Television in English while in France

[yar78]

I am about to head off to France and am looking for a way to have a good quantity of channels in English for my children and my self. The solution can not be Internet but may come in the form of satellite coverage. I know in France their are boxes you attach to your satellite that when pointed at the right satellite allow you to watch public channels normally designed for areas of the country without cable lines. Does this exist for receiving English channels? Is there something out there????

[Joppa]

Originally Posted by yar78

I am about to head off to France and am looking for a way to have a good quantity of channels in English for my children and my self. The solution can not be Internet but may come in the form of satellite coverage. I know in France their are boxes you attach to your satellite that when pointed at the right satellite allow you to watch public channels normally designed for areas of the country without cable lines. Does this exist for receiving English channels? Is there something out there????

You cannot receive signals from satellites serving the US, as they all lie 'below the horizon.' There are certain US programs carried on free-to-air (FTA) satellite channels receivable with a simple dish and tuner without subscription, such as CNN International. If you want to watch wider range of programs, such as sports, movies, dramas and documentaries, you need to subscribe to satellite channels, such as by UK-based Sky, and French-based Canal+. If you are happy with mainly UK-produced programs, a lot of channels are FTA on a platform called Freesat. To watch US network TV, you have to get it online, such as using VPN and broadband.

[Ukrainka]

We get about 20 channels in English through "Orange". We took a package: TV+internet+landline and subscribed to "English" package... we have news, movies/tv serials, cartoons, travel, entertainment, music...
And there are other telecom providers that offer similar packages.
Also there are some companies here that install a satellite dish with an additional receiver and you get another maybe 200 channels in English. You can find such companies in FUSAC classifieds (also comes online, so you can Google it and read all the ads).

[Bevdeforges]

If you get satellite service (i.e. CanalSat) there are a number of channels that broadcast US and UK series in VM (version multi-langue) where you can choose the language. (If you choose any language other than French, you get French sub-titles - but that can be very helpful in learning French, or you can just ignore them.)

For the kids, the Cartoon Network channel broadcasts most of their program in VM. TF1 and a few of the "cable channels" (i.e. those you need cable or satellite to receive) broadcast a number of popular US series in VM - including such things as Desperate Housewives, House, Law and Order and NCIS. both 13eme Rue and SyFy are owned by US networks and much of their programming is in VM.

If you check FUSAC, or some of the anglophone publications in the Paris area (Paris Free Voice, Irish Eyes, etc.) you can probably find some satellite installers who can get you a Sky (British) box and subscription card.

And there is always Amazon.co.uk where you can order videos (DVD and BlueRay) of various US and British series, usually well before they are broadcast here in France.
Cheers,
Bev

[Billy The Fish]

The other option (which isn't 100% legal) is to install a satellite dish, and buy a decoder from the UK. You need an 80cm dish, but you can then pick up free to view English TV (BBC, ITV, Channel 4 etc.) by pointing at the satellites that UK users point at. No subscription to pay. I'm sure that there are loads of internet sites that explain how to do it in great detail.

[Lillyfer]

We have bouygues telecom and I am able to change the language. We have the entire tv set to only English, so if the show is available in English it will automatically start that way. Disney is the main one, that I have found, that is 97% in English/ it's regular version.

Hope that helps.

[Bevdeforges]

If you have satellite (Canal Sat), you can also set up your service to give you English soundtrack any time it's available - though you do have to put up with the French subtitles.
Cheers,
Bev