I may have to get satellite TV for my mother, as analogue tv transmissions (aerial reception) will be obsolete by 2012.
I was thinking of getting a Free To Air satellite system for my mother.
I hear a lot of people have so many problems associated with Satellite TV with commercial satellite TV providers.
I want to think about it very carefully, but I have no one else to turn to, so I hope to get some good answers here.
Thanks.
(I am presuming that you are in Ireland and you are referring to the rte satalite thing so apologies if my information doesn’t apply to your question)
If you have sky tv (payable monthly) you will not be affected because the subscription covers rte1, rte2, tv3 and t na g as standard.
If you do not have sky, you have two choices if you do not want to get free to air:
1. You can buy a digital satelite box to receive rte 1, rte2, tv3 and t na g, 3e and a lot of the irish radio channels. The box cost me about 110 euro and that included installation.
2. You can buy a new tv (but at present only large screen tvs have this) with the built in aerial. Lidl had them a few weeks ago with the proper built in arial. That will cost you at least a couple of hundred euros.
I have free to air as well. It’s fine, you get all the itv channels which are good for the soaps and all the bbc channels along with channel 4, more 4, film 4, basic music channels etc. This is slightly expensive and does not (as far as I am aware) cover rte1, rte2, tv3 and t na g as standard because it is an UK based system. I got this system years ago, I had to pay for the dish, box and card as well as installation. It was pricey back then, it cost me over 300 euro at the time. You see the satelite dishes/boxes come up from time to time in Aldi and Lidl, they will do fine (but again won’t have the rte1, rte2, tv3 and t na g) and you could pay someone locally to install it for you, if you’re not happy with the channels just buy the viewing card for free to air and it should work in the box. The installation was quick enough they just have to feed the aerial in from outside at the dish.
If you live in the UK, free to air comes as standard in most new tv’s so you just have to set the auto tune and it will tune it in automatically for you
Hope this info helps, don’t forget to price around and make sure the company is reputable if you are buying free to air from them.