Free Eurosport

[Hurri]

Hi all,
Did a search but don't seem to be able to find much on this one in the forum - please post up a link to the relevant thread if you're an old hand here!

Anyway, I used to watch free analogue Eurosport till last year when they turned it off.

I have since tried the Eurosport online subscription service but it is truly dreadful, the video on demand playback service doesn't have any commentary. I would be happy to pay a sub to Eurosport if it allowed you to record stuff with your language and play it back, but at the moment that is not an option.

My particular favourite sport on Eurosport is cycling and while we have some Brits who might actually win something, it would be a shame to miss the action.

So, as I'm a cheapskate and don't want to shell out for Sky, I will have to use the 'German' route and I wondered how many people were out there who had tried this. Essentially, there is free to air german eurosport on 19E
... and on 13E eurosport PL happens to have an unencrypted english commentary. Now, I happen to still have my old tuner so I could rig up a second dish and take the audio from 13E and picture from 19E. It would probably be better to use a dual LNB with 6 deg separation for a neater look.

The thing is, I have a 90cm dish, would a '6 degree' LNB work on this as well as any other dish size, I would have thought the separation would be different for different dish sizes...?

Any help appreciated.. and when the weather improves, I'll be up the ladder fixing it before Wiggo scores his first win of the season.

cheers!

 

[Rumpelstiltskin.]

Yes they work ok, German eurosport will remain fta for few years yet hopefully.

 

[Hurri]

Yes they work ok, German eurosport will remain fta for few years yet hopefully.

should do... do you have a dual LNB set in one bit of plastic or is the separate LNB on a mount the way to go?

At the moment I plan to put the audio and video into a DVD recorder to combine them but if there is a PVR out there that can do this.. that would be the best solution???

 

[saj1985]

hey hurri, when it came to the f1 last season i read on another forum that some people watched it for free on rtl 19.2e,
and used a digital dab radio to get the english commentary with uk radio stations,
dont know how the sync was between the radio and tv coverage,
and im not clued up as to how it works to be honest, but i just thought id mention it to you bud!

 

[Rumpelstiltskin.]

Hes after cycling, f1 is fta on rtl though 13e 19.2e

 

[Hurri]

I'll take the F1 if you have it as well. I'd also read that F1 wasn't covered live on radio 5 live any more or there was some kind of synch problem with the live feed?

By the way, the Roberts 83i is the best radio ever, bought one for her indoors and I'm going to have to get one for myself. She loves it. We get better DAB reception on it than FM, and the internet radio works really well. The BBC replay service is really neat and easy to use... and it plays music off my server. And... it also sounds good too. The only downside is that the connection to Capital radio via the internet seems a bit flakey but everything else is super smooth so probably just Capital. Best gadget I bought for some time....

 

[signorwhippy]

Yeah, 6 deg LNB on a 90cm dish will be fine. Works a treat on my 80cm dish

 

[Hurri]

Okay, so I have it all working, the only problem seems to be that the sound is not perfectly in synch... it is really not a problem for most sporting events except when they interview people and then it is a bit of a distraction. The gap is pretty short so maybe putting a cheap delay box on the audio would fix it? Anyone tried this? cheers!

 

[a33]

Okay, so I have it all working, the only problem seems to be that the sound is not perfectly in synch... it is really not a problem for most sporting events except when they interview people and then it is a bit of a distraction. The gap is pretty short so maybe putting a cheap delay box on the audio would fix it? Anyone tried this? cheers!

Sometimes this is not a reception problem, but a problem on the sending side. Then the problem vanishes at another broadcast.
Or do you have the problem continously?

A33

 

[Hurri]

Sometimes this is not a reception problem, but a problem on the sending side. Then the problem vanishes at another broadcast.
Or do you have the problem continously?

A33

it is a constant problem. i set up my laptop to record the audio signal from each source and compare the delay. I assume it is due to the uplink/delay times between the satellites and it is about a second (1100ms). I found a Behringer FEX800 on fleabay for less than £30 quid which does need to be setup manually every time you power it on, but does provide that level of delay in stereo.

Your other options if you wanted to do it properly would be to get a pair of Behringer Shark FBQ100 or DSP110 boxes which are around £70 each. These are proper audio delay boxes, and you can set a fixed delay time. Probably a waste of money unless you are a hardcore Eurosport devotee. Most programming is just coverage with some commentary which doesn't have to be bang on (although it can be quite distracting if you're watching snooker because it has a very specific soundtrack with the balls clicking!!).

The only other thing to note is that the programming on the two sat channels may not be exactly the same. Eurosport Deutschland will carry a lot of stuff that is very popular in Germany such as handball. I guess it is a bit like using BBC 2 Wales for your soundtrack for BBC 2 London....

 

[Zorch]

Hi Hurri,

Have you tried this...

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Best Wishes,
Zorch

 

[Hurri]

Zorch good suggestion. I actually have a PC guitar effects bit of shareware that I bought that would probably do the same thing. But.. I wanted to have a setup that I could leave to record when I'm out and about, and the setup I have now can be set to come on via timer (except the Behringer which has to be set and left switched on, but it is low power anyway).

Originally I had the combined feed going into a DVD recorder, but now I have a Technomate AV input installed by the nice guys at Technomate HQ, I can record everything straight onto the PVR in my 6902... I have the picture fed via composite video from the 'video out' of the TM6902 and into the AV in on the same box, and the sound from a TM5500, through the delay box, and into same input. All you do then is set the timer on the 6902 to record from AV in, and at the same time set a timer event to change the channel on the tuner to Eurosport. Works a treat - as usually bike races are actually pretty dull to watch so you can zoom the finished recording to the hilly/rocky/cobbled bits where the breaks happen or people crash.... I'm surprised that the TM can handle it, but it does actually do what it is told. Of course you can't record anything else or use the machine while you are doing this sort of recording...