Brianandmaria

We have bought a house in Emilia Romagna (close to Forli) and will be relocating just as soon as we have sold the UK property - not the easiest thing to do right now

In the meanwhile we are moving quickly up th learning curve and have just had excellent advice on pet relocation and car insurance, thanks to all

Can we now ask for further help regarding TV? In UK we have cable so no knowledge about technical jargon and decoders : Is FREESAT receivable in the Forli area and if so should I bring the Freesat box from the UK or buy local? If Freesat is not receivable how do we get mainstream BBC/ITV channels -we don't want to go Sky (and please remember our jargon shortcomings).

Patty

Hi again
Now I am one of the most technically ignorant people on the planet - so in real idiot terms this is my input ....I have a box and a dish. It was bought in the local hypermarket - its called Freeview - hubby set it up, fiddled with it and generally mumbled for a few days but then ....whey hey we got all the BBC channels and all the itv and lots more. You will realise when you get here that italian tv is probably in the top 3 of Europe for " Worst TV Awards"
The whole set (dish and box etc) cost about 70€ - so not bad.

ps: I can even get Channel 5 much to my mothers disgust - she's in the Channel Islands and can't get it at all !!! (not that she's missing much I think )

chris120

Patty, can you give us more info on your freeview box so that i can try to buy one

barb14

if you look thru some of the back listings you will find lots of info on bringing sky boxes etc over and setting them up.

I have just brought a place in emilia romagna/ lombady area too

Brianandmaria

Thanks Patty

It seems that with the right equipment we should be able to catch the Beeb etc in Forli. I do think you're being a tad over generous rating Italian TV as high as you do, unless I've only ever caught it on bad nights of course

chris120

I know but they are all illegal (Right?). Patty infers that she has bought something locally in Turin and gets BBC & ITV (Not Sky) on that.

Patty

We bought the set at Carrefour. It was a make called Metronics and had a digital box receiver and a 80cm dish. On the box it says 'freeview - no abbonamento' This set lasted about 4 years and recently the 'box' died - so we just bought another one that was on offer at LIDL for 39€. The dish was fine though.
Hubby is away at the mo so I'll try and remember what he did
He set up the dish to point at Astra 28.2 SE (i think there are markers on the dish thingy ) Then he spent a few days with the remote control thingy picking up the channels. But I'm sure all of you will know what to do - I'm just appallingly bad at anything technical. As I say - you can get all the BBC and ITV and Ch4 and Ch5 and other interesting channels like the Travel Channel and music and all sorts.
The only trouble I have is when there is a storm - sometimes the signal goes for a day or 2 - but apart from that its great

duffer

Well you won't go to prison for having UK Sky in Italy. Your contract will be for a service in the UK so if Sky find out you are not in the UK they will terminate the contract.

barb14

I think the gist of it was you bring your sky box and card which would be registered in UK, if you just want the freeview channels fit a dish, point in right direction, you can use the signal strength on the sky dish to help, and awya you go, if you want more channels you would need to have an address in the uk you can register it from.

Seems to work well enough for friends

duffer

The free channels are not encrypted therefore you do not require any special decoder - best to buy one in the local country to benefit from local warranty support.

If you want to benefit from the Electronic Program Guide (EPG) of Freesat so that you can remind, record and series link programs then it's best to get the Freesat digibox with harddrive from the UK. Go one further and get the HD version if your TV is HD ready.

barb14

thanks for that info, so a freeview + box with dish with work ok in Northern Italy?

duffer

Yeah something like this -
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=227490
The Humax models are very good.
Again, get your dish and LNB here in Italy making sure the size is sufficient for good reception. Anyway from 80 to 120cm depending on the region. You will need 2 cables running from the dish as the decoder has twin tuners so you can record and watch different channels.

chris120

duffer, what size dish do you think i'd need in Rome?

duffer

It depends on the combination of dish size and on the quality of the receiver and the LNB.

The Humax and Pace digiboxes have a lower threshold for quality therefore you'd still get a picture when the signal is weak whereas if you had an Amstrad or Thomson perhaps you wouldn't get anything but snow.

The Invacom quad LNB is very good at picking up weak signals or getting reception when living in a fringe area but maybe Rome is slightly outside the footprint of Astra 2D.

I am thinking you would need something like a 2.4m to get the Beeb. But this is not precise, e.g. 1.6m or 3m might be needed. You would really need to contact some installers that have real experience of Astra 2D or email some hotels that have Sky UK.

80cm might be enough for Sky channels exc. the freeview ones.

Mr Posh

Hello Brianandmaria where abouts near Forli we live in Cesena..