Quote by nipper
Anyone know if the Irish channels are on any of the satellites, perhaps some version of freesat. I know most of them are on Sky, but only if a subscription is paid. I read somewhere they plan to add them to freeview once the switchover is complete.
Irish channels will
never be free on wide beam satellite, However the new spot beam satellites due to come air in the near future have a narrow band transmitters to allow free to air beams directed at the RoI which will be know as Saorsat.
Unlike Freesat which is on small footprint transmitter but still receivable outside the national boundaries of The UK, NI and the RoI the Saorsat for RoI stations will only be receivable in the RoI.
The reason is due to the fact that Irish TV providers only pay royalties based on our population, if the signal was receivable free outside of the RoI non home-made content would be prohibitively expensive, this is also the reason for the current encryption of the existing transmissions.