@pistonmonkey wrote:
We have a shared Sky dish on our estate. I just tried to get Sky Q and was told the LNB needs to be updated. Some of my neighbours have older Sky HD boxes so we need to know if we can upgrade the dish/LNB to support both old and new boxes. I know Sky Q needs a wide band LNB, but does this work with the older boxes,. I have seen mention of needing a hybrid LNB. Also does anything else need upgrading, I assume the original wiring from disk to house will work with a new Sky Q box. Thanks Nick
hi @pistonmonkey
Communal systems work differently to private dishes.
Communal Systems typically have 4 feeds used by SKY HD & Freesat receivers - these receivers use voltage changes & the presence or not of a 22KHz tone to switch polarites & bands.
The communal systems thus then respond to the signals from the receivers and provide the relevant H/Vpolarities high/low bands feed
For SKY Q they need an adapter to respond to digital commands sent in Single Cable Router mode (dSCR) to again select the relevant frequency & polarity
Some more modern systems do not need adapters as the electronics are built in (but these are less common)
Edit : As you are on an estate it is possible that your system may not need an adapter
Thus the LNB on the dish itself is not changed for communal systems
The adapters are typically fitted to the feeds to customers in their local distribution cabinet/cupboard (depending on the adapter I think they can typically feed two feeds)
These adapters thus also do not affect others who can continue with SKY HD / Freesat
To fit these adapters the communal systems must provide a decent enough signal & have suitable space in the distribution cabinet & the existing feeds must be earthed. Premission is needed for SKY to access & fit these
P.S. If you have a communal system and were told the LNB needs to be updated then the adviser needs training
