Free to view satellite on the boat

jimg

jimg

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I want to view the "free" satellite channels on the boat, but not spend a huge fortune doing so.
What digi-box and dish are suitable for a boat at a sensible price? I realise I will have to be moored to align the dish, but that is not a problem.
Any tips or pitfalls to be avoided would be handy as well.
Cheers
Jimg
 
I bought a Kerstan dish from Towsure as recomended on this site and a Sky freeview box for about £200 total. No subscription.

Just come back from 2 weeks in Brittany and it worked very well. Great to keep up with the news especially as it has been moving so fast recently.

Watch where you berth though. The satellite needs to be angled around 150 degrees. Make sure you do not have a line of masts in the way otherwise you will not get a signal. According to the bumf it will work down as far as southern spain.
 
We picked up a Camping FreeView Sat set from Aldi recently for £69

This includes
Case
12v (and mains) digi box
foldaway dish
suction mounts
clamps
cable
screwdriver
compass

- everything you need

We get an excellent picture - used it troughout our trip on South Wales.

Note this particular reciever only recieves Free-to-air channels - it does not have a slot for a sky card and so you cannot recieve ITV or Ch4

BBC is fine - and loads of other free channels.

I plan to try our old sky box and maybe buy a "FreeSat" card for approx £20 which shold then get alll the ITV and Ch 4 channels

We have used it in the Marina - with the dish on the flybridge under the cover with no problems

Check if any local Aldi's have any left - at £69 its a good buy.

Jools
 
Agree with comments on FTA kit; Lidl have the kits as well as Aldi, but make sure that you won't miss ITV etc.

I early bought such a kit but got fed up waiting for Lidl to do their offer and did my own thing instead - I'm glad I did so.

I bought:-
Pace DS430N receiver AND FTV card from http://www.simplydigital.co.uk/acatalog/Sky_Digital_Receivers.html for £99
A LED strength meter from Maxview for £18
A Triax 40cm. dish plus lnb locally (had to blag a bit) £30 all in I think

Notes
The Pace is small and light, but more importantly consumes very little power.

The LED indicator is more effective than the analogue meter 'cos it screams at you and is easier to "peak" the signal. It's not very easy to do without one of these devices as the strength indicator on the Pace is slow to respond. Once I know where 28deg E is it takes 15 seconds to peak the signal. Using terrestrial FTV always took at least 5 minutes and the aerial was bulky.

I prefer the Triax dish as the LNB arm folds making storage easier. If that's not an issue then Simply will sell you a Sky standard dish (?£25).

I have heard adverse comments about the portable kits elsewhere, they don't seem to be very reliable.
 
Check out chichester caravans - I got a very light and small one runs on 12v - about 70quid.

had it about a year now and its worked faultlessly
 
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