Satellite PC

[haveanotherpuff]

I hope this is not considered to be proper for this part,I am hoping General means just about anything to do with computers. Anyhow a friend of mine ask me to find out about Satellite PC,at the time it seemed an easy thing to do,but all I can find is where to buy it,I find no forums or anything at all in any online newspaers. So as a last attempt I thought I would see if anyone here has ever heard anything about it,it seems to good to be true and I am quite suspicious about the whole thing.

They say for a one time fee of 30 to 80 dollars you will have access to 1000's of satellite tv stations.Has anyone every found anything about it at all?

[scorp123]

Here in Europe they sell a thing they call "The Dreambox". It's basically a small + specialised Linux PC which you use as satellite receiver + video recorder. Because there is Linux on it you can feed it with whatever codes you want ... In other words: Yes, with this thing you can watch 1000's of TV programs via your satellite dish -- regardless if they are encrypted (= Pay TV) or not. A friend of mine (he's a freak when it comes to Sat dishes and Satellite TV programs ...) has one of these things. Last time we counted he had 2500 active TV channels on this thing ...

Currently this thing is still legal over here in Europe, but I have no idea how US + Canada laws look like in this regard.
http://www.dreamboxshop.co.uk
http://www.dream-multimedia-tv.de

Here what Wikipedia has to say about this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreambox

I imagine that "Satellite PC" thing you mention is something similar? Do you have a URL or something like that so one could check the tech specs?

[haveanotherpuff]

Apparently it is just software,and only for windows so far,I have seen some of the ones from demonoid and they sucked,only Asian channels,the link below is all she gave me to go on,whenever I google it all I get are more offers for same thing pretty much,which is why I figure it is probably fake or not going to last at the very least.

http://www.secretsatellite.com/index-2.html


Below is from mepis user and what he thought:

I come from the cable side of the industry, so my view of satellite is pretty dim to begin with.

I think you are talking about this program though : http://www.programurl.com/satellite-tv-for-pc-elite.htm

The problem is, it's illegal. It hijacks legit services like DirectTV, or grabs the satellite signal directly from various broadcasters.

So, yes, while it "could" technically work, and no reason why it shouldn't, if you did use it, you would be liable for massive fines ($100,000+), as well as potential jail time.

My advice? Don't risk it.

[scorp123]

http://www.secretsatellite.com/index-2.html

Sounds like Zattoo to me:
http://zattoo.com/ ... With the big difference being that Zattoo costs nada (it's free) and I know it works because I tested it. But there you only get a limited number of channels. Another thing I recently tried out (and it works):
http://www.vuze.com ... most of the stuff is free there.

One of my apprentices claimed that this site is OK too:
http://www.guba.com/ ... it's like a virtual video store where you can buy or rent videos for favourable prices. I didn't try that one yet, but the apprentice who told me about it is reliable in this regard (he wouldn't recommend something to me if it were not kosher ...)

So if you really want to get plenty of satellite channels I'd recommend the "Dreambox". Here in Switzerland people are ordering it like mad ...

[haveanotherpuff]

I agree with you there,it looks awsome.

Thanks for the help.

[clem]

I have a dreambox too, and I strongly recommend it. It's not legal in France but you can get it from Germany. I got 3100 channels or so from Hotbird 3 and the TPS pack for free (it's not actually illegal to decrypt that kind of stuff if they don't sell it in your country).

Clem

[clem]

Actually it's a bit worrying the amount of stuff that's not legal in France (Dreambox, Redbull, 128bit crypting, free-speech, walking in the street without 5 euros in your pocket AND your ID, wearing the arabic veil at school or simply wearing a beard (well unless you're white.. in this case there's no problem), etc...). And if Mr. Sarkozy gets to become our next president.. hum.. sorry, "your" next president, we can expect to see the list growing a lot more. It'll come to the fact where you'll have to ask yourself whether anything you're doing is actually legal or not, since the gap between common sense/morality and the law itselfs grows bigger everyday.

Clem

[clem]

Now having said that, it's a beautiful country with a beautiful culture. Don't get me wrong on that.

Irish people here have a joke about the French:

God invented the best country in the World.
Then he looked at it and thought he had been a bit unfair on the others.
So he created the French.

Clem

[haveanotherpuff]

Thank Clem,this Dreambox sounds great to me,will have to check its availibility here in Canada.

[scorp123]

I have a dreambox too, and I strongly recommend it. It's not legal in France but you can get it from Germany. I got 3100 channels or so from Hotbird 3 and the TPS pack for free (it's not actually illegal to decrypt that kind of stuff if they don't sell it in your country).

Same here. My coworker has got over 2500 channels, and according to Swiss laws the Dreambox is not illegal yet. And people are buying it like mad here. Very understandable. Being a country full of mountains means that in some rural areas you can't get more than the few state owned TV channels (and they are seriously lacking ...). So in some areas if you want to enjoy any serious TV programming you've got to have a satellite dish. And the Dreambox will make sure you will truly use your sat dish to the max and get an insane number of channels ...

This thing surely deserves its name