Dozens of satellites: thousands of channels
One of the commonest questions that we get asked is: “What satellite TV channels can I get for free?” The answer is: thousands, literally! Of course, they’re not all on SKY and most of them aren’t in English but for the more adventurous amongst us, that shouldn’t really be a problem - we’re all Europeans now! Watching TV from Bulgaria or France or Holland or Spain or Turkey, Romania, Greece or even Dubai can be very entertaining. The Albanian version of Strictly Come Dancing is supposed to be excellent, Downton Abbey in Portuguese is actually quite fun and late night shows from Italy have to be seen to be believed.
But there are several good reasons to tune in to other
can be found on Astra 1. It shows mostly news, current affairs and sports programmes. SKY News, CNN, Bloomberg and some other American news channels are also available on Astra 1 & Hotbird. Other channels including MTV & Eurosport can also be viewed without subscription.
For sports fans, Astra 1 & Hotbird offer a means of watching sporting events that they would otherwise just not be able to see. Unless you had a SKY subscription or a massive dish, the FA Cup Final, for example, would be out of reach throughout most of Italy and Spain. So would Wimbledon, the Grand National and the World Darts Championship: not
to mention snooker, the World Cup, the Olympics and so on. Just tune in to Hotbird or Astra 1 though and all these events will be showing on one channel or another. OK, so you may not be able to follow the commentary but you can’t have everything.
As you can see from the satellite footprints shown below, both the Hotbird and Astra 1 satellites have a wide coverage and even with a dish such as the Multimo, you’ll be able to pick up satellite transmissions just about anywhere in Europe.
satellites even if you only want to listen to English. BBC other satellites. A SKY digibox can be used to an extent World News is a TV version of the radio World Service and
but it’s so complicated that, for most people, it’s much easier to simply buy a Free to Air receiver. There are hundreds of different models but those from Kathrein, MicroElectronics and Zehnder work on 12V and so are perfect for use in boats and vehicles. All you need to do then is to connect the receiver to the dish and point the dish at the satellite. Camos, Kathrein and Crystop automatic models will all find the satellites at the press of a button: manual dishes such as the Multimo and Kerstan will need to be aligned accurately and we would always recommend the use of a satfinder such as one of the models on page 58.
So, what’s the catch? None really. All you need is a satellite receiver which is programmed to work with these
Footprint of Hotbird with a 60cm dish
Elevation angles for Astra 1, Astra 2 & Hotbird
Footprint of Astra 1 with a 60cm dish
Please note: The satellite TV situation is constantly changing. The satellites themselves, the satellite's transmission areas, the channels transmitted, the way they are transmitted and the equipment needed to receive them are always subject to change. Although everything written here is, at the time of writing, correct to the best of our knowledge, RoadPro cannot be held responsible for any errors or misunderstandings caused by changes in equipment, actions taken by satellite TV broadcasters or transmitters or any other reason.
Prices and models can change. For up to date prices, to find a dealer near you or for further information on any of our products, please phone us on 01327 312233 or visit our website:
www.roadpro.co.uk 45
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