DIY satellite Dish

[Xraynorm]

I have finally given up with freeview through an aerial, I just cant get a consistently good signal.

Apparently if you point a satellite dish at the at the Astra satellite, you can receive free to air channels with a satellite box.

How easy is it to aline the dish to the satellite?

Signal meters from are cheap from ebay, is this something I can do?

[wiz]

ItÅ› easy with a compass, a protractor and a television you can see from the dish, if you know the approximate angles to point the dish to.
Alternatively, look at a neighbours dish, see where that is pointing and copy it.

Align the dish roughly by the compass reading (or copying) and then use the signal strength meter (shown on the tv screen) of the satellite receiver to do the fine tuning side to side & up & down.

I would check that the free channels are definitely available before buying anything though. ( Oh, and don´t fall off the roof)

[M0PHP]

This might be some help.

[buchaille]

Step 14. Go to the fridge, crack open a beer and watch the BBC. By the time you've finished your beer and flipped through all the channels you will have realised that you have a couple of hundred channels, nearly all of which carry total rubbish. Welcome to the world of satellite TV.

Oh, so true! Yet I still can't persuade my other half to let the Sky subscription lapse

[Dutch_Master]

Well, how about 'forgetting' to pay it? To trick the Mrs, record a day's worth of stuff and tune the Sky channel to that of the continiously running PVR (with MythTV, of course ) She won't notice the difference for at least a week, a fortnight if you're lucky. By then she's so far behind she'll probably lost the plot and her interest

[PLOP]...
Ohwell, can't blame a guy for daydreamin', can you

[buchaille]

Well, how about 'forgetting' to pay it?

This bit won't work: because I can be relied on to forget to pay things she takes care of that part of our family life anyway.

This is a pity, because this suggestion

To trick the Mrs, record a day's worth of stuff and tune the Sky channel to that of the continiously running PVR (with MythTV, of course ) She won't notice the difference for at least a week, a fortnight if you're lucky. By then she's so far behind she'll probably lost the plot and her interest

probably would work - I'd only have to record a few episodes of CSI, ER and NCIS with different channel screens to convince her that all the channels were showing repeats: fairly plausible, I think.

(Hmm. perhaps the last sentence belongs in the thread about acronyms...)