Universal Receiver

[kotto_bass]

Hi,

Is there any receiver that can capture lots of channels for free (no monthly payments)? Can this receiver work in other countries as well?

Bass

 

[cdru]

Hi,

Is there any receiver that can capture lots of channels for free (no monthly payments)? Can this receiver work in other countries as well?

Bass

Yes. They are called FTA (Free To Air) receivers and are available for a variety of types of dishes (DBS, C-band, etc). However, you aren't going to get alot if you are expecting the same channles that you can get with Dish/DirecTV/Cable. Most of those channels are encrypted specifically so that you can't just get a FTA receiver and pluck the stream off for free. Often the channels are foreign, public interest, shopping, or educational, but not always. Dish for instance has some of it's audio channels FTA.

What is available in your particular depends on your location and the footprint of the satellite. Europe doesn't see Dish's satellites, and we don't see Europe's. To see what is on each satellite, check out
LyngSat.

If you are looking for a universal reciver that receives encrypted signals and decodes them, such as both Dish and DirecTV, they don't exist (legally able to decrypt the content that is).