ScotsAhoy

I've been experimenting with various solutions to get UK tv in Canada for a while now (a problem which brings out the geek in me) and just thought it'd be nice to pass on some useful info I've found for others keen to view the same!

Firstly, although he's on the other side of the World, I 100% recommend this guys thorough and easy to understand post which gives you all the basics and introduces you to the wonderful concept of 'VPN', decoding, etc..

http://www.thatstheplan.com/?page_id=211

I took his advice and ran with it, trying lots of VPN services. Of which, Consult-Here.com ( http://www.consult-here.com/vpn.html ) is by far the best I've tried and is unbelievably quick for BBC iPlayer and better than others on 4oD as well. Some of the VPN services are pretty slow and make downloading a 4-day event per program! Consult Here, who I'm with now, downloaded 5 episodes of Top Gear in about half an hour.. ok, so not everyone is going to miss Jeremy Clarkson that much but you get my drift.

So hopefully that'll get you started and win some brownie points with your other half's (I started investigating after severe pressure from mine)..

neill

Look up also "UK Proxy sever" for other services, most of them you have to pay for (still cheaper than license fee!!).

This is one way to get your computer in Canada to appear to be in the UK.

The other way is to use a device called a SlingBox if you have relatives in the UK with a broadband connection. Then you can connect to their digibox and basically browse all the Freeview channels. The quality is dependent on their upstream bandwidth (Their PC's broadband "Upload" speed).

Stuart8472

Scots - bringing TV to the masses since 1926.

Biiiiink

Except themselves

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7scMC7YSDQ

Stuart8472

Damn it, cant get on youtube at work!!

Could it be argued that we also gave the world the internet? In a roundabout sort of way?

dbd33

Perhaps, if Al Gore drinks Scotch.

Brownstar

This has been covered many times............my personal fav solution is to Torrrent things and then burn onto a DVD, then watch it on the TV. Pretty much everything can be gotten for free and if you sign up to UKNova then is also fairly legal.

Yes BBC iPlayer can get mde to work but you are then restricted to BBC programs and watching on the PC, unless you hook it up to a TV.

PaulandNikki

Cobblers I'm afraid, it's still 100% illegal but don't let that stop you

Posidrive

UK Nova may strictly be illegal but because they do not allow any content that is commercially available on DVD, etc you would have to be really unlucky to fall foul of the copyright police.

Brownstar

Exactly, its a grey area as they don't allow anything you can buy..........its about as legal as a Slingbox

PaulandNikki

Well, technically, it's not illegal to download or share copyrighted material in Canada so I wouldn't worry too much either way.

kidmeup

i was lead to believe it was fine in canada to download but not to upload.

sasktel dont give a monkeys what you do anyway and i have no bandwidth limit or even a fair usage policy to contend with.
now thats cool

PaulandNikki

Nope, the judge ruled that making it available was no more illegal than downloading

http://news.cnet.com/2100-1027_3-5182641.html

Brownstar

I'm not too worried about the legality of it, but there is always that like tug in the back of your mind. But its out weighed by the fact that I can build up complete series of programs and keep them to watch when I want.

wizzard

What I have found quite handy is that the Play Station 3 has built in wireless and Windows Media Player 11 is also a media server that the playstation can detect automatically which means if you add to your windows media player library all the videos (e.g downloaded episodes of Dr Who) or music and photographs etc. you can either stream them (if you have a good bandwith wirless network) or copy them to the PS3 hard drive and then watch em on the old big screen TV. If you have a big HD screen it is pretty impressive for viewing high resolution photographs.