YOU TOO?: BRIT SCAMMED BY BOGUS SKY TV BOX DISTRIBUTOR FEARS ‘MANY MORE’ COULD BE AFFECTED ON SPAIN’S COSTA BLANCA

Quite frankly anybody who believed they they were going to get a Sky box able to receive anything but FTA channels for €99 were conned by nobody by but themselves. 

That must have beeen the expectation as genuine Sky boxes which will receive FTA channels are readily available for pennies, I've got at least 3 gathering dust in my garage! 

Ray D

You are not helpful you are a very sad man try a different line please, not everyone is SCAMMER and you know it stop it get a life.

I don't often agree with RayD, but IPTV is an illegal, unreliable streaming service, there may be one or two people offering it with some form of guarantee but in my experience I was ripped off by one provider who refused to give a refund for an unsuitable system.

I may strongly disagree with the affirmation that IPTV is illegal - at least in Spain. Many so called Smart TV sets are fully capable of reproducing streaming channels and even are delivered with pre-installed M3U files. Browse the internet for more - no need to pay anything to anyone. So far no one has ever been sentenced by any Spanish court for streaming copyrighted material for HIS OWN PERSONAL use.

Well said Killjoy certain people copy and paste the same thing anytime anyone asks about IPTV and we all know who that is.

 Well said RayD.

I think the problem here, is everyone or service is 'tarred by the same brush' - which is simply not correct.

There are good and bad companies in all sectors.

There are 'technicalities' in transmission laws within Spain and this does vary based on the rights within certain countries. Russia, for example, is not the same as the UK. You could call it illegal, you could call it 'grey', depends on channels transmitted and where from.

I would agree, there are many poor services & providers out there - simply because they are being offered by not experience companies or individuals, but 'chancers', those who do 'hop on for a quick buck'.

The company I work for, has offered all types of TV services for now over 11 years & never ripped anyone off - have a support and feedback page with over 3500 people linked in - so whilst I do sympathise with  few unfortunate people that have received either a poor service or ripped off by some cowboy, says 'ALL is the same' - no, it's not. We've been here for over 11 years for a reason - I know of course this was not aimed at ourselves, just, unfortunately, a few people/companies that do cause trouble reflect badly on all & it's not always the case.

I did post this up elsewhere - but quite relevant to this post as it may explain to some users, why they have had issues & a help guides to assist.

IPTV information

The main issues are there is such a variation of services. Quality and stability do vary between suppliers, so a 'like for like' in terms of costs, is not always such a simple comparison. Below explains the differences in services/providers & some hardware.

IPTV seller A has a server with recommended loading of maximum 1000 clients. They charge for example €20 per month per client but only have the maximum recommended load for the server - 1000 clients.

IPTV seller B has same server, maximum loading 1000 clients, but is only interested in profit, not performance, so has 2000 clients on the same server, gambling that too many of them won't be online at the same time. This seller could charge half the amount €10 per month, but the performance will not be as good or as stable as IPTV seller A. Payless, increase the probability of a more unstable service.   

'But I can get it free with Kodi' - well you can if you have the patience of a saint, good technical ability and are happy to spend as much time trying to find content as you are watching it? Apps disappearing or taken offline. Maybe for a technically minded home hobbyist, but for the average person who just wants to watch TV, it's trouble waiting to happen.  There's a reason why it's free. It's unmonitored, overloaded and just unreliable. Kodi 5 years ago, is not the same as Kodi today. Poor. When unlimited people can hop on a stream, it will fall over.

Amazon Firestick - Is fine, AS AN AMAZON FIRESTICK. What many consumers do not realise, is the 'free content on a firestick', is not quite as it seems. Amazons own software/ecosystem is ditched to turn the Firestick back to it's the original format - an average Android stick, which puts you back to using Kodi (without Amazons own slick software), if you go the path of the free stream apps, you are back to where you started.

One other factor which can affect people experiences is the internet itself - it has been known on the odd occasion, that a local ISP or two, has blocked or throttled an internet TV connection, either to limit the data they are using, or a type of deliberate act, as many promote their own TV services. If people do have issues and not sure if it's the streaming or the ISP there's a few pointers here - https://www.televisiontechnology.eu/instructional-guides-iptv  recommend skipping down to 'MOST COMMONLY REPORTED FAULTS OF STREAMING & IPTV SERVICES. SYMPTOMS & DIAGNOSIS'.

Paul