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Please don't email me to ask "what size dish do I need?" If the answer isn't here, it's because I don't know. The BBC stopped scrambling its satellite broadcasts in mid July 2003. ITV stopped scrambling in 2007. CH4 stopped scrambling in 2008 but if you use a Sky Digibox you must still use a card to view this channel or else tune it using the "Add Channels" menu. You can receive BBC and ITV programmes without a card (even with a non-Sky Digibox if you wish) provided that you are within the footprint of Astra 2D. Channel Five is due to unscramble very soon. I've had a lot of questions about this so I've tried to address the main ones here. 1. What do I need to do to continue to receive the BBC channels? Nothing if you live in the UK (*but see exception below). The BBC channels use the Astra 2D satellite, whose footprint you can see on this page: Click HERE for a footprint map of Astra 2D The main footprint is very small, covering the UK, Ireland, Iceland and Northern Europe. Astra 2D is one of the Astra "Sky Digital" satellites at 28.2'E. Click HERE for a footprint map of Germany. *Exception: Some people even in the UK are getting no signal or picture break-up on BBC channels since the change. This is caused by two main factors: a. If you are using a Panasonic TU-DSB20, 30, 31, 35 or 40 Sky Digibox, it's probably not compatible with the LNB. The result is that sometimes you would have to change up and down channels to get a picture on ITV. Or you may have had to unscrew the LNB cable then reconnect it. Now it's even worse with BBC. The cure is to fit our Panafix2D Filter. b. Your dish and/or LNB are not correctly aligned. In this case you may find that simply slackening the LNB clamp bolt(s) and twisting the LNB a *tiny* fraction of a degree. It will be easier if you enter the parameters in the Manual Tuning menu and look at the signal reading on the TV screen. Press [setup] 4 0 1 [select]. You may also find that your dish is not accurately aligned for the BBC channels. Note that the horizontally polarised channels tend to be more difficult to receive than the vertical. 2. Will this affect the BBC radio stations broadcast from Astra? Yes. ALL of the BBC programmes (except BBC Prime) moved to Astra 2D. Note: Radios 2 & 4 have been moved back to the south beam for the benefit of expats. 3. What do I need to do to receive ITV, CH4, C5 ? A Free To Air digital receiver or a Sky Digibox. However, if you are outside the Astra-2D footprint area, you will need a Sky Digibox and a "FreesatFromSky" card because only the "Free To View" (encrypted) version will be receivable. 4. Will I receive the BBC channels in southern Ireland? Yes. Eire is well within the satellite footprint and I don't see how anyone can stop you. 5. I'm in Europe and I can't receive ITV / BBC. Will your special LNB solve my problem? Our Invacom quad-output LNB is the best we have found so far. Note that most modern "low noise" LNBs can't compete with this as they seem to be designed to favour high-band rather than low-band frequencies. http://www.satcure.co.uk/accs/page1.htm However, this LNB is not guaranteed to get you ITV/BBC. I repeat that it is simply the best LNB we've tested in southern Spain so far. It even beat the "Syntec 2000" and "Invacom" single-output LNBs by a small margin. 6. A "C120 flange". What does it mean? It is designed to fit on an existing dish which has a suitable feed horn with a matching flange. If you don't already have such a dish, we can't help. We can't get feed horns or dishes fitted with feed horns. (Nor can we get most spare parts for dishes). 7. I can't receive BBC/ITV in Europe. What dish do you recommend? I'm very reluctant to recommend any dish because the "footprint" might suggest one size but in practice you need a different size. If you are south of Barcelona or Milan in Italy you will be struggling to receive ITV or BBC with any dish, although people have had some success with quite large (and expensive) dishes. However, some local regions are "hot spots" where people have found the signal to be stronger than expected (e.g. Gibraltar and southern coast of Spain). So the best advice I can give is to ask people who live close to you. If they can receive BBC/ITV, copy their system in every detail. Try to use the same make and model dish, LNB and receiver. Never mind what I sell - if theirs works, copy it! (and please give me the full details so I can advise others). As a general rule, the bigger the dish the better - and a solid dish tends to work better than a perforated or "mesh" dish. And for goodness sake don't buy one of those "bargain" C-Band dishes because the mesh is so wide that it lets the Ku band signals pass right through. (One guy covered his with aluminium foil - with very limited success). More about dishes on this page. Here's a list of suggested dish sizes for Astra 2D reception: 8. I can't receive ITV in Europe. What receiver do you recommend? In the Sky Digibox range the receivers that work best (listed in order of tuner selectivity) are: * This model increasingly has firmware-related and other problems. § These models have power supply problems which are easily fixed with our capacitor kits. New models are available: Other Sky Digiboxes MAY work in fringe reception areas but less well. Digiboxes that use a "ZIF" (zero intermediate frequency) tuner are very poor. See ZIF tuner picture on this page: http://www.satcure.co.uk/accs/page12.htm You might want to use a FTA receiver in combination with your Sky Digibox. In that case you can "loop it through" if the FTA receiver has that facility. Alternatively, you can fit a twin-output LNB to your dish. 9. If I get a FTA receiver, will I still get the Sky EPG and interactive services? No. Nearly all will work with the search and scan EPG, but probably not with the main EPG. Interactive services will not be available as these rely on the Sky software. Of course the GOOD news is that you'll no longer see the "red spot" if you use a non-Sky Digital receiver! Update: You can now buy a BBC/ITV "Freesat" receiver which has its own EPG. We have no information about fringe reception yet. 10. Why can't I receive BBC programmes? Either your dish and LNB have not been aligned accurately or the dish is simply too small to receive the BBC programmes from Astra 2D. (If you can receive ITV then your dish is probably OK). DO THIS! First thing to do is to set the missing transponder parameters in the "Manual Tuning" menu. The "signal quality" might drop to zero - ignore that. Now twist the LNB (without moving the dish) until you get maximum signal reading on the screen (obviously you have to put a portable TV in visual range). Retighten the LNB clamp. Now gently push the LNB arm up, down, left, right by just a fraction. If it makes the signal go higher then slacken the dish bolts and move the dish in that direction. We are talking a millimetre or so just to get that final adjustment! If that doesn't get you the missing transponder, a bigger dish, better receiver and possibly our MTI 0.6 dB LNB is the answer. Press [Services 401 select] to access the Sky Digibox "Manual Tuning" menu. If your BBC1 region on EPG 101 is wrong, access your BBC1 region on EPG 941 to 958. If 103 is the wrong region, program the region you need into your "Add Channels" and and access it via your "Other Channels" menu. All are SR 22.0 and FEC 5/6. Select the frequency from the list, below, or program all three if you wish. The Sky "minidish" is made by several manufacturers and is roughly 45 cm wide. (The wider a dish is, the less interference it will receive from adjacent satellites.) A larger minidish (about 55 x 75 cm) is used for northern England and Scotland where the signal (from the Astra satellites at 28.2 degrees East of true south) is weaker than in southern England. Several Astra satellites are clustered in space at the same position (within one kilometre of each other but around 22,000 miles from earth). Each satellite has a number of transmitters or "transponders" which give slightly different "beams", resulting in different "footprints" on Earth. In England, a strong signal is received from all of these transponders but, outside England, the signal becomes progressively weaker as you get further away. In some fringe areas, it's not possible to receive signals from EVERY transponder without using a larger dish. It's possible to receive signals from more than one satellite position. For example, you might want to switch between Astra at 28.2'E to Astra at 19.2'E or "Hot Bird" at 13'E. The simplest way to achieve this is to put a bracket on your dish and add an extra LNB. This can be positioned to receive the reflected signal from a different satellite position. However, the more offset the LNB is from the true focal point (where the main LNB is) the weaker the signal will be. To compensate for this, it's advisable to select a larger dish than would normally be required if only one LNB were fitted. The Sky minidish is too small to use a second LNB and no brackets are available. So it's usual to buy a 60 cm dish or larger - normally 80 cm - with an LNB bracket that allows an extra LNB to be fitted. Lots of customers ask me to specify a suitable dish size If they want to receive Sky Digital in the south of Scotland, then a 45 cm "minidish" will just about do, provided that they don't mind losing the signal in bad weather. However, in the north of Scotland they might need a MUCH larger dish - larger still if they want to avoid "rain fade". In most of England, Wales and France, a "minidish" is OK - just about. So I really can't answer such questions and, even if you give me full information, I'd still have to look at the published satellite "footprints" - which you can do just as easily as I can! To look up dish sizes click on this link: http://www.lyngsat.com/28east.shtml This page lists satellites and programmes from the Astra satellites at 28.2'E The page shows recommended dish sizes but bear in mind that they may not be correct for your specific location as there are "hot spots" and "cold spots" in signal strength. For example, you may receive programmes from Astra 2D in Rome with a suitable 1.4m dish, LNB and receiver *if you get the combination right*. For Sky Digital you can read my book "Installing Sky Digital TV" which holds 100 pages of hints and tips from professional installers, as well as pages and pages of reports from Sky Digital viewers as far away as Africa. Read what they have to say about dish types, sizes and LNBs then make up your own mind. If you can afford to, always err on the large side and remember that the type of LNB, receiver and cable (and cable length) can all make a big difference to the results. Remember, too, that a solid dish invariably gives better results than a perforated ("mesh") dish. Sky Digital in Spain (and southern Europe) Salvador Ferrairo Castella spent weeks carrying out tests with various LNBs and dishes. This book is a report of his findings. What size of dish and which LNB works best and why? Complete with photographs including the dishes, LNBs, the ground station where he did the work and the equipment that he used to analyse the signals. Computer plots showing the differences between transponder spectra. This book is full of technical information but Salvador writes in impeccable English with a style that makes the book easy and interesting to read. You can feel his excitement as he reports on his findings! Absolutely invaluable for any expat in southern Europe. Companion eBook to the eBook below. Which LNB? According to Salvador (see "Spain" book above) the best LNB is the Invacom quad-output. For weak signal areas, The Pace BSKYB2600 (DS430N), the Pace "Javelin" Minibox, the obsolete Panasonic TU-DSB30 or TU-DSB20 or the Grundig GDS200/2 (or later model) are the best as the tuner selectivity is good, in that order. This phrase "tuner selectivity" means that the tuner can winkle out a weak signal even when very strong signals are present (as in the case of the weak Astra 2D signal and the strong southern beam in southern Europe). Note that good selectivity does not necessarily mean "sensitivity". Indeed a "sensitive" tuner might be suffer overload from the strong signal produced by a large dish. It's likely that some non-Sky Digital Receivers will perform even better than the Sky Digiboxes mentioned above. This is an important point since the BBC channels became Free to Air. In that case you may wish to add a FTA receiver to your system and use that for BBC and maybe ITV if that goes Free To Air some time later (possibly end of 2004). To do that, you'll either need to choose a receiver with LNB loop-through (uses the same LNB) or else change your LNB to a twin-output version that will let you use two receivers simultaneously. Will an amplifier improve my signal/picture? This question is answered in our book "Installing Sky Digital TV". Briefly, if you are using more than 40 metres of the correct double-shielded cable, an amplifier may help. If your signal is no better when connected to your dish with less than 40 metres of cable, then an in-line amplifier will not help. The amplifier will give no benefit as it amplifies only what is there - signal plus noise. If you want to receive programmes from other satellites then please look at the relevant footprints and see the recommended minimum dish size for your location. If you plan to use two or more LNBs on the same dish then you'll need to use a larger dish. All of the "universal" LNBs that we stock are suitable for the relevant dishes that we supply. There are three basic fittings called "40 mm neck", "C120 flange" and "Sky minidish spigot". Some other variants exist but we don't stock them. If you want to "mix and match" then please make sure that what you buy is compatible. If you buy an LNB from us to fit a dish you got elsewhere, then we can't advise. However, all of our LNBs should work fine if the clamp fitting is correct. Our C120 flange LNBs are suitable for use with "prime focus" dishes and "offset focus" dishes that are supplied with a suitable "C120 feed horn". Sunburn During the months of March and October, the sun goes directly behind Astra 28.2'E This can have two effects: Here's a useful site that gives you dish sizes: http://www.satmania.com/eng/satchannels Here's a site that keep you up to date with Astra 2D news: Watch BBC and ITV in Europe
BBC region, ITV region incorrect?
Dish Sizes
To find the dish size, look in the column entitled "Beam" and click on the satellite number (e.g. "2D") 
Which Receiver?
