Lou71

Wrong, we pay for a UK TV licence at our UK address and pay for a full sky TV contract. Belgium, Dutch and French nationals in Iberia also watch their TV channels via a viewing card. We are not trying to get anything for nothing and always expect to pay for TV and everything else including healthcare. Nice try though.

BillBullock

What a stupid, ignorant comment. It's none of your business what people want to do, so keep your comments to yourself.

wellinever

Like you, I go back to UK for 3 months in the summer, and take out a license just for the 3 months. When we were able to get all channels a few years ago, again like you I simply paid for the whole year.
I guess they will be going PPV for some series they commission in future, then everyone will be able to stream, but payment will be necessary.
Its time the restrictive copyright rules were changed to cover maybe Europe (which still includes the UK)

liveaboard

I gave up on intelsat 901 a while ago and shifted my dish to a German satellite.
It's good for news channels; we get BBC news, German and French national channels in English, CNN, Al Jazeera, and a few more.
If anyone wants to know, I'll find the position number.

Still have MEO satellite but we never seem to watch that. The program names are all in Portuguese so it's hard to find things, and the box they provide will not time shift so it's not possible to wind back to the start of a movie like we could with the old copper line service that they discontinued.

I download entertainment and store it on a hard drive to watch when we like.

BillBullock

I've spent some time searching for the best alternative to Intelsat 901 and talked to a few professionals in the business. I could stick with BBC iPlayer and ITVx through a mini PC using Smartdns, and accept SD rather than HD quality video. The only other alternative seems to be to enrole with a legitimate IPTV company, like SOS UK TV, and pay an annual subscription plus an upfront cost of up to €250 for a new box, loaded with their software. They have a Silver Package for €180 per year which gives you the UK Freeview channels, including the HD ones. They are the only Internet TV provider on the Algarve to have a legal UK based server. Their server pays taxes in the UK for the rights to distribute this service. They have a 2 week catchup period, subtitles and recording facilities.
Has anyone else found any other options?

BillBullock

Further to my last post, I am not sure that any IPTV provider in the Algarve has a legal UK based server that pays for the rights to distribute UK TV services. Treat this claim from them with suspicion. Also, any IPTV provider that charges less than I quoted above should be treated with suspicion. Many have been prosecuted in recent years and closed down.

bicabica

If you just want a simple and not too techie solution, maybe temporary until you can find something better, and just want to replace the channels you have just lost then each of BBC, ITV, C4 and C5 can be found online for catchup and live viewing. You will need a VPN, such as NordVPN, to point you to the UK and for BBC i-player you need to confirm that you have a UK licence.

You can of course just watch these channels on your computer but a simple HDMI cable connected to your TV is the way to go. Add them as bookmarks in your browser to save having to search for them every time.

wellinever

I think we could be caught in the middle of an issue that will be resolved i the next decade, with the onset of EU Wide copyrights rather than on country basis. But not a lot of use today.
I have chatted with Teeveeing and they say that they are fully compliant.
Here is a snapshot of the chat reply from them.

Does this go far enough in confirming that this is a business that is unlikely to be closed down for infringements anywhere

wellinever

As I have said before, this must all be **llshit as I just finished talking with my brother in middle of Dordogne, as they sit down to watch Full Freeview for free, using a 90cm dish and UK Freesat box.
So how does that work regarding copyrights

Ajmandon

All may not be completely lost ..... yet.

Amongst all the various forum chatter, there is some speculation that those to the West of the Iberian peninsular (i.e. Portugal ) and Northern Spain MIGHT be able to receive the Telstar12 beam (referred to as the North Sea beam) with the satback channels.

Some of the websites which show coverage of satellite beams do suggest that this beam coverage might usefully extend as far south as the Algarve. The issue that could scupper this is that there is an adjacent beam (known as the Med West beam) from the same satellite, which would "overwhelm" where they overlap. The glimmer of hope is that there is one user in Asturias who has reported success but no one yet from Portugal as far as I can find ..... Users in Italy and the Canaries have reported no success.. I wont be able to "play" with my setup for at least a week or so but I'll be keeping track of the various satellite forums for any updates.

Even if possible, those receivers that have relied on "flashing software" e.g. Icecrypt 1600 will likely not work unless/until someone develops a new firmware package. I fear, given the age of these, it might never happen. Those that use Enigma2 programmable type boxes will have to make a few changes themselves .... We shall see and live in hope.

Apart from IPTV type services, legal or otherwise, there is another Satellite service with a number of UK channels, some HD, which might need further investigation. Called Kabelio, a Swiss service, requiring a prepaid CI+Cam package, on Hotbird 13E. I know nothing about it

1711JohnB

<snip> Some people on here do pay for a TV Licence but most others do not. Either pay for a service or do not watch it.

1711JohnB

They are not watching it for FREE. Someone is paying for it <<<SNIP>>

1711JohnB

Alllegal of course. FAST is watching.

BillBullock

This is exactly what I set up some time ago for catchup using a mini PC sitting under our TV and using Smartdnsproxy. It works very well but is not as convenient as a satellite receiver with remote control: a few too many stages to go through on a Windows PC compared with just the on/off button of the remote control.

calman014

Another option of course is IPTV. If you have a half decent Internet connection then you can stream your TV through an external box, which incidentally DOES have a remote.

I can recommend the : Formuler Z11 Pro BT1 Edition which has a lot of features.

Take a look at the site formuler.com.

Once you have setup the box you can download apps using the play store.
You will have to research which apps are suitable for you personally depending on your viewing requirements and region but you can try it out using one or two from the USA.
FreeVee is owned by Amazon and a good test platform for example.
Nord VPN can be integrated so it will startup automatically before you watch your channels.

All Ok if you can tolerate the American advertising