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Sky Digital TV

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Sky Digital

Sky Digital is the UK's premier broadcaster of UK satellite television it's broadcasts are in DVB-compliant MPEG-2, with the Sky Movies and Sky Box Office channels supporting optional Dolby Digital soundtracks for recent films, currently the Dolby digital is only supported with the Sky+ PVR digiboxes. Additional multimedia interactive services are also provided as well as an extensive EPG which makes use of a proprietary version of the OpenTV system. The sky digital Set-top boxes have built in analogue modems for a return path this enables interactive functionality. Sky News, and several other channels, provides a pseudo video on demand interactive service by broadcasting looping video streams. Sky Digital has recently started broadcasting High Definition digital channels requiring the use of their flagship digibox, the Sky HD digibox. The channel selection at the moment is limited but steadily increasing, with many new channels planned.

Provided a universal Ku band LNB (9.75/10.600GHz) is fitted at the end of the dish and pointed at the correct satellite constellation, most digital receivers will receive the free to air channels. Some broadcasts are free-to-air and unencrypted, some are encrypted but do not require a monthly subscription (known as free-to-view), some are encrypted and require a monthly subscription, and some are pay-per-view services. To view the encrypted content a proprietary NDS Videoguard UK equipped receiver is required this is exclusively dedicated to the Sky Digital service, and cannot be used to decrypt other services. NDS CI modules are issued by a few providers in other countries, however their supply is strictly controlled and to our knowledge they have not been successfully used with official UK sky cards.

Unofficial "Dragon" CAMs are now available to view the service, although use of them constitutes a breach of contract with Sky and invalidates your rights to use the card. The cards supplied by Sky must be paired to an official dedicated Sky digibox, so to use the dragon cam you enter the serial number of the official digibox into the cam and then use the module in a CI receiver. It has however been reported that this is unstable and that when used cards do not update properly, the advantage for users though is the ability to use a CI receiver with features not normally available on a sky digibox, such as better threshold to receive weak signals or diseqc on a motorised system.

BSkyB has no veto over the presence of channels on their EPG, with open access being an enforced part of their contract with Ofcom to operate the service. Any channel which can get carriage on a suitable beam of a satellite at 28 East is entitled to access to Sky's EPG for a fee, ranging from £15-100,000. Third-party channels which opt for encryption receive discounts ranging from reduced price to free EPG entries, free carriage on a Sky leased transponder, or actual payment for being carried. However, in this case, Sky does not carry any control over the channels content or carriage issues such as picture quality. Recent years have seen the launch of numerous low-budget channels, some with very poor technical quality.

Due to either limited regional availability of certain channels, or conditions relating to their must-carry status, Sky operate a number of distinct regions for their EPG - with the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland and Great Britain having slightly different channel line-ups mainly differing in targeted advertising and local news content, although a few distinctly unique regional programs such as Gaelic language programming for Wales and Scotland are provided.

Additional services such as the Asian channels are operated independently from Sky but carried in the EPG, to get subscription cards for these channels one must contact the operators directly. Recently the EPG has been extensively modified and Sky are continuing to make modifications to the Open-TV software. Some problems have been reported during the modifications but most of the bugs have now been rectified. The latest modifications which are now being rolled out are rumoured to include automatic power saving by turning the box off following extended periods of usage and an onscreen warning message which warns the user that the box will turn off after a set period of time unless the message is acknowledged.

The net result is a high quality offering of a variety of categorised subscription channels, which are listed else where within this site. We can provide digiboxes which are free from contract and obligation to connect to a telephone line, these are often used by subscribers throughout Europe, care must be taken that the correct dish size is obtained to view the programming outside the targeted broadcast area because the footprint of the Astra 2D beam is tightly focussed on the United Kingdom. For people who are using subsidised digiboxes or installers who require to activate digiboxes, or others who seek to avoid paying the administrative fee for ordering PPV events via the call centre when outside the United Kingdom, can connect the digibox using their normal telephone line, we supply digidiallers which are suitable for this purpose. These have been tested with the HDdigibox.

The new style digiboxes have proved to be reliable and it is good news to see that once again Pace are making digiboxes with the latest model being the DS445NB. Pace technical material states that the sky plus digiboxes are DiSEqC 1.2 ready, however like the USB port, and Ethernet port on the HD boxes this feature is disabled which is a pity.

Sky Digibox Overview.

On this page you will find an overview of sky digiboxes.

'Freesat from sky' cards are necessary for using sky digiboxes for Channel 4, Channel 5, Sky Three, however the freesat cards are subscription free - ideal if you just want a relatively good spread of UK digital TV channels. Reception limitations may hinder some people in their choice between Freesat or subscription packages. To see what channels you can receive have a look at our channels page.

Don't confuse the 'freesat from sky' offerring with the card less non-sky non-subscription Freesat offer compared in our freesat pages. http://www.smart2check.com/freesat.html

Sky Plus Twin Tuner PVR Box

Sky Plus

for more information about sky plus go to our online store.

Sky Digibox

click the image or link below for other options including a digibox with freesat card and more technical information :-

Sky HD

The latest in technology - Sky's flagship digibox, the Sky HD box, incorporates both HD and sky plus functionality. Click the image to read more about it. You agree to subscribe to sky using our service for at least 12 months, at the end of which you can opt to renew for another 12 months.

Sky Digiboxes Overview
Digiboxes have been made by Amstrad, Sony, Thomson, Panasonic, Grundig, and most commonly, Pace. Despite the reference designs being identical, a number of digibox lines have specific faults or traits, such as failing modems on Grundig units, and unstable tuners on older model Pace and Amstrad boxes. Some units add features not found on other models, such as S-Video sockets on some Grundig units, and TOSLINK output on Sony's.

Amstrad and Thomson have recently resumed production with the DRX500 and DSi4212 boxes respectively. contract Digiboxes for new customers are assigned randomly, and cannot be chosen, creating an after market for specific boxes due to their individual features. Some as example perform better in fringe reception areas.

Standardised design
On December 16th 2005, it was announced that future Digiboxes would have a standardised cosmetic design, although manufacturing contracts would remain with the three current makers, the remote control is also to be redesigned with a silver colouring.

A PVR version of Digibox exists, marketed as Sky+. These PVR units have dual LNB inputs, a hard disk ranging from 40 to 160Gb, and optical digital audio output, as well as all other features of the Sky box. These units are manufactured by Amstrad, Pace and Thomson only, and use a different remote control.

The latest HD generation of Digibox has also just been announced,6 with the features of Sky+, and the additional ability to receive DVB-S2 HDTV signals in the MPEG-4 format. The initial manufacturer of these SkyHD boxes is Thomson, and they will debut in April 2006 with the launch of HDTV channels on Sky Digital. Pace already make DVB-S2 receivers and are expected to make a Sky HDTV digibox shortly afterwards. Currently National Geographic is broadcasting test HDTV programming.

Recommended digiboxes for fringe reception areas in Europe
Whilst assessing which digibox to purchase consideration must be given for the Astra 2D footprint. Astra 2D provides the signal for BBC and ITV programmes and the footprint is tightly focused on the UK, unlike the other footprints which carry the signals for Channel 4 or Sky News. Although it is possible to pick up 2D signals as far away as Africa, to do so successfully requires a very large dish. Most people want to keep dish size to a minimum and having a receiver that has a 'low signal threshold' helps them do this.

Pace
The digibox generally recognised as the best for Europe - especially those parts of Europe well away from the footprint epicentre - is the Pace 2600C1 and its recent successor, the Pace DS430N. Both models look the same, but the DS430N has a faster processor. The 2600 is generally considered to work better in a weak signal area and this model should be considered for countries such as Cyprus, Greece, Southern Italy, the Canary Islands etc - where signal strength is exceptionally weak. Most installers in Spain use the DS430N, but you may consider buying a 2600 if you are in a difficult area such as the coastal region around Cartagena and Valencia, or one of the Balearic islands. If you live anywhere in France, choose the DS430N over the 2600, as it is unlikely that you will benefit from the very low-threshold level of the 2600. In our tests the picture and sound quality from the pace units proved to be admiral (indeed this was also true of older pace models).

The Pace 2600C1 is no longer available to buy new and it's low signal threshold makes it highly sought after and therefore more expensive than a new DS430N.

The DS440N is a recent release by Pace and like past releases by Pace the model performs well in fringe areas, it is still not as good as the 2600C1 but overall a good receiver from a respected manufacturer and generally better than the DS430N which was successful in many fringe areas such as Morocco and Canary Islands. The DS445NB is the latest release and it's tuner in our opinion could have room for improvement we found in particular that it's threshold wasn't particularly good which makes little or no difference in the North of Europe but a big difference in fringe areas, however we are being picky and a good installer should be able to compensate with quality dish and LNB components.

Amstrad
The Amstrad DRX 400 also has a low threshold tune, new Amstrads are not available for sale, they are exclusively delivered by Sky only, so normally you'll only find Amstrad's either come supplied with cards or that they are second hand models (e.g. on our site we only supply Amstrad's with cards or the Pace/Thomson models with / without cards) with the older Amstrad's the reliability of the power supplies are now becoming a concern as these models are starting to show their age. The latest DRX660 is proving to be better than the new Pace DS445NB's.

Grundig
The GDS 3000 is a good model for low threshold fringe reception but suffers from power supply problems, we verify all power supplies and functionality before dispatch, but if this is a concern for you we also offer as a substitute the Panasonic model DSB40. Please specify at time of ordering. Power supply kits for digiboxes start from £8 please contact us if you need any servicing or reliability kits. Other good Grundig's include the GRD310/2.

Panasonic
The Panasonic TU-DSB30 which is an old model of receiver is also good for fringe areas, and was very popular with expats in Spain. Some of these have power supplies which are nearing the end of their useful lives, but can be refurbished with power supply kits, if other components have failed it's usually more cost effective to replace the unit with a new Pace machine.

Sony
Sony models look nice, but they aren't particularly good in the fringe areas. Not recommended.

Thomson
New model Thomson DSI4214C receivers are particularly good in fringe areas, although picture and sound quality via RF could be better, via the SCART the sound quality in our tests was actually quite good the picture quality did however have occasional wobbles on the edges - the saving point was the threshold which tested quite well. We have shipped these across Europe to many fringe areas including Greece, Cyprus, and several other Mediterranean Islands although we no longer stock this sky digibox, we replaced it with the Pace DS445NB and Amstrad DRX660.

For more information of the subscription viewing card bundles follow this link:-

RECEIVING UK FREE DIGITAL / SATELLITE BBC TELEVISION IN EUROPE

We will be extending our range of digiboxes to include more second hand models including older models with a proven capability in fringe reception areas. If you are only after a cheap second hand model and don't have a specific requirement, contact us we have plenty in stock. Do you want to buy more than one unit at a time, then contact us for a discount favourable terms for multi unit purchases for both trade and consume alike.

More digibox models can be found here:-