I have noticed a lot of traffic in the past few days has arrived from people googling BBC Prime Not Working, or a similar phrase. Just in case people don’t understand why this has occurred, I thought I would post a quick update.
If you currently pay a reputable supplier for a satellite subscription, you need to contact them and have your account and card checked. If you happen to have bought a receiver that had some codes pre-installed, then some channels that are subscription based (that you are supposed to pay for) will have been decoded. Similarly, if you update your satellite receiver with key codes from the internet, then certain channels will work once the new keys are in place. However, BBC Prime (on HotBird) have switched to a newer incarnation of the ViaAccess encryption algorithm, which has not been cracked by the people that publish codes. There is another BBC Prime channel broadcast on Hotbird, but that has been inaccessible ever since I discovered. It was useful for the EPG information present though.
I’ve just checked some other channels, and it looks as though the HBO channels have either been moved or taken off-air in Hotbird. I’ll post an update if the new scan in progress discovers a new position for these movie channels.
Oct 15 2008