Multi-room, Sky Plus HD, Sky Q issues

[TF03]

Hi everyone

So we may be in a bit of a unique  situation and everytime we try and speak to Sky they either put us on hold for ages, pass us from pillar to post and give us very different answers depending on who we speak to. 

Basically, we are a Fire station that has paid for a full sky subcription for years. We have always had multi-room so we can watch Sky in our rec room and in our gym for sports etc. We have the old Sky Plus HD boxes. 

We have been told that Sky no longer support these and to continue to multi-room, we have to upgrade to Sky Q (free of charge to be fair). Whilst we have wifi in our building, it does not belong to us but our employer so we have no access to it and obviously can't be using it for streaming etc. 

The first time we spoke to Sky, they said that we didn't need an internet connection for it to work. So they sent out an engineer to install it all but when he got here he said, you 100% need an internet connection. 
Sky customer service then said, yes sorry you need and tried to upsell us broadband, which we said we can't have into the building. So they were going to refund us for the months we didn't have multi-room and reduce our bill down to just a single screen subscritpion. 

We rang again recently as they are stil charging us for multi-room, when the adviser once again said we didn't need an internet/wifi connection for Sky Q multi-room to work. 

Can anyone on here advise what the actual situation is as Sky Customer Service don't seem to know their own products!

Thank you! 

[SKY1992bf]

@TF03 Whilst sky plus is no longer supported it will continue to work for the foreseeable future probably until the end of the decade , so you will only hit issues should any of your boxes break as they can longer be replace 

[nigea99]

hi @TF03 

It is a bit more nuanced than what you have been advised for SKY Q minis to work.

SKY Q minis do not need your wifi as, for 3rd party wifi, they use a wifi signal generated by the main box.

They can also be connected to the main box via ethernet (either directly or via unmanaged switches or the router)

However, the main box needs to  be connected to a router (either via ethernet or wifi) to provide IP addresses & initially the SKY Q minis need an internet connection (via the main box) to be authorised.

SKY Q also is quite limited without an internet connection but can function (after minis are authorised etc) 

[TF03]

Unfortunatley, the "second" box did develop a fault hence the situation we now find ourselves in. 

[TF03]

So the main box needs to be connected constantly to some kind of internet connection? Does the signal not come through the sky dish any more?

[SKY1992bf]

---

@TF03 wrote:

So the main box needs to be connected constantly to some kind of internet connection? Does the signal not come through the sky dish any more?

---

@TF03  it does for broadcast via the epg , but there are a number of services that require internet connection for example red button sporting events or apps like Netflix etc

[TimmyBGood]

@TF03 

Live content from numbered EPG channels arrives through the dish: everything else (on-demand, catch-up, 'watch from start' and anything in an app) is from the internet.

Strictly speaking a main Q box doesn't require internet access as long as only live content is consumed, but a Q Mini box needs an internet router to be present to provide DHCP service.

[nigea99]

---

@TF03 wrote:

So the main box needs to be connected constantly to some kind of internet connection? Does the signal not come through the sky dish any more?

---

Sorry if my earlier reply is not fully clear.

The live channels etc still come via Satellite

The main  box doesn't need to be continually connected to the internet (but you can't download from catch up etc or use apps etc)

The mnis get their Satellite feed via the network from the main box (i.e. the main box acts a media server to the minis)

The router I mentioned is needed to help  provide the 'network' for the minis to connect to the main box but the router (after initial authorisation of the mini(s)) does not need to be connected the internet  Thr router  provides the IP addresses for each box 

[Chodley]

You could install a 4G router.