Hoorah! Freesat has finally arrived. I can now sever my relationship with Sky. I am never to be messed about by them again.
Freesat is a joint venture by the good old BBC and ITV and is intended as a viable alternative to freeview. You need a satellite dish, and a freesat box. I can supply and fit the former and you can get the latter from Argos or Currys
Freesat boxes come in 2 flavours, Standard Definition (which is what we are used to) for about £50 and High Definition for about £140. If you have a HD ready TV then you might consider the HD option.
The dish is a normal Sky type, and it needs to be pointed at the normal sky type satellite. Hence you can use an existing sky dish for receiving freesat.
Remember though that if you have a sky dish and box you might have contractual obligations with Sky (normally only for the first 12 months). If you then cancel your subscription your sky box will then do the same job as a freesat Standard Definition box.
The dish needs a good view of the sky to the south east, at an elevation of 25 degrees. In layman's terms, that means any obstruction that is 10 metres away must not be higher than 5 metres above the dish. check out the following tool....
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