Freeview in Spain

hi all,

we are making our first visit to our purchase on camposol on the 6th march, and cannot wait.

we hope to retire there very soon, within the next 2 months.

whilst over there we are going to buy a tele, we already have a large dish on the roof, does anybody have any suggestions as to the type of tele we should buy, we have two options, a small 17" that we could use in the bedroom at a later stage, or a 26" as a permanant lounge tele, also when does digital start in spain.

thanking you in advance, tom and eve

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Digital terrestrial is already there in spain and size of tele depends on your own lifestyle but I would go with the lounge option

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many thanks conrad, we have wasted enough money in this life do not want to waste any more.

may see you out there at some point.

regards tom and eve

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The previous owners of our house left us two tv's, a 22" in the lounge and a 14" in the bedroom.

Originally you could get English tv in both places but once it went digital you need boxes for each tv.

I decided to take out a tv/dvd combo as I've never seen them for sale in Spain, the one we bought in Tesco's has a multi region dvd very handy for our large collection of Region 1 dvd's.

We also bought a 28" tv from Eroski for the lounge, they normally have good deals there.

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Enjoy your holiday, Tom & Eve. We go March 17th for 25 days. (Guardamar, CB)

Please would you mind updating your location on your forum profile so others can see where you've bought ?

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HI

We are out on tuesday 20th may to buy tv and freeview torn between carfour and torrogroso homes (an all in one shop) does anyone have a number of some one too fit sat dish extra

Thanx for your help everyone (in advance)

Steve

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Bobaol,

can i ask how you got on with the tv dongal.

i have used the slingbox connection but have to  rely on the upload speed from uk so its not fantastic.

simon

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The dongle didn't work in the El Galan area at all.  No TV channels picked up whatsoever (In March this year).  Then I noticed an ad in the free papers saying "Digital TV  coming July 2008" so that's probably why I couldn't pick anything up.  Either that or I didn't have a good enough aerial.
In May, I tried it out in Quesada using the communal TV aerial and picked up well over 20 channels.  All in Spanish except for BBC Prime and BBC 24.  Unfortunately, I don't have a PC connection on my TV so I couldn't try out the dual language option.  So, yes, it worked but I guess you have to have a good aerial and be in a good reception area.  Won't be taking over my TV with the PC connection for some time so can't report on that.
Amazon are selling this for £9.99 which is brilliant.  I pick up all the Freeview channels in UK on it and can connect my PC to my TV.  I assume I picked up all the Spanish Freeview channels as well from Quesada and will try it out again in El Galan in September (when Freeview comes to that area).
You do, however, need a decent aerial.  The one that comes with the dongle is rubbish, can't even pick up anything on it UK, but I can pick them up with an indoor aerial providing I go upstairs.  The normal outdoor aerial picks up everything.

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I live in an apartment block and receive tv via a communal aerial. I purchased a freeview box from Carrefour about a year ago and can receive most of the freeview stations including the English versions but this was still a bit hit and miss when i was last out there in early June. We are not allowed to put up satellite dishes and most people who receive Sky do so by a box. i assume that there could be more than 1 provider but as far as i can tell you pay 400E and then so much a month. I think 400E is a rip off price and as we only go out to Spain infrequently this does not justify the price for us. 

Has anyone with a communal system tried using a freesat box or even a digital skybox on a similar system? I understand Telemicro has stopped broadcasting and I wonder if this will affect the systems broadcasting sky to communities. At the moment there seems to be an argument as to whether receiving sky in Spain is legal or not. Any info would be appreciated.

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Hi,

TDT is spanish version of the uk "freeview". you get the signals from the tv aerial. just like the UK service there are channels on TDT, that are not available for free on satellite - spain has europes first and only free digital terrestrial Disney Channel!!
you can get up to 30+ channels depending on your area and which transmmitter you are closest to. many of the channels allow you to change the  soundtrack to the original version - meaning if it is available, a movie or programme made in the uk or usa, will be available in english - this is not al the time or on all stations - on one channel you can get the simpsons in english, on the "sister" channel you cannot!!
check out tdt.es and put in your postcode / town and you can see if you are in a good area and what channels are available. if you are not getting all the channels you should be complain to the community administrator.

You cannot receive UK freeview in Spain.

Freeview is a terrestrial system via land based mast and TV aerial. Freeview is not availabel via satellite. A Freeview box connects to a TV aerial.  you cannot use a Freeview box with a satellite dish (ubnless it is a sat / terrestrial combo unit). A Freeview box in Spain will only receive the Spanish digital terrestrial channels.

Avoid installers in Spain who say they can get Freeview in Spain, or advertise Freeview in Spain - there are a number of these "cowboys" around, who use this incorreect terminology - if they cannot use the correct terminology can you trust them to do an installation?. It is impossible to get Freeview in Spain, as the nearest "UK Freeview" transmitter is in the Channel ISlands, and its siganls just do not reach as far as Spain.

to use a sky a freesat receiver you must have a satellite dish pointing at the satellite constellation at 28.2 - 5 degrees east of south - know as the Astra 2 group as the satellites there are Astra 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d and eurobird1. 

there is no argument as to whether receiving sky in Spain is legal or not. receiving and watching any free satellite channels (BBC, ITV, C4 and about 100 others) is not illegal. receiving and watching a sky channel directly from the satellite is also not illegal, but you are breaking hte terms and conditions of your sky contract, which state you must not use a sky card outside the uk, and if sky find out then they will disconnect you.

unless you community has a dish pointing at the astra 2 satelites, then any UK programming was being received by rebroadcaster. you cannot use a sky or freesat receiver with the "mesh aerial" used by telemicro of any other rebroadcaster to get UK TV channels.

more info in the telemicro gone thread...

 

This message was last edited by satandpcguy on 04/09/2011.

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Many thanks for the information. I don't know what the current situation is locally until I go out in a short time.

The Telemicro situation seems to have brought things to a head and it will be interesting to see how it progresses. I wonder whether this is the start of any further action against other providers.

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i have read on various other forums that many other providers were visited by the guardia and told to take off "sky subscription" channels. TM may have been targetted as being a major player and to be made an example of. but we will not know the main reason until either the court documents are made public or when / if TM return and with what channels.

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I first heard about TM on another forum where there is still much discussion on the subject. This is the first I have heard about other providers being targetted. If this is to be the case then it appears the only way to receive British television is going to be via an individual 2.4m dish. This would not be practical in most cases I would imagine. Hopefully common sense will prevail.

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My oh my, when did T.V. ever rule our lifes, oh what would we do without it?

Now if everyone decides to have a barbie, we wouldnt need Sky would we, O.K. who's first?

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Worry not! 

Just spoke to Telmicro on their phone line (902512930 in case anyone else wants to call), and they confirmed they have all relevant licenses to install and broadcast digital TV systems, I asked if that includes English channels too and they confirmed there are some that are allowed and some that are not, others need to be confirmed if they're legal or not. She gave me some of the channels that'll def be back when they come back mid-sept... Fox, National Geographic, Calle13, Sky News, Cinestar etc. Others will be coming back as and when the courts confirm they're legal. She made a good point - after all this, if Telmicro can't show the channels, then no other company can legally show them either.

Having looked at a number of forums and papers etc I'm getting loads of conflicting rumours, and I'm not gonna be changing to any other company just yet... I'd rather save my money, get a tan and see what happens.

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Hi we have a 1.8m dish pointing to astra we dont get chanel 4 or ch 5 ,i just hope where not next to have ours turned off bye irene

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"Hi we have a 1.8m dish pointing to astra we dont get chanel 4 or ch 5 ,i just hope where not next to have ours turned off bye irene"

if you have a 1.8m dish pointing towards the astra satellites at 28.2 to 28.5 degrees east of south, then you are on the main satellites for the UK channels.
C4 has recently changed frequency so it is not as easy to receive as it was before august - in my area if you can get BBC2 you can get C4.
Five can be received on an 80cm dish. you do need a sky receiver and a "freesatfomsky" onoff payment card or a sky subscription card to unscramble Five, Fiver and Five US, C4+1, Sky Three, Sultana Sports News.

I dont thinkthat these satellites will be turned off (unless a huge meteroite hits them!!!) - if so 8 million Sky subscribers, and many more freetoair and freesat users will be up in arms!!!!

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hi our community put the dish up in the costa del sol area gemstat instilled it we have a freeview box  put up in april are you saying we need to tune our box in to get ch4 and ch5 ? bye irene

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"hi our community put the dish up in the costa del sol area gemstat instilled it we have a freeview box  put up in april are you saying we need to tune our box in to get ch4 and ch5 ? bye irene"

if your dish is pointing to the correct satellites (those at 28.2 degrees) for UK TV, and you have a satellite receiver, you will get all the free tv channels broadcast on those satellites - bbc itv and c4 if the dish is properly aligned.

if you do not have a freesat or sky receiver then you will have to manually tune the channels into the receiver.
freesat or sky receiver automatically scan and tune in the channels.
c5 is only available with a sky card - and a sky receiver - at the moment
sometimes a sky receiver that has no sky card in and just being powered up (after a power cut) will not show c4 or c5 in the channel list - you get a red channel unavailable message if you type in 105... they will appear when a sky card is put into the receiver...

a freeview receiver will not work with satellite signals. freeview is the name of the uk only digital tv service provided by the tv aerials on the roofs of UK properties. span has its version of freeview called TDT - digital TV provided by tv aerials.

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Found the posting by Loulouspain very interesting re the response from Telemicro. There was no mention about the channels watched by the majority of Brits  - BBC,  ITV Channel4 etc.

I have no idea who provides the signal for our complex. All I know is that all the Spanish terrestrial stations can be picked up free with a bog standard tv setup and more Spanish channels with a TDT box. In addition Sky was offered via an installation charge of between 400 & 500 euros + about 15euros per month. No idea if this is by 1 provider or several. All the signals appear to come down 1 cable to the coax socket. Will be interesting to see if Sky still being received. Going out there soon. If Sky not affected then I suspect this is because the system is connected to a big dish somewhere, so a freesat box might work?. 400euros+ for a box - someone is making a lot of money somewhere!

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