How will this work for me?

At the moment I have two satellite dishes fixed to my house, the oval shaped Sky Digital one and the old round analogue one which is no longer in use but hasn't been removed.

My television in the lounge is old but linked to Sky Digital so the Switchover Help Scheme will sort out the television in my bedroom and I have asked for Free Sat rather than Freeview since it seemed to be the better option of the two.

Will I need a third satellite dish or will they be able to use one of the existing ones? What happens?

I am confused. They supply the necessary equipment and will install it for £40 which seems OK since they will get it working for me.

This is a UK situation so is probably different in other countries, I need the UK information only. Thanks.

Have you called the installation or satellite company (although don't do it now...since it's midnight BST)? I'm sure they could help you on that. I'd know what to do if you were on this side of the "pond"...I have installed satellite systems in the past (11-12 years ago, but it hasn't changed).

Sue, there are two versions of FreeSat in the UK, one from Sky and one run through the BBC (I think). If you've got an existing Sky dish you could get a local guy to run a cable from that to your second TV. Buy another Sky box, ebay is a good place to start and then ring Sky and ask for a FreeSat card. It's a one off payment of £20.00, or it was when I worked for them.Sky may provide a new box and do the cable work but the charge was £140.00 last year.

This field left me behind a while ago, so the following may need correcting.

I think the installation people should be able to use an existing dish by changing the LNB (the part on the end of the boom arm) to one that has a multi-output. For example: the cable from one of the outputs goes to one TV and a cable from the same device goes to another. Each TV would need its own box. LNBs can have as many a 4 outputs. I believe the cable doesn't look like two (or more) cables. It can have a number of cores within a single sheath that can be split up once inside the house.

Edit: I was thinking that we had a satellite installation engineer here but the question was still unanswered this morning, so I thought I'd have a go.

Thanks.

I would imagine this would be the BBC one as it is the Switchover Help Scheme, we don't get to choose who does it, it is arranged by the scheme. I have been given a date and time for when the engineer will arrive and have paid £40. They will 'convert' one television in the house and as I have Sky in my lounge they are doing the television in my bedroom.

Since the price was £40 regardless of whether I had Freeview or FreeSat and the difference is an additional 100 channels it seemed to be a no brainer.

From what you are saying Martin it is possible perhaps that they can use my old analogue dish, I still have that as well as the oval dish. If I need a new dish they will provide and fit that within the £40.

The people I spoke to on the phone yesterday were very sweet, I think they are more used to talking to 'old confused' ladies so spoke slowly and carefully. I was even asked if I wanted the engineer to use a password to prove to me that he was genuine so I said the changes of a bogus satellite engineer arriving at the same time and date was a bit remote so no needed, he will have his credentials I am assured.

Once they have done it I might actually go to bed earlier as I will be able to watch Create and Craft in bed! The Freeview only has C&C until about 1pm which was a good reason not to opt for that especially since the cost is the same for both systems. Actually the price of a new telly appears to be very reasonable on this scheme but as I would rather replace my lounge telly that wasn't an option as that can pick up satellite now. Mind you the prices of new sets will drop further once the surge of people having to buy new equipment ends.

I just checked the leaflet and it is definitely the BBC/ITV FreeSat system. We switchover on 17th November, they are installing my equipment in early October.

Today was the day. My heart sunk when I saw which company he was from. When I worked for the CAB if anyone had a complaint about an electrical shop then it was 99.9% certain that it would be this one. Before knowing of the problems with them I bought a few television sets and also arranged for my analogue Sky installation, three receivers and they charged me about £1,000 which was much more expensive than having three dishes so I have no idea how they arrived at that figure other than thinking if I was having three Sky subscriptions that I must be made of money.

I was his first one of these Help Scheme jobs and he said that the whole thing was a shambles and that his boss was only after the fees he will be paid, that he couldn't care less about customer service. The engineer said that he was looking for another job as he really hated working for them, which was reassuring for me as he actually cared about the standard of work he was doing.

Anyway he removed the old satellite dish and fitted a new one as my signal was weak apparently. No one told him that I had no skart socket so someone will have to come back to install the connection and I need to get a longer multi-socket lead, the set top box only has about a metre and that isn't long enough to reach the wall socket and sit on top of the telly and I cannot spare that socket anyway, I need it for the vacuum cleaner.

I guess for £40 it is good value to have it installed, and with the new dish.

Sue, if your TV doesn't have a scart on it it belongs in a museum You shouldn't really need one anyway as the set top box should have an RF out so it can be connected directly to the aerial input on the TV. Scarts just make things a bit easier. Any competent engineer should be able to tune your TV in to pick up the signal from the box. It's a five minute job. I think the £40 installation is a set fee for certain people who qualify.

I bought the telly when I moved into this house so it is about twenty give or take, but it has hardly been used. I used to have Sky analogue but when that went off I haven't used it, it just sits there. I will use it when I get the FreeSat rigged up properly.

I just went and looked, there is the power cable, a skart socket (with the other end of the lead sitting on the floor) and a lead into the aerial socket in the wall. I have a double aerial socket, the normal telly and the satellite, both have cables plugged in.

The FreeSat box is Grundig GUFSAT 101DHS - and yes, I qualify for the Help Scheme hence the £40 flat fee.

I just Googled the model number and it looks as if it a special Digital Help Scheme box, really basic, the bare minumum required to enable the set to receive digital. He spoke about a modulator or something like that which hadn't arrived yet.

The box should be connected to the dish, otherwise it's not freeSAT. I'm assuming one of the aerial sockets goes to the dish. Some people did it that way but it's not ideal. The feed from the dish should have a little connector on the end that screws into a connector on the box. A direct feed is best as any form of join can interrupt the signal and an aerial connection is one of the worst. I had to replace hundreds and fit the proper ends. I haven't come across a box that needs a separate modulator. They're built in. That's the bit that the TV picks up it's non digital signal from and converts it to something the TV can recognise. It might be worth trying to get a cheap TV with a scart. On the mainland there is a thing called freecycle. People donate stuff they no longer need and it costs you nothing except for having to collect it. You can also ask for something you need and if someone has it they get in touch.

We don't have Freecycle but have something similar where people get rid of stuff, we cannot ask for stuff. Since the Help Scheme people are responsible for getting it up and running I won't bother to replace the tv at this time, they will bring whatever is necessary to get it receiving and working.

The man said something about three feeds from the dish, I assume one is my Sky, one is for the FreeSat and heaven knows what the other is, perhaps to the booster box thing in the loft. Who ever comes to do the final bit will show me how it all works.

Three feeds the dish? Will that not mean three cables coming into your house?

I have FreeSat from Sky (I'm too mean to pay for a Sky subscription) plus an analogue aerial with a cable that is split to feed both the living room and kitchen TVs.
When my region (Ulster) goes digital, I'll have to decide whether to get a new kitchen TV or a digi box for the current one, both feeding from a new aerial, or a wireless connection from the LR satellite box to the kitchen.

£40 seems to be a reasonable price to pay if you get a new dish, cabling, a set top box and installation.

I used to be amused at people who had TVs in their bedroom. To my mind there are only two things that a bedroom is really for (!), but now with the financial situation looking to get worse, I can see that we may all have to huddle beneath the bedclothes as soon as the sun goes down because we can't afford to heat our homes, so maybe a TV in the bedroom will not be wasted...