Formula 1 on 19.2E

[F]

I'm fed up with spending hours avoiding hearing or seeing the results of F1 qualifying or races that the BBC are not showing live. And I'm even more fed up when my attempts fail!

To avoid this I'm thinking of sticking a second dish on the wall and pointing it at 19.2E for the live broadcasts on RTL. If I do this, I understand that I will need to connect both my current 28.2E feed (which comes through a multiswitch in the loft) and the new feed into a DiSEqC switch and then connect the output from the DiSEqC switch to my Foxsat-HDR's input.

Before I get the ladders out...

Is the above correct, and are there any gotchas to look out for?

With this setup, would the Foxsat automatically switch between satellites as the recording schedule required, or is it necessary to make the change manually?

Is the Foxsat the best option for this, or would it be advisable to buy a different, second PVR? If so, is any particular PVR to be recommended?

[Andy Burns]

You don't have to have two dishes, two LNBs on one dish (still with the DiSEqC switch) will suffice.

[F]

Yes, sorry, I should have made it clear that I knew that. The idea of a second dish was that the first is a larger 60cm zone 2 dish with a quad LNB and so 4 cables from it. I want to avoid overloading the dish with the additional offset arm, LNB and cable and risking it moving too much in the wind.

[tony sayer]

FWIW we have One garden mounted 600 mm dish with Three LNB's thereon and a 4 way Diseq switch and the LNB's are on 13,19.2 and 28.2 respectfully and do work well.

We also have Telecom 5 on a separate dish into the same diseq switch and its ticked fine for years....

[Brian Gaff]

As an aside, it does make you wonder about the contractual situation for F1, if one network can screen it free while another charges and the main broadcaster puts it out time delayed.

Crazy.

Brian

[Another Dave]

True but to get commentary in English you have to tune in to Radio 5Live I believe.

Another Dave

[Mentalguy2k8]

Yeah it wouldn't be so bad but there's hardly any decent sport left on the BBC since they decided to blow their entire sports budget on the F1 Scalectrix snooze-fest.

I seem to remember reading that the BBC got a bit carried away spending money and ended up having to re-negotiate the rights which meant they shared the F1 season with Sky but were only allowed to show half of the races live.

I think Ecclestone saw the BBC coming a mile off.

[The Natural Philosopher]

will net you a free lo res live feed

[Another Dave]

Thanks for that. It's not needed for Monaco as the BBC are showing everything but I'll try it on the later races.

Another Dave

[F]

[snip]

Thanks.

[F]

Thanks, I'm making progress on this...

I'm going for a second dish for 19.2E as the present one has enough hanging off of it and I want to get the strongest signals I can.

I have a Vision multiswitch in the loft with all four inputs filled from the present quad LNB. All eight outputs are distributed around the house. To distribute the signal from 19.2E around the house, and keep all options from the present LNB, can I add outputs from, say, a dual LNB on the second dish to the multiswitch using a DiSEqC switch on one of its inputs? Or is it best to run new cables from the new dish and install DiSEqC switches immediately before two receivers?

[tony sayer]

Crumbs you must watch a lot of TV!.. I don't think you'll have much success adding on another in the original system, seems rather complex with the switching perhaps it might be best to limit this to the Two receivers that you refer to...

[F]

No, we just watch in a number of locations. It's a little like having two toilets: you don't pee twice as much!

I decided that if I was going to put in a distribution system then I might as well cover all potential options while I was at it rather than have to re-visit the issue.

I think I'll do just that.