Watching UK BBC channels in India

mahiruha

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Hello,
is anybody aware of any technology which will enable us to view UK BBC channels in india. I speacially need this to view live snooker matches.Actually BBC also broadcasts all the matches live in the internet but that is also limited to UK residents only. If anybody can throw some light on this that will be really helpful.
Thanks,
Mahiruha.
 
TV signals are transmitted in two ways. The traditional way is the transmission over air where you use an external antenna to catch the signals. Here the signals are scattered across the atmosphere and have limited range usually 25 to 50 KM. To extend their reach, broadcasting companies use relays (or repeaters) of transmitters that cover a wider geographical area. To save energy, most broadcasting companies use LPTs or Low Powered Transmitters. That is the reason why the transmission are usually available to a max of about 50 Km around the position of the transmitter's antenna. Such transmission are usually free and is done by government owned broadcasters such as AIR, BBC. etc.

The only way to reach across the world is through satellites. Each broadcaster beams his signal(s) to a satellite that is stationery above his head. This satellite, if necessary amplifies the signals, and then beams the signals back to the earth covering a much larger area. You need a special receiver and a dish (antenna) that is pointed at the satellite. A few years ago, this was an expensive proposition and you had cable operators who would receive the signals using large arrays of antennas, re-amplify the signals, and send them to your house through cables.

Today the technology has reached a level where you can receive the signals yourself using a small dish on your rooftop.

These satellites are usually geo-stationary. In other words they are rotating at the same speed as the earth so they seem to be hovering over your head all the time. These satellites also exchange data for worldwide transmission. For example, a satellite over San Francisco can transmit Indian channels such as Star or Sun. This is done by hopping the signals across multiple satellites in the sky till it reaches the satellite that is geostationary over SFO.

For the BBC signals to reach you, the satellite over UK must hop the signals to a satellite that is stationary over India. This would need an agreement between the two companies managing the satellites. Check with your DTH provider and see if he can include BBC signals as part of the package you receive. You get Discovery, HBO, and other channels this way.

Other than this (leaving aside the NET, of course) there is no way you can receive BBC signals on your TV in India. Unless you have the technology and smartness to hack into a satellite's signals.

Cheers
 
For the BBC signals to reach you, the satellite over UK must hop the signals to a satellite that is stationary over India. This would need an agreement between the two companies managing the satellites.

I am not an expert in this area, but feel that the foot-print of the Satellite(s) (which is beaming the channels you are looking for) is the most important factor to consider. Say, if the satellite geo-stationed above UK and beaming BBC channels has a wide foot-print to cover India as well, you may be able to get the channels by using a dedicated dish, STB with the dish aligned exactly to this particular satellite. The STB should be able to receive FTA channels though.

I read that Indian DTH broadcasters are making hell a lot of noise about NRIs carrying their STBs, cards to Gulf region and other countries and are able to watch the channels there while their relatives in India recharge the accounts. From this, I inferred that Satellites might have a foot-print bigger than just one or two countries.
 
This depends upon the distance the satellite is from the earth, Some satellites can cover 1/3rd of the earth's surface. But usually the signals will be weak on the fringes or edges.

You can certainly buy a STB and dish antenna from the UK and try to use it in India. You have to locate the position of the satellite and point the dish at it. I think the satellite will be at an acute angle, and the physical obstructions such as building will weaken the signal.

India, Singapore, Sri Lanka, the Middle East could well be within the coverage of a geostationary satellite.

Cheers
 
You can certainly buy a STB and dish antenna from the UK and try to use it in India.

We may not really need a dish+STB from the UK, but any dish + an unlocked STB which could scan and accept Free-to-Air channels should do, provided the satellite's footprint covers India and the channels are FTA.
 
Hi Mahiruha,

In order for you to receive the UK based channels, you've got to receive the signals from the particular satellite.

Your first step would to find the satellite that downlinks the signal. This may be found from LyngSat - Lyngemark Satellite. this site also gives you the foot-print size, EIRP values etc., so as to calculate the receiving dish size.

In all probability, the foot print would NOT be covering India, except Hotbird, which is receivable in West India. Again, if the channel is encrypted, it would not be possible to descramble the program.

I would recommend you to check with some internet based TV sites to which you may subscribe to watch such channels. Be aware of the legality though.

Thanks,

Nitin.
 
Hello,
thanks everybody for your valuable suggestions. Now I am kind of understanding where the problem lies. I guess there is not much option left for me to try and see if this really works since I don't know how to get a unlocked STB and a dish where I can try and tune the UK BBC channels. I will have to do some literature study tomorrow to see which satelites are beaming this stuff and what is their footprint area. when I was in UK one of my friend told me that he has a dish and a STB through which he watches many channels from the world.That's why this idea came to my mind if it is possible to buy a STB and a dish here in INDIA and watch the BBC channels in UK. I have read some literature regarding the online broadcast of BBC channels. They have a idea that if we can use a UK based proxy server to route our internet then BBC thinks we are in UK and the stream works here. I am yet to test it myself since I am not very good at this sort technology. I will try and see if something can be unearthed. Thanks again for your valuable inputs.
Mahiruha.
 
If there are any experts in this field here, can we explore Freesat?

This is a FTA dish service in UK and they have some HD channels/programing too. Need "any" dish and may be a specific STB they are selling, HD channels need a bit costlier STB though. The STB is a onetime cost and there are no monthly charges for FTA channels including HD ones.

If their satellite' footprint covers India, we could just get the STB from UK (50 for SD and 100 for SD+HD) and receive UK programs here. The main motivation will be the ability to watch HD channels, BBC had olympics on HD last year!!!

Experts...
 
Hi
Contact BBC through email. These multinational companies are very helpful to their customers. (I have personal experience of these of Pioneer electronic Corporation) I am sure they will give you correct answer.
regards
 
Hello,
I have been researching about this last couple of weeks and there is some hope. As discussed earlier there is no way to get TV signals but BBC has something called iplayer which can be used to see past episodes as well as some live telecasts. The problem is it is limited only to UK users. The way to do it is to use a proxy server and route the internet connection through it. I tried to do it using IE but didn't work maybe because I am using a wireless router and all my home pc laptops are connected to the router hence the proxy settings in the router needs to be changed. I didn't want to do it that's why I tried with mozilla web browser. It has an add-on called foxyproxy which can be used to route the urls through a new proxy server.There is website called proxy4free.com which lists some free public proxy servers.We just need to select a UK based proxy server and key in the ip and the port in foxyproxy and it works wonderfully. I am hoping when there will be some live telecast of snooker I will be able to view it ( fingers crossed). Now the question is how to get it to the television. I guess the easiest solution will be to connect the laptop and the televison through HDMI cable. I have HDMI out in my laptop ( HP pavillion DV6000) which can be used to connect with my lcd tv. But I have never tried it. Does any body know if it is just a plug and play thing or I need to make some changes in the laptop for my televison to recognise it. Or it can be treated as a simple wireless media receiver with a HDMI connection.
Thanks,
Mahiruha.
 
1. Connect the HDMI cable from Laptop to TV.
2. Select the appropriate HDMI input on TV.
3. Now hold & press Fn (function) and press F4 twice.

Now should be able to get display only from TV.

This is a toggle switch.

If you press Fn + F4 again then display should come back on Laptop.
Now if you press Fn + F4 only once then display should come on both i.e. laptop & TV.
 
Hello Reju,
thanks for your suggestion. I will try it and let you if it worked. But due to terrible strom in calcutta I don't have electricity in my house for last two days so god knows when I will have electricity to try it out.
Thanks,
Mahiruha.
 
Hi guys,
its snooker time now and UK masters is being played and live telecast is available on BBC website but for UK users only. I am looking to buy a uk proxy server service for a month. Foxy proxy has directed me to a site which offers this service. Does anybody has any experience of buying proxy server services I mean to say are they reliable? Any good alternative source?
Thanks.
 
Just try asking the local cable operator who are using C-Band for receiving signals. I think with the KU band, it wont be possible. Try C-Band with big dish and their receiver.
 
Well,
i took the plunge yesterday went ahead and bought this uk proxy server service. Then configured foxy proxy and all the uk limited content started working like a breeze. Really satisfying experience. The match was scheduled to start at 7 and when tried I to watch the match for some reason I don't know firefox browser refused to play it. I was very dissapointed. Then just switched to good old I.E and just put the proxy details in the lan settings sections and to my astonishment it started working. :yahoo: I have only 512 kbps internet so I took 1 mbps speed on demand from airtel ( very impressive service) and here I go Live snooker after 4 years. To top it all the first match was played between Great Ronnie'o sullivan and the fighter Peter Ebdon.Just too much for me.:clapping: Thoroughly enjoyed the match.
Thanks.
 
Well,
i took the plunge yesterday went ahead and bought this uk proxy server service. Then configured foxy proxy and all the uk limited content started working like a breeze. Really satisfying experience. The match was scheduled to start at 7 and when tried I to watch the match for some reason I don't know firefox browser refused to play it. I was very dissapointed. Then just switched to good old I.E and just put the proxy details in the lan settings sections and to my astonishment it started working. :yahoo: I have only 512 kbps internet so I took 1 mbps speed on demand from airtel ( very impressive service) and here I go Live snooker after 4 years. To top it all the first match was played between Great Ronnie'o sullivan and the fighter Peter Ebdon.Just too much for me.:clapping: Thoroughly enjoyed the match.
Thanks.
congratssss man!!!!!!!!!!!

also salute to your passion of sports!!
 
Well,
i took the plunge yesterday went ahead and bought this uk proxy server service. Then configured foxy proxy and all the uk limited content started working like a breeze. Really satisfying experience. The match was scheduled to start at 7 and when tried I to watch the match for some reason I don't know firefox browser refused to play it. I was very dissapointed. Then just switched to good old I.E and just put the proxy details in the lan settings sections and to my astonishment it started working. :yahoo: I have only 512 kbps internet so I took 1 mbps speed on demand from airtel ( very impressive service) and here I go Live snooker after 4 years. To top it all the first match was played between Great Ronnie'o sullivan and the fighter Peter Ebdon.Just too much for me.:clapping: Thoroughly enjoyed the match.
Thanks.

You could have saved yourself all this trouble by just getting Neo Sports on Tata Sky!!! I watch the matches on that channel
 
Hi Vinyl,
I do have neo sports and watch matches there. But they are old recorded matches and normally broadcasted at odd time like 2.30 am.It will be great if they start broadcasting live matches.
thanks.
 
As might have been said already, BBC do not make TV available outside of UK because of rights issues. For sporting events, where the coverage rights may be both very specific and very expensive, even some of the radio output (normally freely available) is withheld.

Given this situation, I'm amazed they are not excluding known proxies --- but hey, if you don't tell them, then I certainly won't ;)

Snooker is the only sport I ever showed an interest in watching, and I had some late nights watching stuff like World Championship finals, back in UK.

Enjoy!
 
i was working with settopbox development ,(Airtel and sun), know the fact the great govt has blocked some amount of channels,even though they are aired by the satellites that provide programs to china and receivable in india .

All domestic settop box mfrs have to comply to that regulation :rolleyes:.

Proxy server route is good , may get slow time to time ,there are Rtsp URLS that you can use to receive channels over internet.

I can sometime see some channels in radio master player.
 
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