English-speaking satellite dish installers

I currently have the standard sky digi dish, but since bbc1 and itv switched transponders, I cant get the channels. With Euro 2004 coming up, I dont want to miss the games, so I was wondering how much a bigger dish was to buy and install?

Anyone know where I can go to ask?

You will need a minimum of a 85cm dish. I had to get one myself a while ago, it cost about €40. You will also need a new LNB (the receiver) which is about €35.

My friend and I bought the dish and just set it up ourselves, the tricky part is pin pointing the satellite signal. It just takes a little patience and it a lot cheaper than gonig to somewhere like Bavaria Satellite and paying them to install it for you.

I picked up my dish from Schwanthalerstrasse. They have a few shops up there just opposite Saturn. Bargain a bit and you will get a good deal.

I am too scared of death, to get up on my roof.

Right then.

Here is how you get British telly here in Toytown:

1. Go to Aldi and buy the cheap satellite dish setup.
2. Put on an old climbing harness and go up on the roof of your house. Tie yourself to the chimney so you don't fal off.
3. Try to align the dish using an old mountaineering compass which was not used since navigating in a shitty blizzard in Snowdonia. Simultaneously tell yourself you are an ex-climber and should not be wobbling like this.
4. Listen through the baby alarm for your wife to tell you it is aligned okay. Mishear her comment and shift the dish way off line.
5. Come down totally pissed off at your crap DIY efforts.

Now this is the most important step...

7. Call Geoff @ Bavaria Satellite, he will come around and fit the thing properly and take care of the whole deal. But he inisists on lots of cups of British tea, which given my three years supply of Tetley Tea Bags in the cupboard is no problem to supply.

I cannot recommend this company highly enough. They took care of everything for us and we are now enjoying decent telly.

The final stage is...

8. Sit back and enjoy long missed old BBC stuff. Fools and Horses Saturday (the one with Uncle Albert's funeral) and also Red Dwarf repeats.

See you in the spring!

I have a 80cm dish but with a 0.4dB LNB and I get everything no problems. (Signal with my original 0.6dB LNB was a bit flaky in bad weather).

Other thing is that the dish and the LNB were both good brands (Triax and Sharp respectively).

Aligning dish is easy enough without a compass/satfinder- just using you receivers standard signal strength equipment.

Having said that I wouldn't get on the roof myself. I'd get a qualified and insured professional for that.

I have tried re-aligning my dish after a storm and it is not quite as easy as you make out. I spent a good two hours freezing my b***s off without getting the remotest signal. And when I finally did get one it kept fading while i was trying to tighten the brackets.

Maybe I am just incomptetent and no good at DIY but I find it easier to shell out the extra few Euros for Geoff to freeze his off instead. I just make the tea (which I can, just about)

SAT TEAM GmbH DigitalTV-Shop will instal/set up your dish and decoder for a 1-off payment of about €300 - providing you with free-to-air BBC and ITV. No monthly charges either are necessary. That's if you can do without the pay channels like Sky Sports / Movies.