SKY multiroom with communal dish

[TEKNOPUG]

Currently have standard SKY in the flat with a single connection from a communal dish on the roof.

Flat mate has bought an HD Ready LCD for his bedroom and also ordered an HD Sky multi-room package. Do we simply need a twin LNB splitter to hook the two boxes up or does HD require two connections of it’s own (requiring a quad LNB splitter)?

What if one of the boxes has SKY +?

[TEKNOPUG]

Aha!

Now you see, that’s what we thought…..

…however, SKY arrived on Sunday and said “you’ve got a communal dish so you can only have one SKY box connected. You’ll need a splitter box, which SKY don’t provide. Call us back when you’ve got one to organise a new call out date for us” then promptly left.

Edited by TEKNOPUG on Wednesday 14th October 16:03

[TEKNOPUG]

Paddy_N_Murphy said:

TEKNOPUG said:

difficulties

Not very relevant stuff

Flat-mate ordered online, no mention on website of private/communal dishes, equipment you'll need prior to visit, equipment that SKY won't provide etc. I realised that the signal would need to be split but obviously I was being presumptious in thinking that SKY would provide the required connectors, particularly as they are charging £70 to deliver a box and plug it in. I wasn't at home when they called and flatmate if both blonde and Aussie...

Thought that someone on here might be able to shed some light on the matter, rather than me having to endure the horror of calling SKY customer services...

[headcase]

Every sky box needs at least one connection to the dish, sky+ and HD needing 2 per box. In a communal system you will only have one dish connection going to the sky box you already have. You cannot split this signal (for technical reasons it dont work like that ). By the looks of it you are gunna have to have a seperate dish installed just for the HD Box as upgrading a cummunal system is not as easy as it sounds. And if installing another dish is out of the question then so is having more than 1 sky box.

[TEKNOPUG]

headcase said:

Every sky box needs at least one connection to the dish, sky+ and HD needing 2 per box. In a communal system you will only have one dish connection going to the sky box you already have. You cannot split this signal (for technical reasons it dont work like that ). By the looks of it you are gunna have to have a seperate dish installed just for the HD Box as upgrading a cummunal system is not as easy as it sounds. And if installing another dish is out of the question then so is having more than 1 sky box.

Right. So SKY saying "you need a splitter box, call us when you get one" is a complete load of bks and what they should have said was "can't be done"??

[headcase]

Yup, you cant split a LNB output, what he is proberbly confusing it with is a diplexer, you can infact send 2 LNB signals down one lead and 'split' them at your end BUT that means expensive modifications at the dish end to do it so for a communal install unless the building owner is goimg to pay for the mod then its out of the question.

[TEKNOPUG]

What about one of these?

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=9273

[GreenV8S]

TEKNOPUG said:

communal dish on the roof.

How does a communal dish work? Surely not a separate LNB per flat? Given the need for polarity control etc I suspect this may involve more than a simple splitter, so perhaps it's something more complex. If so, perhaps it can provide the equivalent of multiple LNBs per flat, and in that case it's the person who manages the communal supply you would need to talk to.

[miniman]

Interestingly all that Sky say on their ordering pages is this:

sky said:

Sky+/Sky+HD box prices may vary if you live in a flat. You must get any consents required (e.g. landlord’s).

[TEKNOPUG]

Well you can have an Octo (8) line LNB straight from the dish apparently. However, there are probably 40 flats in my building so whether there are multiple dishes or whether it’s something far more complex, I’m not sure. It’s just odd that the SKY installers turned up with just a coil of cable and nothing else. Were they expecting there to be multiple satellite connections available to them? One in every room perhaps? The fact that it was “multi-room” that had been ordered would suggest that we already had at least 1 SKY box connected already. I’ve had a search through a few AV forums but can’t seem to find a definitive answer.

The Maplins device sounds like it will work, to an extent. The second box won’t be able to receive all channels as the master box will determine the polarity. More importantly, the master box supplies the DC input the LNB, thus if it’s in standby, the slave box won’t work. SKY boxes go into standby automatically after an hour or something like that.

Anyone got a link to see what channels are what polarity?

[TEKNOPUG]

Something like this?

To have proper multi-room you need a separate connection to the dish, to give you full control. Which we don’t have.



Using a splitter will work – however:



There has to be a “Master” and “Slave” box.



One box (the Master) sends a DC power feed to the dish.



The Master box determines the polarity. All channels have a polarity; either H or V



So……for the slave box to work, the Master box must be on. Bear in mind that SKY boxes go into standby after a set time.



As the Master box selects the polarity, the slave box will only be able to select channels with the same polarity. For example, if the Master box is set to BBC 1 and that is H polarity, the Slave box will only be able to choose channels which are also H polarity. If you are watching something on the Slave box which is H polarity and the Master box is switched to a channel that is V polarity, the Slave box will lose the channel that you are watching…..

[miniman]

TEKNOPUG said:

So……for the slave box to work, the Master box must be on. Bear in mind that SKY boxes go into standby after a set time.

Not if you turn off the auto standby setting.

[headcase]

GreenV8S said:

TEKNOPUG said:

communal dish on the roof.

How does a communal dish work? Surely not a separate LNB per flat? Given the need for polarity control etc I suspect this may involve more than a simple splitter, so perhaps it's something more complex. If so, perhaps it can provide the equivalent of multiple LNBs per flat, and in that case it's the person who manages the communal supply you would need to talk to.

The dish has a quad LNB (but not the type sky use) it has 4 outputs, one is H one is V one Low band one high band, these feed a multiplexer that can derive as many Full spec outputs as needed, for example if you are feeding 10 sky boxes then you use a 10 output multiplexer or 10 sky+ boxes then you need a 20 output multiplexer (usually 2x10 way cascaded multiplexers) then you run 1 cable from each output to each flat.

So if you need more outputs than are available you need to replace or add to the multiplex system, that is quite expensive and because you dont have the extra cables installed to carry the extra signal you then need to start diplexing the signals down the same cable and un diplexing them (the formentioned splitter) at your end.

If its a very cheap system then there could be a few dishes on the roof all using 8 way LNB's

[GreenV8S]

headcase said:

because you dont have the extra cables installed to carry the extra signal you then need to start diplexing the signals down the same cable and un diplexing them (the formentioned splitter) at your end.

That makes sense. I don't see any way a sky engineer could do that, so he's stuck until the building management provide the extra feed.

[headcase]

Sky wont do it no, its way beyond what they are prepaired to do but it is possible but generally not worth it if it is possible to sight a dish out of the way and just run in a couple of cables.

I was in an appartment block a few month back called urban splash (you may have come across a few of them), they have fitted a cat5 system for everything and its totally hideous!! Some people managed to get a sky box installed near the central riser then uses AV over cat5 boxes to get a composite sky feed to their TV's others took the easy route and sat a portable sky dish (intended for canal boats etc) on the walkway outside the appartment wich does a far better job