The Guy

You need to subscribe to a UK VPN, and input their settings details onto the router. The best services have several uk servers, and have setup guides telling you how to set it all up. Some provide a link / install in their set up pages of their website that does it all for you....

But as well as making sure your router is ddwrt / tomato compatiable, you will also need to make sure it is openvpn compatiable. not all are, especially those with only 4 meg of "flash memory".
Somewone earlier mentioned a TP-Link 740N - it runs ddwrt, but not openVPN! The 1043 works great.

They key things is READ, and make sure you have the correct firmwares and software versions for your router, otherwise you will "brick" it...

And also, only sky+hd boxes (and not thomsons) will have sky on demand. currently only amstrad and pace have it, with samsungs coming "by the end of november".

Even for the BBC Iplayer, although you do not need a Sky TV subscription, you still need a Sky+ subscription (costs £10 per month I think using a freesatfromsky card) , as the on demand service uses the Sky+ functionality.

njf

Many thanks, The Guy. I also had a helpful and quick response from Astrill to a ticket I raised with them.

May I pick your brains a bit more?

I already have a Sky HD 1Tb box I brought with us when we moved to Spain a couple of months ago. It connects OK to the internet but as soon as I try to view or download something from Sky on Demand, it says Failed. I assume it's because it sees it is connected to a non-UK ISP. Is that right?

I am planning on getting an Asus RT-N16, which is recommended by Astrill and seems quite reasonable at Amazon.es, and connecting it via ethernet to my existing Asus modem/router. I will put DD-WRT and OpenVPN on the N16 and then connect my Sky box via ethernet to the N16. With that setup should I be able to use Sky on Demand OK?

Thanks for your help.

Norman

The Guy

Correct.

Yes.

As long as you have also registered with Sky for our account to be activated for their on demand service - via a mysky account.

njf

Thanks again. I'm going to go for it!

Countryboy1

That was me I think, so what does the above mean in practice? If can run ddwt but cannot openVPN does that mean that I cannot configure my router to access the iplayer for example, via my network devices as I need the openVPN facility? Therefore ddwt on my router would be useless for this purpose?
All this is new to me so please explain as basically as possible.
Thanks.

The Guy

I thought I would try a 740, but it is simply not compatiable with openvpn.
According to the many many the forums I have seen about this, 740's do not run openVPN.
So you cannot use it to run openVPN.

No.
Depending on your VPN, it may still be possible to manually input and configure ddwrt for your vpn settings...
It worked fine for a few free vpns i tried on it... but took time to manually configure it all to work.

CapnBilly

I think the problem with a 740n is its an Atheros chipset, which is not as well supported by dd-wrt. In addition its only got 4mb of ram, so you have to flash it in a certain way, because of the size of the ram. Also, Tomato doesn't support Atheros, so you can't even switch to that.

Its not impossible to flash a 4mb router, as I have a Linksys 54GL which has 4mb, so you have to flash it with the mini dd-wrt and then the vpn edition. However, the 54GL is a Broadcomm chipset, which is what dd-wrt was designed to work on originally. However, they strip some code out to get it all on, so when I used it with Astrill VPN I couldn't get some of the features, like picking which devices used the VPN.

I upgraded mine to a WRT160NL, which is Atheros, but because it has 32mb of ram, will take the full version of dd-wrt, so includes all the functionality.

I have my sky box set to access Astrill at all times (but some of my other devices use the normal IP), and On Demand works a treat, I use it every couple of days.

EsuriJohn

Completely off topic but the Guy is hanging about this thread so I thought I might as well post my question here. We had a deluge last Wednesday sufficient to black out Sky for short splls. Since it was so miserable we had lit a fire the day before. I now notice that my dish on the top terrace is covered in small black soot spots like a measles rash. Will this degrade the signal reception and is it worth cleaning the dish? Also when rubbing one spot with spit and a finger I noticed that a fine surface film was displaced. Is it worth painting the dish?

The Guy

Cos it is peeing it down!! Luckily managed to get a few jobs done before it started.

Dishes are smooth and colours white for one reason - to reflect the maximum signal to the LNB.

Any distortion of the dish, or "spots" on its reflective surface can mean the beams are not reflected to the LNB effiecintly - basically reducing the signal. How much it reduced will depend on the size of dish and the amount of distortion or number of "spots".

Best to use luke warm water, washing up liquid, and a soft cloth to clean the dish, rather than painting it.

If you MUST paint it, use a matt paint (gloss shines too much), non metalic (metal disrupts the reflection). The last oine I did I use matt car spray paint , which gave a neater and smooter finish compared to one I did with a tin and brush.

tommy.irene

Well im in the Canary Isles and i can get good filmon on the internet.. I think it goes by good or bad internet..

Fred James

You are missing my point - the HD version is not free.

tommy.irene

I know thats why i watch the SD version for free..

EsuriJohn

more to come Thursday looks bad your way!

Saxy

HD version of FilmOn is not free, but it's not expensive either, and you can download the programs to your hard drive for viewing later.
I've just bought a new TV that's 1080p, with a refresh rate of 2.1. Wow, fantastic!!!

John

tommy.irene

Good for you , they are selling 50" LG TV here for €450.. with 3D..