Hello Freesat
May 7, 2008 by upyourego
In my house I currently have three television - not including the giant, multi-layered, worlwide content rich television called … my computer.My main television is in the living room and as I’ve already mentioned has Sky+, a PS2, a couple of DVD recorders and my computer attached to it.
The second is in my bedroom and has an ordinary Sky box (with multi-room subscription/card) and a DVD player attached to it.
The third and final television is in the kitchen and has a Sky box attached to it but without a card so I currently only get the BBC and ITV Digital Channels, the Radio stations and a load of crappy cheap channels.
I don’t have televisions in either of my two older childrens bedrooms as they’re only four and seven and FAR too young to have their own TVs (although I’m thinking about getting my seven year old a computer for her room - without internet access).
Image via Wikipedia
It’s that third television that I’m going to write about - well not technically the third television but the box I intend to put underneath it.
Thanks to the BBC and ITV I no longer need to use an old Sky box and piss about skipping through dozens of channels telling me to get a Sky subscription.
I can now just go into a shop buy a £45 Freesat box, plug it in and enjoy more or less the same channels you can get in large parts of England on Freeview.
We don’t have Freeview in Jersey and won’t until 2013 (when the analogue channels will be switched off and the digital service switched on over night) so having Freesat will be a big deal.
However - you currently can’t buy a box in Jersey as none of the four partner retailers (Argos, Currys, Comet and John Lewis) have shops in the island and I’ve been told by one of the only independent retails being allowed to sell boxes in Jersey that only 20 will be sent to Jersey in the first run.
In fact he told me only 500 boxes were being made available to independent retailers across the whole of the UK - so we might not even get the 20 in Jersey.
Apparently stock levels should be up to spec by August - but that’s a long time to wait if your eager to get some free HD tv before the Olympics.
But I don’t want to dwell on the negative at the moment as this is a great new service.
And Freesat is going to be a LOT more than just a satellite version of Freeview - it will eventually have more channels than Freeview (with the hope of increasing to 200 by the end of next year and will have HD - two to start with eventually increasing to four.
It’s going to be an open platform - the boxes will have an ethernet post built in (not unusual for a satellite box but this one will actually be useful) and will have an architecture that will allow applications to be developed for it.
The first of these will be the BBC iPlayer - there are plans to launch iPlayer for Freesat by the end of the year with a specially designed interface and I’m sure we’ll see something from Kangaroo not long after that.
But you could equally see a YouTube player for Freesat - as services like this would be connecting to the internet for their data delivery and not attempting to use the Satellite (which would require a very limited delivery) you can do a LOT more.
In fact you could see a whole new BBC News Multi-Screen that delivers a massive selection of on-demand videos (from BBC News Online) through a Freesat interface.
Although I may actually have dreamed all of that or at the very least mis-read the meaning of Open Platform and the comments made in interviews and press statements - but the above WOULD be good.
There’s a great post by Brian Butterworth on UKfree.tv from the press launch of Freesat that goes into a LOT more details of what the platform offers, can offer and will offer.
Also worth checking out is a post by the BBC Tech guy Rory Cellan-Jones on the BBC dot.life blog that looks at the potential market for Freesat and what would make it a success in the eyes of the services founders.
You can also read the launching channel list on the second page of the Register Hardware review.
Speaking of HD there is also a really good post explaining HD at the BBC by the person responsible for it, Seetha Kumar, on the BBC Internet Blog.
The current batch of boxes will NOT have pay TV capabilities but it doesn’t mean a manufacturer couldn’t release a box with a card slot - much like they could on the DTT platform if they wanted to.
All the BBC TV regions will be available through their own channel numbers (like they do now through SKY) and all the ITV regions will be available by pushing the red button on ITV 1.
You’ll also be able to set your own region for 101 and 103 by entering a postcode.
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[...] Original post by Up Your Ego [...]
Ryan, is there no way to order it online from any of the retailers? Or do they not deliver to the channel islands?
Yeah I’ve just found out I can order from John Lewis and Currys as they both deliver to the island BUT neither have any stock at the moment!