Lost Channels

Simplemeans · 01-05-2009, 22:11

Guys

I'm in need of some help - and may have been ripped off.

I recently had sky installed (sky+ and sky multi room). Everything was OK until a neighbour started winging about the dish being unsightly on the front of the house.

I therefore paid £230 for a private company to move the dish to the roof.

The problem is that after the dish was moved I noticed that a few channels are no longer being received. These have a message saying 'No signal' on the screen.

I contacted the firm who moved my dish and they said that the channels I cannot receive (such as TVEi) send a weak signal to the satelite. This signal is then lost due to the additional length of wires going from my dish to the sky box.

My questions are:

1) Am I being lied to.
2) What can I do about this? Is there a signal booster device I could use to ensure that I get all the channels, or do I have to buy a bigger dish?

Turkey Machine · 02-05-2009, 02:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Simplemeans

Guys

I'm in need of some help - and may have been ripped off.

I recently had sky installed (sky+ and sky multi room). Everything was OK until a neighbour started winging about the dish being unsightly on the front of the house.

I therefore paid £230 for a private company to move the dish to the roof.

The problem is that after the dish was moved I noticed that a few channels are no longer being received. These have a message saying 'No signal' on the screen.

I contacted the firm who moved my dish and they said that the channels I cannot receive (such as TVEi) send a weak signal to the satelite. This signal is then lost due to the additional length of wires going from my dish to the sky box.

My questions are:

1) Am I being lied to.
2) What can I do about this? Is there a signal booster device I could use to ensure that I get all the channels, or do I have to buy a bigger dish?

You're being lied to. By the sounds of things they haven't aligned it properly, it's pointing more towards one dish rather than inbetween both (Astra 28.2E and Eurobird 28.5E). Length of wires has little impact on signal being lost to the box, as the box has to provide the LNB (thing on the end of the dish) to receive the channels. Either way, they've done a crap job.

My suggestion to you would be find a Hughes if you're in East Anglia somewhere as they do very good installations, particularly in Lowestoft, or another well-reputed sat-dish installer. They should be able to align it properly for the cost of a call-out fee or a bit higher for optimum Sky reception. Check that they'll be able to access it on the roof though.

As an aside, why didn't you just ask the neighbour to put up with it? You've spent a lot of money having it moved, which you didn't have to do. As it's now costing you more, a polite discussion with him about fronting some of the cost of moving it might be a good idea.

What was so unsightly about it in the first place? Every house up my street back home has a dish on the front of it pointing to the sky, and nobody's complained.

Simplemeans · 02-05-2009, 12:40

Thanks for the advice.

I live in North London. Can anyone recommend a decent firm to realign my dish?

Stuart · 02-05-2009, 18:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Turkey Machine

You're being lied to. By the sounds of things they haven't aligned it properly, it's pointing more towards one dish rather than inbetween both (Astra 28.2E and Eurobird 28.5E). Length of wires has little impact on signal being lost to the box, as the box has to provide the LNB (thing on the end of the dish) to receive the channels. Either way, they've done a crap job.

My suggestion to you would be find a Hughes if you're in East Anglia somewhere as they do very good installations, particularly in Lowestoft, or another well-reputed sat-dish installer. They should be able to align it properly for the cost of a call-out fee or a bit higher for optimum Sky reception. Check that they'll be able to access it on the roof though.

The signal travels miles to get to the satellites and back. I shouldn't think a few extra feet of cable will make any difference. I agree, it is likely that the dish is not properly aligned.

Quote:

As an aside, why didn't you just ask the neighbour to put up with it? You've spent a lot of money having it moved, which you didn't have to do. As it's now costing you more, a polite discussion with him about fronting some of the cost of moving it might be a good idea.

What was so unsightly about it in the first place? Every house up my street back home has a dish on the front of it pointing to the sky, and nobody's complained.

On this, I agree with the neighbour. Satellite dishes (even the 30 centimetre "mini" dishes used by Sky) are unsightly. They look ugly and IMO, Sky could do a *lot* more than they are to design a dish that blends in with it's surroundings.

Simplemeans · 05-05-2009, 14:58

Thanks guys.

I will get on the case and arrange ANOTHER firm to look at the dish....

..BTW, I have

---------- Post added at 14:58 ---------- Previous post was at 14:49 ----------

..one more question (sent last reply accidently).

I have Sky multiroom. Sky gave me 1 Sky+ HD box and 1 ordinary sky digital box.

I have 4 leads going to the dish, 2 of which feed into the living room and 2 go into the bedroom.

If I purchased a 2nd Sky+HD box, would I be able to get HD in both rooms, or would Sky charge me extra for that?