especially to the independent satellite traders like ourselves.

French TV :

In this region of France (Limousin Dordogne border), it was planned that the French TNT service would be coming to the Limoges transmitter at Les Cars in December. Ditto the Pays-de-Gex and southern Alps region near Geneva, which, according to local sources, is still waiting for TNT. Les Cars was to be the last of the major transmitters to turn on TNT but, after many technical difficulties, the switch-over has been postponed to November 2011! There is a satellite equivalent to TNT called TNTSAT and we've been installing that for our French customers for quite a while. It uses the Astra 1 satellite and provides the 18 TNT channels without subscription. France2, France3, Arté and M6 start High Definition transmissions on TNTSAT in February next year.

John Sidwell, a satellite television specialist, runs Bigdishsat,  a French-registered company supplying satellite equipment aimed at the British and European community in France and Switzerland.