Watching Sky TV online

[CerberusRogue]

I don't have Sky TV at home, but I really want to be able to legally watch Sky Sports via their streaming service. Anyone know if Sky offer a streaming only package? I called Sky and bizarrely got 2 different answers: yes and no. So was wondering if anyone else had sussed it out?

I know I could just get a Sky package and the Sky Go comes with it but none of us watch any TV at home (other than me watching some football when it is on freeview) and I don't want a satellite dish on the house. Also, getting the "full" Sky package means I'll end up paying something like £50 a month just to get access to the football, so was wondering if there is a cheaper option...

[Teppic]

CerberusRogue said:

I don't have Sky TV at home, but I really want to be able to legally watch Sky Sports via their streaming service. Anyone know if Sky offer a streaming only package? I called Sky and bizarrely got 2 different answers: yes and no. So was wondering if anyone else had sussed it out?

I know I could just get a Sky package and the Sky Go comes with it but none of us watch any TV at home (other than me watching some football when it is on freeview) and I don't want a satellite dish on the house. Also, getting the "full" Sky package means I'll end up paying something like £50 a month just to get access to the football, so was wondering if there is a cheaper option...

Sky used to do the Sky Go Monthly Ticket, which would fit your requirements, but they stopped the service in May this year.

Your best option I think would be to buy a Now TV box (£25 one off payment) and purchase daily (£6.99) or weekly (£10.99) Sky Sports passes as required.

If you have a PlayStation 3 or 4, or XBox One you can get Now TV via that.

[megaphone]

http://www.nowtv.com

You can watch it on your device or get a box to plug in you TV.

[CerberusRogue]

Nowtv looks like it could cut it. Is it a media centre replacement? I.e can I watch terrestrial tv on it and connect it to a share on my Windows server and watch content?

[DrTre]

Keep an eye on the likes of hotukdeals you find cheap deals very regularly

http://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/pringles-twin-pack...

The original nowtv box was a roku 3 and could have apps like Plex loaded onto it with ease. Not sure about the rest of your question though

[gr1340]

Do you know anyone with the Sky Sports package?

If so, you can watch using an ID linked to their account.

http://help.sky.com/articles/sky-ids-for-family-an...

I have Sky but do not pay for sports but my mother in law does. I have an ID linked to her account which then allows me to use Sky Go (via PC/phone/tablet/PS4 etc) and watch the same channels she has on her package.

Perfectly legal and very simple.

Or, pay £35 for an Amazon Fire stick, install Kodi and watch live TV streams for free using vdubt25.

[CerberusRogue]

gr1340 said:

Do you know anyone with the Sky Sports package?

If so, you can watch using an ID linked to their account.

http://help.sky.com/articles/sky-ids-for-family-an...

I have Sky but do not pay for sports but my mother in law does. I have an ID linked to her account which then allows me to use Sky Go (via PC/phone/tablet/PS4 etc) and watch the same channels she has on her package.

Perfectly legal and very simple.

Or, pay £35 for an Amazon Fire stick, install Kodi and watch live TV streams for free using vdubt25.

I don't know anyone with the sports channels on their subscription. I looked into adding it and paying for that add-on but it's £25 a month. I just spoke to Sky and they offered me a 50% discount for 12 months on a full Sky installation with the sports channels, making is the same money. Sounds very tempting but even with that discount I still wouldn't amortise the £300 odd a year just to watch a couple of football games a month.


Can you elaborate more on the Kodi/vdubt25 idea?

[gr1340]

CerberusRogue said:

I don't know anyone with the sports channels on their subscription. I looked into adding it and paying for that add-on but it's £25 a month. I just spoke to Sky and they offered me a 50% discount for 12 months on a full Sky installation with the sports channels, making is the same money. Sounds very tempting but even with that discount I still wouldn't amortise the £300 odd a year just to watch a couple of football games a month.


Can you elaborate more on the Kodi/vdubt25 idea?

No problem

Buy stick - £35
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Amazon-W87CUN-Fire-TV-Stic...

Install Kodi:
http://kodi.wiki/view/HOW-TO:Install_Kodi_on_Fire_...

Install vdubt25:
https://seo-michael.co.uk/how-to-install-vdubt25-a...

Or if you have a laptop that you can hook up to your TV, TVMC has a downloadable set up already preconfigured:
http://www.tvaddons.ag/tvmc-windows/
You still need to install vdubt25 but the above set up has Genesis and Pheonix included which gives you a huge library of streaming material.

[CerberusRogue]

gr1340 said:

CerberusRogue said:

I don't know anyone with the sports channels on their subscription. I looked into adding it and paying for that add-on but it's £25 a month. I just spoke to Sky and they offered me a 50% discount for 12 months on a full Sky installation with the sports channels, making is the same money. Sounds very tempting but even with that discount I still wouldn't amortise the £300 odd a year just to watch a couple of football games a month.


Can you elaborate more on the Kodi/vdubt25 idea?

No problem

Buy stick - £35
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Amazon-W87CUN-Fire-TV-Stic...

Install Kodi:
http://kodi.wiki/view/HOW-TO:Install_Kodi_on_Fire_...

Install vdubt25:
https://seo-michael.co.uk/how-to-install-vdubt25-a...

Or if you have a laptop that you can hook up to your TV, TVMC has a downloadable set up already preconfigured:
http://www.tvaddons.ag/tvmc-windows/
You still need to install vdubt25 but the above set up has Genesis and Pheonix included which gives you a huge library of streaming material.

looks interesting, will take a look.

Am I being thick? I can't see how this will get me the Sky Sports channels!

[gr1340]

CerberusRogue said:

looks interesting, will take a look.

Am I being thick? I can't see how this will get me the Sky Sports channels!

Sorry, should have explained.

vdubt25 has live streaming of UK and USA sky sports channels as well as other streams including HD content.
The screenshot shows the layout.

[gr1340]

gr1340 said:

Sorry, should have explained.

vdubt25 has live streaming of UK and USA sky sports channels as well as other streams including HD content.
The screenshot shows the layout.

Obviously this isn't as polished as turning on Sky and putting the sports channel on but you can balance this against the cost saving. From turning to watching sport on Sky it takes about 5-10 seconds. With Kodi you are probably looking at about a minute by the time you get the stream playing.

You can't record easily although it can be done by setting up a PVR client.

[CerberusRogue]

gr1340 said:

Obviously this isn't as polished as turning on Sky and putting the sports channel on but you can balance this against the cost saving. From turning to watching sport on Sky it takes about 5-10 seconds. With Kodi you are probably looking at about a minute by the time you get the stream playing.

You can't record easily although it can be done by setting up a PVR client.

Cheers for your help. I used something (which I guess is relatively similar) on my RaspBMC and had really mixed results. I got in touch with Sky in the end and they offered me a year's subscription for £22 a month for all 7 sky sports channels + their "basic package". Seemed an offer too good to miss so I took it!

[wiggy001]

gr1340 said:

Obviously this isn't as polished as turning on Sky and putting the sports channel on but you can balance this against the cost saving.

It also doesn't meet the "legal" criteria in the OP...

[gr1340]

wiggy001 said:

It also doesn't meet the "legal" criteria in the OP...

From Wikipedia:

European Union[edit]
In Europe, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has ruled that it is legal to look at content (copyrighted or otherwise) online.[2][3] The ruling relates to the British Meltwater case settled on 5 June 2014.[4]

The judgement of the court states that: "Article 5 of Directive 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society must be interpreted as meaning that the copies on the user’s computer screen and the copies in the internet ‘cache’ of that computer’s hard disk, made by an end-user in the course of viewing a website, satisfy the conditions that those copies must be temporary, that they must be transient or incidental in nature and that they must constitute an integral and essential part of a technological process, as well as the conditions laid down in Article 5(5) of that directive, and that they may therefore be made without the authorisation of the copyright holders."[5]