At the new house the previous owner kindly left the sky dish and digibox, but no viewing card :(

BBC no longer supply cards to view the equivalent (ish) of freeview, so I suspect when I hook it up I'll just have the BBC channels.

Anyone know of how to get a viewing card? Could really do without having to subscribe to a sky package (although sky one would be nice). No - need to watch what I spend right now...

Anyone got any ideas? :confused: :confused: :confused:

I seem to recall some posts on a mailing list I subscribe to about these. Need to do some digging... Another option is to visit the Digital Spy forums and look around there.

Already a DS member, Q - not looked on there about viewing cards yet though...

Any other ideas are very welcome though...

ebay

just did a search and ther's loads on there

marc

You used to be able to get a trial subscription for one of the porn channels. Can't remember if it was adult channel or television x or whatever. Costs you a one-off fee of a fiver or so, but after the trial of the porn channel expires, you still have access to all other basic freview stuff such as beeb and what not.

Now ITV, C4, C5 have remained on NDS Videoguard, I think it may be useless though :(

I'll ask at work tomorrow. Know just the chap who's an expert on the sky viewing card front

Wow. They are quite expensive...

Howard, the card will remain open (for the free to air channels) for the rest of it's life. The only thing which would render it useless are an inquisitive toddler or a change in encryption method...

I managed to replace my old free to air card with a new one by using a pron channel loophole. All it involved was registering your interest into the channel, entering your viewing card number and aborting the procedure. Their servers noticed you had an old card and would automatically generate a request at Sky to replace the card with a new one... all for free .

From doing a bit of reading it seems that the cards on ebay should be avoided... Someone will sell their current card, wait til they receive positive feedback, then ring sky and say they lost/broke their card and need a new one. Sky 'cancels' the original card; seller gets sent a working replacement; buyer ends up with a dud card... :(

Xavier - ask away mate

Steve, get yourself one of those local "Ad-mag" type newspapers.

There's always loads of Boxes & cards in there for a lot less than

Also, with the ebay method, I don't see how it would work - the encryption system is so tight you cannot use any card in any set top box: the card is linked to the set top box.

You buy someone else's card, and unless you can sort out with SKy and give them the serial number of your new box, the card will be useless anyway :(

Sky can "re-pair" cards, but how willing they would be to do it with a free card is another question :rubchin:

Old Sky card swork for free channnels. When I moved house it worked out cheaper to get a brand new sky box and dish under the wifes name than to have my old system re-installed on the new house. I now have the dish connected both to the new box with all the channels and to my old box in the bedroom with the old card from my cancelled subscription. It works for all the BBC, ITV, C4, C5 channels.

Maybe I'll just go for the

Howard' date=' the card will remain open (for the free to air channels) for the rest of it's life. The only thing which would render it useless are an inquisitive toddler or a change in encryption method...

I managed to replace my old free to air card with a new one by using a pron channel loophole. All it involved was registering your interest into the channel, entering your viewing card number and aborting the procedure. Their servers noticed you had an old card and would automatically generate a request at Sky to replace the card with a new one... all for free .[/quote']

Q, from what I understand this is true. However, you also get the encrypted ITV, C4 and five access with a cancelled subscription card. That is, until they issue new viewing cards ... at which point the encrypted channels disappear, as the viewing card is out of date. You can pick up the FTA channels from the Beeb and others without a viewing card in the system, but without the encrypted ones Freeview would be a better option.

Now Sky haven't sent out new cards for a while, but Law of Sod says that they will within a couple of months of me cancellin. However, have noted the dodgy pron cancellation technique should such circumstance arise...

Maybe I'll just go for the

Arent Sky going to release a free-to-air device very soon?

Yep..costs upwards of

Unlike Sky to be less than competetive on something, I have seen Freeview devices for as low as

A newer "Freeview" box might be a better bet, as they are starting to come with built in card slots for the additional channels..in the unlikely event that you want such dross, that it

Freeview..

Pay Channels...

Me is confuffled :rubchin:

Geoff - Already got a freeview box, although the picture sometimes breaks up, etc. The pay channels on freeview (top-up tv) are time-shared so you wouldn't get a whole channel 24/7. Also, things like interactive services don't work as such...

Andy - Sky's FTA service will consist of a fitted dish and digibox, viewing card - and in the small print, a promise that you can use the card for a minimum of 2 years. I.e. they'll probably switch it off after that period... Rumoured cost is

I dont use the interactive services anyway.

Whilst I like the idea of Freeview, it really bugs me that watching the footy on BBC or ITV via my digi Sky box,it gives me black curtains on the picture. Its so frustrating I have to revert to crappy terestrial picture.

I would also add that prior to having Sky, I hated them. But now, I prefer it to BBC or ITV, especially when footy is on. I do feel though that they could reduce the prices to be more accessible to everyone.

From doing a bit of reading it seems that the cards on ebay should be avoided... Someone will sell their current card' date=' wait til they receive positive feedback, then ring sky and say they lost/broke their card and need a new one. Sky 'cancels' the original card; seller gets sent a working replacement; buyer ends up with a dud card... :(

Xavier - ask away mate [/quote']

:eek:

there's some nice people around -

OK, spoken to our in-house sky card expert

Stimps, you're right about that ebay scam. When the naughty ebay seller rings up Sky to cancel the card, it will totally nuke it. So ITV, C4 and C5 go too.

The best option is to have a look on this pron website. If you can get your hands on a dead version 1 sky viewing card, all you need to do is enter the card's serial number on the website. The system will recognise your card is out of date and will automatically issue you a new one. May have the pron channel's logo on it, but as it's pay-per-view based, you don't pay a "subscription". It costs