# Digibox or Free to Air receiver?



## MaxandPaddy (Mar 18, 2006)

Help please!
We are going to have a Camos Sat-Dome fitted and we are not sure if we need a digibox or free to air receiver?

We do not have Sky and most of out travels are within the Uk,when we travel abroad we would probably want news and weather so which device do we need to us with a Camos?

My initial thoughts were we needed a Maxview free to air receiver but our dealer,who is fitting it, says we need something like a Pace digibox and I do not know which one we need!

Can anyone with a Camos 40cm model suggest what we need?

Thanks :?


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## gm6vxb (Nov 3, 2007)

To my knowledge, any satellite receiver will work with the dish, but if you want to look at more than one satellite then one with DisceQ will be needed.
If you keep an eye out at Lidl's they sometimes have satellite receivers on sale. Also Maplin do one but not sure of the type.
If you want to receive all Sky channels, then yes you will need a Sky receiver, but then you will only receive one satellite. The 'Lidl' box allows you to receive quite a few satellites, but dependant on where you are abroad here may not be enough signal strength for a decent picture.
I am running a Camos dish and have a Lidl receiver and can receive up to four different satellites. ONly 'free to air' but plenty to watch.
Have fun.

Martin.


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## Pudsey_Bear (Sep 25, 2008)

to use a sat dish it would have to be digital, only an aerial will use analogue.

it'll be down to what you want to watch, some progs will only be on Sky etc, while some will be freeview.

Kev.


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## madontour (May 19, 2008)

I believe that the Pace digibox ( the Pace one is preferred for motorhomes simply because it has a 12v power supply) is now hard to get. A standard digibox will require you to have either mains hook-up or an inverter to provide 240v.

The Maxview free to air receiver ( actually a re-badged box made by Comag in Germany) is widely available, as others have said, under many brand names. The Comag receiver has both a 240v and 12v power supply.

As you go further south it becomes more difficult to get the UK TV channels from Astra 2 and so the ability to tune to other satellites (where you can get BBC World) is an advantage for the Comag receiver. Trying to use a sky digibox with other satellites is not easy.

On the other hand, the Sky digiboxes have a very easy to use programme guide which you don't get with the other boxes. 

It depends where you're going to use it most.

M


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## MaxandPaddy (Mar 18, 2006)

Thanks everyone,so am I right in thinking I need a digibox of some type?
Sorry but I am blonde  !

Val


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## 106559 (Aug 19, 2007)

You're going to need one helluva big battery to keep all that stuff going. That telly of yours looked about 42" when I saw it on the telly! 8) :lol:


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## derek500 (Oct 31, 2005)

madontour said:


> As you go further south it becomes more difficult to get the UK TV channels from Astra 2 and so the ability to tune to other satellites (where you can get BBC World) is an advantage for the Comag receiver.


BBC News (formerly BBC New 24) is available on the south beam of Astra 2. A 40cm dish will pick it up all over southern Europe.

Sky News is the same.


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## gm6vxb (Nov 3, 2007)

Kev_n_Liz said:


> to use a sat dish it would have to be digital, only an aerial will use analogue.
> 
> it'll be down to what you want to watch, some progs will only be on Sky etc, while some will be freeview.
> 
> Kev.


There are still quite a few satellites with analogue signals on them, Astra 1A,B,C,D for example. Fine if you you understand German !. Probably you would not need to know as most satellite receivers now are digital and not combined analogue/digital like the system I have in the house.

Maxandpaddy, if you have a Maplin store close by try here first. They do have receivers available, not sure if mains or 12 volt though. 
BTW if you are looking to use an inverter it may be worth looking for a 'pure sine wave'type, you may get problems with a normal (cheap) inverter giving interference to picture or sound.


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## geraldandannie (Jun 4, 2006)

Hi Val

We have pretty much the same requirement as you, and don't have Sky at home.

We've had a crank-up fitted (by Snellyvision, plug plug :wink: ), and we had the Maxview satellite receiver installed by him, which looks like >> THIS <<. If you look at Maplins >> HERE << you may note a striking similarity between the Maxview and the Comag one.

With this, we can point our dish at a number of satellites, but I lose the will to live stepping through the channels. We point it at Astra 2, and we can pick up all the standard UK channels (1,2,3,4,5, ITV2, E4, etc etc etc etc), as well as some other nonsense. Enough for us to watch. As Derek says, once we get too far South to pick up the normal stuff, we'll tune into the South beam to get the BBC News, which is all we want when we're far away.

Gerald


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## MaxandPaddy (Mar 18, 2006)

Thanks everyone!

Val


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## Rocles (May 1, 2005)

If you are a music fan, particularly 70s music 8) the EinsFestival German sat channel are broadcasting 50 complete 1970s Top Of The Pops editions over the course of 2009. These are full and unedited, so some have never been seen since original broadcast. Its on Astra 1, 19.2 degrees East. Settings are -

124215H
27.5
3/4

I'm told you can add it as an extra channel to a Sky box (move dish to 19.2 degrees first), using THIS GUIDE

I've put a quick DishPointer calculator on my BLOG PAGE


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## MaxandPaddy (Mar 18, 2006)

Hi everyone who responded to our dilemma (or lack of knowledge  !).
We had our Camos sat-dome fitted and eventually went with a Technomate free to air box as recommended by Brymar Satellite Shop in Sherburn-in-Elmet.
Everything works perfectly and we can pick up lots of channels and we are very pleased with our purchase.
We were off to a bad start as on our first attempt to tune in channels it kept asking for a pin number and we could only tune in BBC1,2 and ITV which was a disappointment after investing so much in a Sat-Dome and box!
After reading the very confusing Technomate manual (written in japanese style english!) we discovered the pin number at the bottom of a page in very small writing!
Once we put the pin number in.....Bingo the world is our Oyster or Camos in our case  !
So thanks for the advice you guys,it was a big help in getting us started.

Val


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