Spotting Squarials

Jenny · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 15.54

I spotted a squarial the other day. First one I've seen in years.

nwtv2003 · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 16.45

There's a house just down the road I can see from my bedroom window that still has a BSB dish. Considering Sky ceased using Marcopolo in 1992, it's quite surprising to still see many squarials still about, you don't see any old Sky Analogue dishes these days, especially those vulgar white ones with Amstrad on them.

Going slightly OT, but we've had Cable for about 12 years now and our brown box on the front of the house still works well and still has NYNEX engraved on the front of it, now that's surprised they're futureproof, considering we only got Cable for the TV, you can get broadband down the bugger too.

Back to Marcopolo, AIUI it was sold off to another country after the ITC revoked the licence, is it still in operation? Or has it died like parts of the old Astra 1?

Pete · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 18.16

nwtv2003 wrote:Back to Marcopolo, AIUI it was sold off to another country after the ITC revoked the licence, is it still in operation? Or has it died like parts of the old Astra 1?

according to the bastion of info that is wikipedia, marcopolo 2 was sold to the norwegians but was sent into a junk orbit in 2003 whereas marcopolo 1 was sold to the sweedish and operated as sirius 1 until 2000. it's now doing nothing.

Sput · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 18.46

Hymagumba wrote:according to the bastion of info that is wikipedia, marcopolo 2 was sold to the norwegians but was sent into a junk orbit in 2003 whereas marcopolo 1 was sold to the sweedish and operated as sirius 1 until 2000. it's now doing nothing.

That's not true, it still enjoys pottering about in its retirement, watching the sun rise and set and rocket spotting. Of course, the less said about MarcoPolo House the better!

Nini · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 19.41

You speak as if it's a house of ill repute Sput.

Is it?

LaSeandre · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 19.53

They spent a few million purpose building it, only to be merged into Sky's HQ, it's now occupied by QVC.

Nini · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 19.54

So yes then.

Pete · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 19.55

onDigital had it inbetween them.

Nini · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 20.37

Isn't it enough QVC have it? Saying that though, I did like ONdigital a lot more than ITV Digital.

nwtv2003 · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 21.01

Nini wrote:Isn't it enough QVC have it? Saying that though, I did like ONdigital a lot more than ITV Digital.

Indeed, On Digital was a good concept, their main problems were that the software and hardware wasn't very good, the price was too much in comparison to Sky, and that Sky were killing it from it's birth, especially since they were ones to give away free STBs.

Although I think we're better served by Freeview, it's really helped the uptake of Digital TV and it seems to be getting stronger and better.

Philip · Sun 04 Jan, 2009 21.11

They gave us stickers to put over the old logos on the remote and box, but they never updated the software to say ITV Digital! Not on our box at least. We still used it for Freeview, until the frequency change earlier this year.