Time to ditch Sky ?

[lazyitus]

In short, they cost me alot of money and they piss me off with their stter than st customer services and obvious delaying tactics on the phone to earn even more revenue from you to tell you what you already know. And then want to charge £65 for a bloke to come round to confirm, yet again, what everybody already knew.

Anyway - mini rant over..

Thinking of ditching and going to Freeview (with HD)

Is it as straight froward as cancelling Sky subscription, buying a Freeview box, plugging in and off we go??

Any/All advice and comments welcome.

[Shaw Tarse]

It's that easy.

[2 sMoKiN bArReLs]

As long as you have a decent aerial pointing the right way

[lazyitus]

2 sMoKiN bArReLs said:

As long as you have a decent aerial pointing the right way

Yeah, we'll need a new one of these as the old one is knackered but didn't pose a problem with a sky dish.

[SirBlade]

Freeview isn't as good as Sky with an option or two.

Sky movies is rubbish

[Shaw Tarse]

I've got Freesat, just had to plug the cable from Sky dish into the back.

[lazyitus]

Shaw Tarse said:

I've got Freesat, just had to plug the cable from Sky dish into the back.

Really? That's intersting. If that's the case, the cost of a new aerial will not have to be catered for.

[lazyitus]

SirBlade said:

Freeview isn't as good as Sky with an option or two.

Sky movies is rubbish

Isn't or is ? I'm aware there's less choice but not sure if you made a typo in your post?

[Stu R]

I've got Sky, but I barely ever watch it these days, struggle to see the point really.

For movies and TV shows I generally prefer on demand stuff - so Apple TV and Lovefilm have that covered (though I'm just looking at Netflix now and it seems decent).
The only thing I'd miss is sports, but I don't follow football and the stuff I like gets such little coverage it's a bit wasted. I could probably pop an ESPN card in and see 99% of the stuff I like anyway.

So yeah, I can see Sky getting cancelled here before long.

[TorqueTalk]

Dropped Sky after many years of being a good customer, and after getting pissed off with them giving new customers the best offers, finally told them to get stuffed...

Now have freesat HD samsung recording boxes which work very well indeed, missing discovery channels but other than that haven't looked back...

You just use the current sky cables and dish etc...

[sprouting]

I cancelled my dads Sky subscription last year. There was no need for a new box or card, now he just gets the basic free sat package with the same equipment he was using before.

[lazyitus]

TorqueTalk said:

You just use the current sky cables and dish etc...

Great stuff.

[Morningside]

lazyitus said:

TorqueTalk said:

You just use the current sky cables and dish etc...

Great stuff.

But you will miss Sky plus.

I swapped to freeview but dont really like the menu system or the format of the thing. Plus the picture drop outs seem to be higher.

[Kudos]

Cancelled Sky HD and sports this morning. Realised I was paying £20/month for something I get no benefit from

[lazyitus]

Morningside said:

But you will miss Sky plus.

I'll probably miss alot to be fair but this is about getting a good balance. And for what I'm paying at the moment and am getting asked to pay in addition whenever there's a problem (which isn't infrequent), I just feel a little like I'm beginning to get raped instead of having consensual fun, if you see what I mean.

[scorcher]

I cancelled and haven't missed it. Always use to end up watching repeats anyway! Do an online search for a freephone number for SKY.Use to take about 1/2 hour on there premium rates to get through. Rang them on their freephone number and I was transferred to their call centre in less than 10 seconds.Funny that!

[Morningside]

Kudos said:

Cancelled Sky HD and sports this morning. Realised I was paying £20/month for something I get no benefit from

But you can still use BBC/ITV/CH4/CH5 HD which is nice. Even though the woman on the phone was trying to convince me that I would lose all HD channels - Lying cow.

[2 sMoKiN bArReLs]

If use existing satellite dish, its Freesat, not Freeview. Make sure you get the right box.

[valiant1]

I done this around 9 months go and have never looked back.

Got myself a PVR freesat box and can record,rewind just like a Sky+ box.

You will obviously lose a few channels (sky atlantic,etc) but you'll soon adjust.

Best of all - you'll no longer have to deal with the monkeys at Sky!!

Edited by valiant1 on Sunday 29th January 12:30

[TorqueTalk]

The best sky boxes are made by samsung...

If you buy a Freesat box which is made by samsung it works very well...

You can still record two channels at the same time, if it conflicts it automatically choses a repeated program to record. The library is better as you can make your own folders to organize programes better...

I can play external media from a usb stick. Etc...