steve_nairn_sti

Hi People.

My satellite signal has been screwed up over the past few days. It's not been particularly bad weather but I keep getting the "No satellite signal is being received" message. It's now been permanently on screen on all channels for over 24 hrs.

Sky were useless and told me to check the connections to the digibox. After that they wanted me to get an engineer out for £65!

The lock indicator shows as not locked with the Network ID and Transport Stream both show as 0000 and there is no data in the signal strength and signal quality fields.

Is it likely that I will just need to re-align the dish or is it more probable that I have a faulty lnb/dish/digibox?

Digibox model is Amstrad DV3 if this helps.

Any help appreciated.... I hate having no TV!!!

douglasb

It's been a while since I had anything similar, but powering the box down (remove the power lead) for a couple of minutes and cleaning the contacts on the viewing card has done the trick for me in the past. Have you tried this yet?

I can't see why you'd need to re-align the dish if it hasn't moved.

pslewis

Strange??

SKY are renowned for their OUTSTANDING Customer Service!!!

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NOT!!!

I don't know why anyone bothers .... £45 a month for repeated crap, over and over and over again - then, if you have a problem, is TOUGH TITTY!!!

Pete

steve_nairn_sti

I know. It's a right royal pain in the **** when it buggers up like this!!

Thanks for the help so far. I've powered down and removed viewing card etc but it didn't resolve it.

I'm trying a hard reboot procedure that I found on another tech site at the mo so should know in about 10 mins or so if that's worked.

The reason I think the dish might need re-aligned is because the weather has been crappy lately and I reckon it might have thrown the dish out slightly. Will need to get the ladders out tomorrow if this hard reboot doesn't work me thinks!!

JPL

You need to reinstall the box, can be done easily using the remote but I've forgotten how - I moved and now have to use NTL thanks to a f*cking great oak tree in the way.

From what I remember, got to services, but instead of pressing 1, you press 01 and a different menu pops up. If you buy the second remote the intructions are in there - so rifle through a DIY store.

Whatever you think of Sky... don't you dare knock it until you try NTL, customer service... what the f*ck is that!!!??

Dr Hu

one thing to watch with SKY callouts which royally pissed me off when I paid the £65 call out, is the fact that they dont carry sky boxes on the van - yep - you read right - they DONT carry the boxes as spares

So you have a day off work for them to come out - they plug in a little meter on the line, 30 secs later:- its your box mate - we dont carry those.......

wha????

So I've waited in all day for a 30sec diagnosis - which I could have told you first and you dont bring any spares FFS

Cue another week without TV, whilst they send your box off for repair......

Dont bother with SKY repair service - get a local independant in - prob cheaper and much, much, much better service - prob have it fixed within an hour. Trust me.

feckin bastids......

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

They've been updating the firmware over the past few months.

But I will say our box has never skipped a beat, come rain, hail, snow or storms


If resetting the box makes no difference, then there is only 5 other things to go wrong on these....in order of most likely:

LNB (bit on the end of the dish- very common)
Dish alignment (made worse if the LNB is on its last legs)
Box (corrupt firmware, fried reciever/PSU etc)
Cable (can get chewed through by rats etc.)
Card (did you pay the bill? And story about static is complete rubbish )

As mentioned above use Independents. - they are much cheaper and friendlier to deal with.

Or buy the new bits off eBay (cheap as chips )

As a footnote, the boxes can overheat, especially with DVD players, VCRs etc and other stuff piled on top, so first thing is leave switched off and unplugged for a few hours to cool off.

steve_nairn_sti

Thanks Ali-B.

I've just reset the box but to no avail. I've also tried turning off the LNB Power Supply and 22KHz Command options then turning them back on but it's made no difference. The system is JUST over a year old (which is typical because it was guaranteed for the first year) so I wouldn't think the LNB would be goosed but it's still a possibility I suppose.

Going to re-align the dish tomorrow and see how I get on from there. Bill is all fully paid!

Cable is routed externally and I can't see any breaks in the cable but will give it a good check tomorrow. I'm going to try and get hold of a neighbours box too if the realignment doesn't make a difference..... Might do that first actually.

Off to bed for another night without any decent telly then! SIGH! Cheers for all the suggestions guys! I can always rely on Scoobynetters!

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Borrowing your neigbours box is probably the easiest thing to do.

Then you know if it's your dish or your box

JPL

And if it still doesn't work ask your neighbour if you can borrow his wife!

rgv_stu

we had that same sounding problem
we told em we were cancelling unless they fixed it for free....
they came out, changed the box, the lnb , realigned the dish before realising the cable was damaged, so they replaced that.
now we have virtually a brand new system except the dish

Jay m A

iTrader: (2)

Hmm, I hav'nt had ITV (via SKY) for a while now, not really a problem just an annoyance.

How come I can't get a signal for ITV1, 2 and 3 yet all other 999million SKY channels are OK?

steve_nairn_sti

I was checking the cable routing the other day and happened to glance up at the dish.......

Two bolts securing the dish were missing and it was flapping about quite freely in the wind!!! :EEK: :EEK:

Got a couple of bolts and my local engineer is going to fit them and align the dish for £20. Not bad I suppose.

Had to speak to Sky customer services twice though and I've never been so appalled with ANY service as I was with them.

Arseholes!

Anyway, problem solved. Thanks people!

TruthHurts

lol@people paying £65 for a Sky engineer callout.

Ring them, tell them you can't pick up their **** anymore then when they offer you the £65 call out tell them you'd rather cancel and ask them to put you through to disconnections. At this point the engineer callout becomes free. If you fancy a new digibox you can do the same thing.

In any case Sky is utter crap and you're a mug for having it- all IMO of course.

steve_nairn_sti

Well thanks for your input......

TruthHurts

Who knows it might save some dumb **** £65 on a callout fee for a Sky 'engineer' (HA!). Therefore pretty useful, although I can save you £40 a month or so depending on package if you follow this advice



TRY NOT WASTING YOUR LIFE WATCHING TV. OR IF YOU INSIST ON SITTING ON YOUR FAT ASSES EVERY NIGHT TRY JUST WATCHING THE FREE CHANNELS INSTEAD OF ZAPPING FROM CHANNEL TO CHANNEL IN A DESPERATE ATTEMPT TO FIND SOMETHING TO WATCH- WHILE NEVER REALLY ENJOYING ANYTHING

This announcement was brought to you by the National Association for Educating the Stupid.

steve_nairn_sti

Why judge people when you know nothing about them??

Ever read a book called "How to win friends and influence people"?

It's a good read.....

TruthHurts

Dale Carnegie, use his techniques in my everyday social engineering. Here I prefer to educate and use a stick, it's the best way of teaching dumb animals.

steve_nairn_sti

Trust me, nothing you have said in this conversation will educate either myself or any others on this site.

I won't lower this into a petty slagging match so enjoy arguing with yourself while I go and find something more entertaining to do.

mightyyid

Steve

The only good thing about the £65 is that if the digibox is screwed, they will leave a replacement there and then - thus getting you working. If you go for someone local, they will charge less (say £40) call out fee, but if they then tell you your digibox is screwed, you have to buy another one, which is down to you (ebay etc) and of course you're without Sky for the interim.

I decided the best way was to pay the £65 - at least we knew it would all be sorted and we'd be working. Unfortunately, we went from Pace v2 box to an Amstrad, which does not seem to have as good picture quality.

In regards the secret menu, it's 4, then 0, then 1 - in order, followed by select. A planner rebuild is the first thing to do, as this often frees up lost space. The new installation (bottom option IIRC) will lose all your saved items and all your programmes - so make a separate note.

Hope this helps

Andy

TruthHurts

See Nairny, if this idiot above could read properly he'd have saved himself £65. Sort of makes your comments about nobody benefiting from my advice look ******* stupid.

I'll say it again in big writing for the dumbos.

YOU DON'T NEED TO PAY £65 FOR ANYTHING, FOLLOW MY ADVICE AS OUTLINED ABOVE AND YOU CAN HAVE A NEW BOX FOR FREE AS WELL AS A FREE ENGINEER CALLOUT.

Truth really does hurt sometimes

mightyyid

How nice of you to call me an idiot. I'm flattered...

kiss kiss

TruthHurts

My pleasure, anytime, what else would you call someone who just needlessly p1ssed £65 up the wall?
Next time you kiss my *** have a shave first.

mightyyid

I'm sure we've both pissed at leats £65 up the wall many a time - and unlike with Sky forgotten about it by the next morning.

and by the looks of your ****, I wasn't the first person not to have had a shave!

TruthHurts

lol fairy nuff

Top tip though don't spunk any more of your cash on Sky. You'd do better 'wasting it' on Coke N Hookers.

mightyyid

Fair point well made. Had a laugh today anyway... cheers for the cheer!