Satellite Television in the United Kingdom: 28.2°E

Satellite television in the United Kingdom is broadcast on 2 satellites. The Astra 2 satellites at 28.2°E and Eurobird 1 at 28.5°E. There is only 1 package on these satellites and that is Sky UK or BSKYB (British Sky Broadcasting). It has more channels than any other package in Europe and has a great selection of free to air channels including our national broadcasters (BBC 1, BBC 2, ITV 1, Channel 4 and Channel 5). The channels on 28.2°E are encrypted in NDS Videoguard and are decrypted by a Sky Viewing card. The card also decrypts the channels that are free to view, even if one is not subscribed to any specific TV pack.

28.2°E has strong beams that cover the UK and parts of Europe (e.g. France, Germany, Italy, Spain). 28.2°E is in fact receivable outside of it's intended beam. An example, I was on holiday in Turkey a few years ago and they managed to receive Sky UK with a good, watchable picture. Unless it rained then it would go to the "No satellite signal is being received" message as is standard on Sky Digiboxes. Here are some pictures of the Sky Digibox EPG and the minidishes found on houses across the UK.

North Korean Television available at 78.5e

I thought I would talk about in this post how to receive television from the DPRK (North Korea) and with the recent death of their leader, Kim-Jong Il there will be some interesting reports on it. First of all this will not work in the UK and you will need a fairly large dish depending on which country you live in as it is broadcast over C-Band and not KU-Band. The channel is Korean Central TV (KCTV) and is broadcast via Thaicom 5 at 78.5°E. The beam is Global so it is receivable over Asia, Australia, Africa, Middle East and parts of Europe (see the coverage below). Again, please note that you will not receive this if you live in the far Western countries of Europe or North/Latin America. First make sure your dish is aimed at 78.5°east and input the following transponder into your receiver:

Frequency: 3505
Polarization: H
Symbol Rate: 3367
FEC: 2/3

There is no encryption on this channel - it is Free To Air. So enjoy :)


Also, below are some images from the channel, reference is dxsatcs.com

My Dish Setup: Triax TD88 + Inverto LNB

I want to talk about my satellite dish setup. Back in February when I originally started doing this hobby I purchased a very basic setup (Fortec Star) that was only really good for the strong satellites where I live (13e, 19.2e, 5w etc). However I have since upgraded to a Triax TD88 satellite dish. When I purchased the dish it said that it was 88cm in size, however when I got the dish I measured it myself and found it to be 94cm, not that I am complaining - the bigger the better! I also upgraded the LNB to an Inverto Ultra Black. This is a high gain LNB and so put together it makes the perfect satellite setup. I even managed to receiver BADR at 26 East, used for the Arab countries it is quite hard to receive in England without using a large dish (according to Satbeams.com I need a 100cm to receive 26e!). Anyway I will post some pictures of the satellite dish, which sits in my back garden, as well as that there is a video of my setup.







Video of my setup

Decided for a Change

I have decided on a change for the blog, I have changed the main subject of my blog to satellite television and FM radio. These are my 2 favourite hobbies and I will enjoy writing about them more so than writing about myself. I believe this will be a successful venture and will attract people who are also into this hobby as much as I am. So I would like to present - The Satellite TV and FM Radio blog.

Mexican Channels receivable in UK and Europe at 24.5w

There are TV channels available from Mexico on the Intelsat 905 satellite at 24.5°W. The beam that these channels broadcast on is called Spot 2. You can see from the image below that the beam covers most of Western and Eastern Europe with the strongest area being centred on France/Spain/Italy areas. I have labelled the beams to see what dish dish size is recommended for that country. There are 6 Mexican channels broadcasting from 24.5w, encrypted in Viaccess 2.5. They are as follows:

Clásico TV
RitmoSon Latino
TeleHit
De Pelicula
Canal de las Estrellas
Telenovelas

These channels can be decrypted and viewed by purchasing a subscription card and receiver for €269 (£225). The provider of the card is by a satellite shop called DD Electronics based in Paris, France. To program these channels into your receiver point your dish to 24.5w and input the following transponder:

Frequency: 11626
Polarization: H
Symbol Rate: 13500
FEC: 7/8

Lack of Xmas music on foreign music channels

I have recently noticed a lack of Christmas music on foreign TV channels. They all seem to be playing what they usually would throughout the year. Here are some screenshots from some French music channels which shows the lack of Xmas music, taken on the 18th December 2011.


MTV Base

MCM Top

MCM Pop

M6 Music Hits

M6 Music Club

Christmas Day Radio Appearance

I will be making another radio appearance on 1Radio.org with my good friend Ceejay. This will be happening on Sunday 25th December 2011 at 4pm UK time. I am personally looking forward to this. It will be 2 hours and we will be playing pop music mainly from the 70s and 80s. I understand Christmas Day is busy for many people so for those who can't tune in a recording of the show will be available. After the Christmas show on New Years Eve (Dec. 31) we will be having 3 hours of the past guests from Ceejay's Solid Gold Sunday show which should be a server max out, and of course we have Jethro Sheeran on 1st January 2012. So it is going to be busy in the coming days for me and Ceejay on 1Radio. As for now we are concentrating on the Xmas show, so watch my Twitter/Facebook on Xmas day and I will inform you when I am due to go live on air. I look forward to it and hope to see you all there!!

Chat with Jethro Sheeran - Now Confirmed!

Hi guys, just a quick announcement that it is now confirmed Jethro Sheeran will be making an appearance on DJ Ceejay's show on 1Radio. This will be happening on the 1st January 2012. I am looking forward to chatting with him after and possibly before the show. Who knows, maybe Ed Sheeran, the man himself will also appear and I'll have get to have a chat with him also.

Jethro Sheeran - Cousin of Ed Sheeran

Hello everyone, as you will all remember in my previous post I talked about me being on CJ's show and chatting with Alabama Capital. Well next month (January) CJ is getting Jethro Sheeran on the show who is the cousin of British singer-song writer Ed Sheeran, well known for his song "The A-Team". Now, I always get to chat with CJ's guests, so hopefully I will be able to chat with Jethro and possibly Ed himself if he turns up. I will keep you up to date with that as it gets nearer.