Freesat semi-technical question

[andy400]

Thinking of switching to Freesat, as Sky fees are just too much to pay for a bunch of unwatchable and/or repeated-for-the-tenth-time ste. Now, I've just been reading on their website about set up, and the Freesat box that records as well (bit like a Sky+) has two inputs from the dish, both of whcih need connecting in order for the unit to record one channel whilst another is being watched. My dish is plumbed into the aerial wires in the house, and as such I have just a single aerial socket by the TV. Can the aerial signal be split between socket and Freesat box in order to have two inputs as required, or won't this work?

Any help much appreciated, cheers.

[Plotloss]

Wont work, there needs to be two cables to the dish for DVR functionality.

There is a heath robinson way around it but it doesnt work very well in reality.

[Slurms]

Yeah it's not the same as just splitting the incoming cable - as you can do with Terrestrial TV.

If you've not had Sky+ in the past then you'll struggle to make this work without forking out for some extra kit and cabling.

[andy400]

Thanks guys. I was afraid that was the case - yet more forking out required!!

[OldSkoolRS]

IIRC you need a twin LNB, but what they cost I've no idea. I have a single cable and use a card in my HTPC to watch Freesat, but in practice I rarely bother as there's not much on it that I can't already get on Freeview. BBC HD and ITV HD have so many repeats of the same old films and Planet Earth that I haven't watched either for months now (I'm not into football so the ITV HD matches don't interest me). Just a heads up before you spend too much money on setting it up, at least go into it with your eyes open anyway.

[GreenV8S]

A new twin LNB wouldn't be expensive to fit - the main hassle would be running the extra cable in.

[headcase]

If its the humax box you have been looking at then it does have the ability to run from one LNB feed but you are limited to recording what you are watching.
Also if your downlead routes via a loftspace or some internal space there are diplexers available that do let you send 2 LNB feeds down 1 cable then split it again behind your skybox, ive had no problem with these on a number of occations where 'breaking the decor' just isnt an option. But both ends need a power supply so it does need to be done internally as these things tend not to be very waterproof.

[VEX]

Twin or Quad LNB and then a (new) Global stacker to convert them onto one cable down to your TV and then split them back out from there.

Might need to upagrde your dish to a 60cm (Region2) dish to get a better signal to noise ratio.

HTH

V.