A question for daveh75

[SpiceWeasel]

Hi, moving to a new house next weekend... hopefully (still waiting for the ok & paperwork to be sorted by letting agency). At the moment we have a multi room SKY setup with a sky+ and bog standard box. My question though is it cheaper to pay SKY to move our current setup, or cancel it and order a new set up at the new house ? I know you get the best deals as a new customer so my brother could order it as at the moment SKY is in my name. We rent a house together btw.

I was thinking about getting SKY HD although the £10 a month extra does seem a bit of a rip off tbh. So that would be a new hd box and using the old sky+ box. Is HD worth paying extra for especially as some channels like bbc hd are now starting to use reduced bitrates. Surely the other channels will be heading in the same direction as they add more HD channels. So I am thinking maybe just get another sky+ box instead and save £10 a month.

The other question I have is regarding phone lines as I don't think theres a phone socket any where near where the boxes will be. As you have to have a phone line connected for the 1st year would the installer also run phone lines if required and would this be included in the installation cost or would you have to pay extra ? Would they run this outside the house with the SKY cables or would it be an internal around the skirting board job. Being rented we may need to look into it, although got the go ahead from the owners that we can install SKY.

We also may be able to get virgin at the new house as I think they have fiber optic, although we tried checking online but our house number does not appear. The house is a new build and has only been built for a year but we are looking to get broadband through virgin fiber optic if possible. Does anyone know whats required to get fiber optic setup, do they hook it up to the street outside the house or would you have to pay extra for a line to the house as it's a new build and I doubt there would be one there already. From the street to the house I mean.

If we can get fiber optic woud it be better/cheaper to get everything through virgin, although I know they only have a handfull of HD channels compared to SKY. But I don't think you have to pay an extra £10 a month for the privelage.

Thanks

 

[SpiceWeasel]

Forgot to mention that I have a Pany42PZ85 full HD tv and I tend to mostly watch Discovery channels and History etc.

 

[daveh75]

SpiceWeasel:

Hi, moving to a new house next weekend... hopefully (still waiting for the ok & paperwork to be sorted by letting agency). At the moment we have a multi room SKY setup with a sky+ and bog standard box. My question though is it cheaper to pay SKY to move our current setup, or cancel it and order a new set up at the new house ? I know you get the best deals as a new customer so my brother could order it as at the moment SKY is in my name. We rent a house together btw. Well a "moving home" install(i.e you take your old equipment with you,and Sky come and fit a new dish/cabling etc,at your new address) will cost £60.

If your brother subscribe's as a new customer, it will cost £49 for the box( either a standard Sky+ or Sky+HD) + you get a free multiroom box(standard Sky box) and usually a £30 install/set up cost, but i'm sure they're waiving that ATM so install/set up is free,i would check on that though.SpiceWeasel: I was thinking about getting SKY HD although the £10 a month extra does seem a bit of a rip off tbh. So that would be a new hd box and using the old sky+ box. Is HD worth paying extra for especially as some channels like bbc hd are now starting to use reduced bitrates. Surely the other channels will be heading in the same direction as they add more HD channels. So I am thinking maybe just get another sky+ box instead and save £10 a month.
That's a judgement call you'll have to make unfortunately, I subscribed to SkyHD on launch but cancelled after 3 months as we was mainly watching stuff that was FTA(free to air) so it wasn't worth paying the sub's for me and why i now have Freesat and european satellite for sport's coverage.

With regard to the falling b/rates it still seems unclear why th BBC have done this,though there has been hint's on other forum's that it's a budgetary rather than a bandwidth one.But there isn't an unlimited amount of bandwidth and usable frequencies available,so as more channels go HD and the launch Sky3D etc we certainly may see bitrates tumbling to accomodate them.SpiceWeasel: The other question I have is regarding phone lines as I don't think theres a phone socket any where near where the boxes will be. As you have to have a phone line connected for the 1st year would the installer also run phone lines if required and would this be included in the installation cost or would you have to pay extra ? Would they run this outside the house with the SKY cables or would it be an internal around the skirting board job. Being rented we may need to look into it, although got the go ahead from the owners that we can install SKYYes,the engineer will run the cabling to the phone socket, and yes it's part of the installation so wont cost any extra.If it's a Sky engineer then the cable will be run internally round skirtings etc. If it's a subby they may/may not carry external telco cable, so it can be run externally if it's easier/neater to do so.But don't automatically expect it as it's not a requirement by Sky to do so,so some independent's dont/wont run external phone cabling.

Cant help with your VM questions i'm affraid,as i've never looked into it as my area's not cabled.

 

[SpiceWeasel]

Thanks for the help daveh, your advice has helped me no end. Looks like a new install is the best way to go then, or possibly virgin but will need to look into this further.

 

[Anonymous]

Hi,

if you pay an additional one-off £25 you don't need to permanently connect the sky box to the phone line. The engineer will use a telephone extension reel to validate the card in the box and then leave you without the cabling. Obviously you won't have the interactive facility if you do this.

Kev.

 

[daveh75]

kevol:
Hi,

if you pay an additional one-off £25 you don't need to permanently connect the sky box to the phone line. The engineer will use a telephone extension reel to validate the card in the box and then leave you without the cabling. Obviously you won't have the interactive facility if you do this.

Kev.

Sky don't offer NPL(no phone line) install's on multi-room install's unfortunately and must be connected to the phone line.It's to stop customer's getting a second box cheap/free with cheap multiroom sub's and then giving it to friend's/family or using it at caravan/holiday home etc......