How to get British TV Worldwide Part 2: Paying for it

This is the second article in a series titled How to Get British TV Worldwide. In Part 2 of this series I’m going to cover How to Pay for British TV anywhere in the world.

Slingbox and British TV

The development of the Slingbox has revolutionized the way to get TV anywhere. It didn’t take long for enterprising individuals to adapt the technology to distribute local TV to viewers across the world.

Basically, a Slingbox ‘placeshifts’ TV. It take a TV feed and sends a streaming video feed over the internet. As long as you have a broadband internet connection, you can see TV and control it as if you were actually there.

UK Based Companies have begun setting up Slingboxes to placeshift British TV anywhere in the world. Basically, they put a Slingbox in a server room in the UK, hook it up to satellite and it broadcasts your own personal British TV feed over the internet. As long as you have broadband you can view your feed anywhere. These services were very expensive but with a lowering exchange rate and competition, prices are becoming reasonable.

Recently, I found an operation called UKTV2C that has some reasonable prices and serves many happy Anglophiles and British Expats with their fix of British TV.

UK TV Placeshift Service – UKTV2C

I had a chance to play around with UKTV2C recently and it’s a pretty solid British TV Slingbox service. They gave me a 24 hour demo and I had tons of fun watching British TV live from the UK here in the USA. Despite the time difference, there was still plenty to watch, even at all hours of the night. There is some pretty cool stuff on the BBC at 3 in the morning, UK time!

My first impressions of UKTV2C is that the service is pretty solid. Occasionally the stream skipped, but I can chalk that up to my unreliable Comcast connection. The video was clear and the sound was good. Keep in mind, the video quality it not HD quality but quality is comparable to most TV captures downloadable on the UK TV Bittorrent sites. Video quality also depends on your own connection speed. UKTV2C has their own dedicated servers and high speed internet connections, so you can rely on their end being speedy.

They have many options for customers, from a pretty basic set-up that just gives you the most popular channels. This plan has a low set-up cost and a low monthly ongoing cost (£99 (about $150) to set-up, £29.99 (about $45) a month). They have other plans that feature recorders, premium channels and much more. Their pricing model is a batter value for money than the other shops out there providing British TV via Slingbox. The Slingbox software is free, so all you need to pay for is the service itself. The set-up fees and monthly fees cover all the costs and there are no hidden charges, as can happen with other outfits that offer this service.

If you’re an Anglophile on a budget, the exchange rate is in your favor right now, so these services are very affordable. Currently, the channel line-up is huge. You can get staples like the BBC, ITV, Four and Five as well as the newer cable networks. They have packages that include Sky Satellite TV, but they require an additional Sky Subscription. The good stuff is on Freeview.

I spoke to UKTV2C’s friendly owner, Mike Gamble, and he said that they are working on a pricing model to hire Slingboxes for short periods of time in addition to monthly services. Their turnaround is fast and you can be watching live British TV within 24 hours, but some of their higher end packages take a little longer to set-up. They’ve been around for awhile now and have a solid, satisfied customer base. They take recurring payments via Paypal.

Many people probably have questions about the legality of this. It is perfectly legal. Placeshifting Television breaks no copyright laws and you don’t have to worry about pay the BBC License fee.

If you’re concerned about the time difference and having to miss your favorite British TV shows, you can get a UKTV2C package that includes a recorder, so you can record all your favorite programs and account for the time difference.

Don’t fancy sitting at your computer to watch British TV? Well, you can either hook your computer up to the TV (like I’ve done) or you can get a new device from Sling Media called the SlingCatcher. The SlingCatcher is a TV set-top box that connects to your home network and allows you to watch your Slingbox feed directly on your TV. Not bad for cool tech, not bad at all.

Now, the trick is to convince the wife this is something we NEED.