Hi

I am a complete novice on this so bear with me!

I have brought my Sky+ box across, I have a house in the UK so it is registered there.

In Switzerland (Villars) the house we have just moved into has two sizable dishes facing south.

What do I need to to to get a signal, as attaching the existing cable has no effect.

From reading a couple of threads it seems I need a 'dual LNB' for the Sky+ box and to point the dish at Astra 2D? Is this right? furthermore...

a) where can I get a dual LNB from (and what does LNB stand for anyway?)
b) I have teenage kids and therefore have another sky+ box (for the cell I try and keep them in), so am I better getting a 'quad LNB'
c) How do i point it at Astra 2D?

As you can see I need help!


We moved in over a week ago and are here for the long haul, any help is appreciated.

Chrisknms

You can get dual or quad LNBs in Media Markt or most electronics shops. Get the lowest 'LNF' figure that you can find, preferably 0.2 or 0.3 dB

Your dish(es) will have to be pointing at the Astra 2D satellite. In Zuerich that means a bearing of 150 and an elevation of 30 degrees. Maybe slightly different in Villars as it's more westerly and southerly. You should also experiment with the skew (amount of rotation) on the LNB to get a better signal.

Either use 2x dishes with a dual LNB each or put a quad onto a single dish. If you can get a better dual LNB than the quad (lower LNF figure), then maybe better to go the 2x dishes route. Also, the dishes should really be about 80cm or more for best reception of the BBC and ITV channels.


Then just plug in the Sky+ box(es). Did you activate the cards with them before you came to Switzerland? If not, you'll have to phone Sky and ask for them to be activated. Use caller line blocking, or better still a UK mobile roaming, and DON'T TELL THEM YOU ARE IN SWITZERLAND. Have your card number and box details ready (from the setup screen).

Give it an hour or four for the boxes to become active.

If they were already activated in the UK, it's possible that the cards have become inactive and you'll need to keep them connected for a day or two to reactivate.

Even without activated cards, you should be able to view the BBC and ITV channels.


Gav

I'd hazard a guess that the dishes are pointing at 19 east and 13 east and thus pretty much will offer you nothing when connected to Sky+.

I would recommend at least 80cm for a dish; you do benefit from being further west than we are here but 80cm or more should get ALL channels and in MOST weather conditions.

An LNB - Low Noise Block. It's the thing at the end of the arm on the dish. Quad-LNB is your best solution as you can then connect 2 x Sky+ to the same dish; makes sense to me...!

How do you feel about putting up your own dish? If you don't fancy it, there are companies who will do it for you.

You might have issues with a second Sky+ box; certainly you have to pay full-whack for the box and subscription....I'd actually look at having a second box purely for the FTA stuff like BBC and ITV - otherwise you're overly-complicating your solution.

For dish+LNB....try Media Markt, pop into France and see what they have there too - or mail-order www.satshop.ch

I don't know any installers in your area but there are some in Zurich - but they will charge for the hours on the road.

As Gav said, you're likely to need a bearing of 152 on your compass and you should be around the same as us for elevation (32 degrees). One of the links in my signature has a page with hints and information and further links for self-installation....

Hello everyone

I am wondering, if I can get Skyplus here in Zurich. Someone got it and has an idea, how to get it in Switzerland? Thank you for every hint!
Good night ;-)

Roman

you can use Germansky or skycards.net or another "handler". Sky+ works perfectly here and most satellite installers will have a good idea.

Thank you!!! Skycards.net it will be then
Cheers,
Roman

Before you buy a box and sign up to a year's subscription, make sure you have somewhere you can put the dish. Either the landlord's permission to put one on the building, or for example in my case, a south-facing balcony. Otherwise you could find yourself stuck paying even when you can't view it.

A related thought; Lob - if you ring up Sky and tell them you're in Switzerland i know they cancel your card. But do they actually stop charging you too? Probably a stupid question...

I would say that if you call Sky and they cut you off, still ensure that your DD mandate is cancelled.

Is there something you want to share with us, Dan?

I've run this Sky+ thread into another as it has useful additional information and would read somewhat "well" together.

Do note that there is another longer Sky+ thread here which may also offer decent information.

Sky Sky+ SkyPlus satellite TV UK BBC ITV Eastenders Corrie Channel4 five CSI

Just something from another conversation; wondering about the logistics of making a quick exit from Switzerland

Lob: Maybe we should write a Sky outside UK FAQ

From what I can read in several forums, Sky will not activate a sub on Sky+ and HD unless they get a callback fiirst. You could always try, but chances seem to be very low.

The best and safest thing is to actiavate it in the UK. It doesn't matter what caller ID it is activated from. If done, take box and card to Switzerland. As far I know all agents do it like this.

If you call them, the best is to use a VOIP service like sipgate. This will give you a UK number. Never admit that you are outside the UK.

Some people claim, that Sky is getting bitchy about the phone line, even on fullprice boxes. I personally doubt that. Even they should not there should be ~10% of the subs outside the UK. I don't think they want to loose that much money.

my Sky+ was activated with a phone call not a callback from the box. 3 years is a long time in this area; but I do hear that HD boxes are being installed successfully in Cyprus, etc

You were lucky back then.
Accodring to experienced installers in other forums Sky doesn't turn such cards on. So do it in the UK or use a digidialer. (Ofcourse its always worth a try)

If you call them, the best is to use a VOIP service like sipgate. This will give you a UK number. Never admit that you are outside the UK.

Lob - Can you tell me in broad terms, how to set up the sipgate Voip and connect it to a box.

to fiddle SIPGate, I googled "public proxy server" and tested a few of the proxies. I then gave myself a UK regional number and I think I used x-lite to use the number for the first time (using a UK proxy again).

Now I have a Linksys PAP2 device permanently connected to their SIP servers

I don't believe the codecs are in place to use a Sky+ modem over this connection - but I've never tried.

The other details I bunged onto the Swisswiki telephony article....

Sipgate should work without proxy.

I at least can connect with my 08x number.
This is at least better then calling from here and risking that they see +41

But as the staff is so "smart", you could maybe even say "Hello from Zurich!"

to allocate yourself a UK number, they do a *basic* check that your IP address is in the UK. This is the reason you need the proxy.