get TV abroad

Archive for the ‘How to watch TV Abroad’ Category

I tested something today which I have been meaning to do for many months Sky TV in Australia!!!

Yep Sky TV abroad, not that awful Foxtel that people normally have to suffer here.

I have to say it works amazingly! Even better than BBC iPlayer abroad! Now don't get too excited as Sky Player requires a subscription, as it is of course a premium network in the UK and not free to air. It is possible to get a subscription just for Sky Player but the prices are pretty high, in fact they seem to be about the same as a full Sky TV subscription in the UK! However if you have friends or family back in the UK then perhaps they will let you use their accounts for free. A Sky TV account will support up to 4 PCs, they will however also need either multiroom OR Sky Broadband Unlimited.

And of course YOU will need a copy of Identity Cloaker to make it seem like you are still in the UK!

Once you have Identity Cloaker installed all you need to do is connect to any of its UK servers and then login to Sky Player, once you are logged in you can actually turn off Identity Cloaker and it still works! It would seem Sky Player only checks the IP address when you login (this may of course change in the future so if you have problems after turning Identity Cloaker off try running with it on).

I have found the quality is actually better than BBC iPlayer for On Demand, even in Australia on one of the worst ISPs in the country I can watch a 60 minute show without a single pause. Sky Player seems to buffer much more of the program than BBC iPlayer does, in fact it buffers the entire program if it can, and this really helps smooth out any connections problems you might have.

For Live TV it obviously can't buffer the same way and this gives a few problems, I am however able to run Sky Player Live on medium quality setting most of the time and the low setting always works. So if you want the best quality its better to watch On Demand rather than live (given the huge time difference between the UK and Australia the On Demand function is much more useful anyway!).

I will try and get a video up of Sky TV working abroad with Identity Cloaker this weekend for you all!

 After a month, or was it several years, the close battle for who with run the next UK Government is perhaps coming to an end (well assuming there is not a hung parliament!). Those of you living abroad but with close ties to the UK may well want to enjoy the UK Election TV coverage abroad, and of course as always you can!

With most programs starting around 10pm UK time you can watch using Identity Cloaker anywhere in the world on:

• BBC iPlayer
• Sky News
• ITV Player

If you don't already have Identity Cloaker then don't worry as the signup process only takes a few minutes, and if all you want to watch is tonight election broadcasts then the 10 day trial for 5 Euros is all you need (and don't worry at the end of the trial the subscription DOES NOT auto renew). If you want to know how to setup Identity Cloaker to watch BBC iPlayer Abroad along with all the other UK TV channels then take a look at our simple guide.

The Formula One season has started, the first practice is already over as I write this and second practice about 40 minutes away.

Now not many TV companies actually bother to show the practice session, certainly here in Australia all we get is the race and qualifying. However have no fear as the BBC is showing everything!

Those in the UK can of course just turn on the TV and press the red button, but if you live abroad you can still view through the BBC website.

Normally when you visit the race pages from an IP address outside the UK all you will see is the text commentary, but if you fire up Identity Cloaker and select a UK location and visit the page as if by magic video will appear at the top!

You can also view directly through iPlayer  while abroad with the same method.

If the video does not start for you disconnect Identity Cloaker and connect again, as events like Formula One are so popular they seem to put a little more strain on the servers (I had to try 3 servers before I was happy today).

If you are new to the idea of watching BBC iPlayer abroad, or any of hundreds of other UK and US TV stations, then why not find out a little bit more.

SeeSaw TV has just been launched and as always all you need to watch it outside the UK is a copy of IDC! Simply use the UK proxy from IDC, though you can use the VPN method too if you prefer, and start viewing UK TV abroad from this new supplier! They offer archived TV from several UK TV companies, including the BBC. Be sure to turn off encryption in IDC if you want the best quality video streaming experience.

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SeeSaw uses technological know-how from Venture Kangaroo, the now defunct venture owned by BBC Throughout the world, Channel 4 and ITV plc. Kangaroo was blocked by the European Competition Commission in February 2009. In September 2009 all of Kangaroo's technologies and assets were bought by Arqiva for approximately £8m.

SeeSaw hopes to has around 3,500 hours of TV content offered, which includes a mix of free advertising-supported content material and paid-for programming. SeeSaw has already announced a content deal with BBC Worldwide, so shows like Cranford, Lark Rise to Candleford, That Mitchell and Webb Look and classic Doctor Who are going to be offered for viewers

I have just taken a look at what is on TV this Christmas here in Australia. Well ABC1, the equivalent of BBC1, is running with the 1956 classic The Man Who Knew Too Much. In fact they are showing the same film twice!

So if your local TV is as dire as this, why not treat yourself to a bit of proper Christmas fun and see what Auntie (the BBC) is broadcasting for you through BBC iPlayer!

You can be watching BBC iPlayer outside the UK in just a few minutes through Identity Cloaker. Or of course you can catch up with all the other UK TV stations, as well as many US and European ones. Check out the videos on this site to see how easy everything is to setup.

They have packages for as little as 10 day, so you can just subscribe for Christmas if that's all you are interested in.

Give it a go, I am sure you will not be disappointed!

Merry Christmas!

I have already covered how to download from BBC iPlayer outside the UK (you will need to use the VPN function) however these videos are all DRM protected and you can only watch them for a certain amount of time. There are various rather tedious way to convert the videos to a none-DRM version, however there is a rather neat utility you can use to download the videos directly from the BBC DRM free. iPlayer Downloader is a free tool which downloads MP4 versions of programs on BBC iPlayer, and you can use it while abroad if you have a copy of Identity Cloaker.

I will put a video up showing how to use it after Christmas, but it's pretty easy to use if you want to give it a go now. Simply download the program and run it, then start up Identity Cloaker and use the VPN option (this will not work through proxy at the moment) select one of the MAC compatible UK servers and connect as you would normally do. Now visit the BBC iPlayer website and slect the program you want to watch, when the program starts take a look at the URL in your browsers address bar, it will look something like this:

hXXp://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00pftz5/The_Hairy_Bikers_Twelve_Days_of_Christmas/

All you need to do is copy the bit I have highlighted in yellow in to iPlayer Downloader and click 'Download'

After a short time your program will be downloaded and ready to watch whenever you want. As the program downloads the MP4 version you can even upload the video direct to your iPhone or iPod if you like.

I am currently in Moscow Russia, and there really is very little to watch on Moscow TV after work. However thanfully the entire of Moscow is covered by a fantastic 4G network called Yota, this gives you 10mbit unlimited internet access almost anywhere in the city, and a number of areas outside the city.

The cost is only 900 roubles a month, and you can use it for just 1 month if you want. Compare that with the cost of hotel Internet, or god forbid the cost of using your 3G phone abroad!

There is one extra great advantage with this system in that you can connect your mobile, laptop etc. to the device via WiFi so you can run all those programs which Apple don't allow to work over 3G networks! So if you have your Slingbox back home you can use your Slingplayer or of course you can use Identity Cloaker and be enjoying BBC iPlayer in Russia and you will not longer be stuck with just Moscow TV.

I tested the speed of this just a few days ago and were getting a good 5mbit connection back to the UK, which is more than enough to watch iPlayer even in the highest quality modes!

So if you find yourself in Moscow (perhaps unlikely) and dont want to watch Moscow TV (or of course enjoy some of the other sites of the city) do consider getting hold of a Yota unit and enjoying a bit of UK BBC TV abroad!

Great news for everybody as there is a new version of Identity Cloaker out and it has an option which makes viewing TV better than ever!

As many of your know Identity Cloaker was originally made to make your online surfing more secure, however for watching TV you don't really need all of these security enhancements and they do tend to slow the connection down a bit. So now in the latest version you have the option to turn off encryption, and this has enabled speed increases of up to 5 times!

Check out these results from Moscow Russia:

• With Encryption
• Without Encryption

As you can see the download speed is much faster, for some reason the upload speed has decreased but this is not important at all when watching TV.

All you need to do benefit from this massive speed increase is press the 'Disable Encryption' button visible in the bottom right of the Identity Cloaker main screen once connected.

Yes it truly is as simple as running software that makes it look like your computer is in the UK to watch BBC iPlayer abroad, perhaps a better question is why?

If they, the BBC, wanted to block users from viewing their system from abroad they could. Much the same as Sky TV could easily take action against people viewing Sky Television down on the Costa Del Sol! Now of course Sky has a commercial Internet as they still make make money from each any every customer. In the case of the BBC IF you are not paying for a license fee then you are not contributing to their revenue, however the BBC currently has NO method for you to contribute unless you have a house in the UK!

So why do they allow it? Well we can only speculate here. Perhaps they want the publicity, that people from all over the world will get to see BBC content and enjoy it, perhaps then buy BBC DVDs or even subscribe to local BBC versions like BBC America or BBC HD in Australia. There is also the growing idea that eventually the BBC will officially launch its services abroad, in fact we talked about this idea only a week or so ago. If they were to launch globally then it would perhaps be nice for them to already have a user base of many thousands of people already bestowing the greatness of the BBC to their friends.

Whatever the reason the simple fact is its incredibly easy to watch BBC iPlayer abroad, I have tested it with Identity Cloaker in countries all over the world and have rarely had issues. In fact the only problems I ever had were with an ISP called Dodo in Australia, they are well known for being slow even by Australian standards!

The simple thing to do is use the 10 day trial and test your ISP for watching BBC iPlayer abroad in just a few minutes time. I can say with great honesty that for most ISPs it will work just fine.

You may have seen in the news that the BBC is planning another push at making iPlayer open to international users through an official subscription systems. So does that meen you will not be needing Identity Cloaker soon?

Well more than likely it does not!

Firstly this idea has been brought up by the BBC many times before, but they have never been allowed to open their archives to other countries. It is no suprise that one of the main objectors are TV stations from other countries who really dont want the competition of the BBC being available on their turf. As the BBC makes a lot of money from selling its show to these other TV companies they would not want to put their relationship in jepordy. Even other areas of the BBC would not like to see this, such as BBC America and BBC HD Australia, who both alread charge a premium to access a limited BBC content.

There is also the cost issue, for the service the BBC are talking about costs of 10 Euros to watch one single eppisode of a major hit show, 10 Euros! Thats almost two months of watching iPlayer abroad when using Identity Cloaker!

So don’t go holding your breath waiting for an official version of iPlayer for those outside the UK!

Don’t forget that you also get all other UK and US TV and radio channels with Identity Cloaker as well!