FTA stands for Free to Air

FTA stands for Free to Air. This technology allows home owners to receive free to air signals from TV satellites without subscription. Many home owners install their own FTA satellite dish and they get to enjoy thousands of free channels. Mostly, the signals are unencrypted. But some signals may be encrypted and require special software before the channels can be viewed. Channels are also constrained by geographical location.

To watch free channels, you first need to setup the proper FTA equipment. On paper, setting up the equipment appears easy. All you need are two pieces of hardware – a FTA dish, and a receiver. The dish is connected to the receiver via a coaxial cable. The receiver is then connected directly to the television. You can easily purchase a dish from your local electronic store. Buy a C-band or K-Band dish.

The dish is usually installed on the highest point of the house – the roof. You are going to need some help installing the dish. One person should be up at the roof, trying to point the dish to get the best signal. Another person should standby at the television to see if the receiver is receiving good quality signals. If you have no experience setting up the dish, try to engage the help of someone who had setup an FTA dish before. Before you can view the content, you must remember to select the satellite on the receiver. Also, make sure that you have updated the firmware to the latest version. Once you have setup the hardware, you will be able to view additional channels on your TV set.

However, as mentioned earlier, some signals are unencrypted. You can easily view channels with unencrypted signals. But for those with encrypted signals, you will need to download FTA keys to view the content. The key acts as a password, and needs to be input into the receiver. The receiver then descrambles the encrypted signals that it receives. There are literally thousands of free to air channels that require secret keys. Keys are used by TV stations to control access to the content. Only subscribers get access to a key. However, FTA keys offer an economic alternative for those who do not have the budget to access the programs.

So where do you obtain such keys?

There are several companies on the Internet that you can go to for downloading of keys. By becoming a member, you get unlimited access to all the keys that are provided by the service providers.

Free to air

Free-to-air (FTA) television (TV) and radio broadcasts are sent unencrypted and may be received via any suitable receiver:

Free-to-view (FTV) is, generally, available without subscription but is digitally encrypted and may be restricted geographically. Neither of these is pay-TV, which is an encrypted subscription (or pay-per-view) service.

FTA is sometimes delivered by satellite television, but in various parts of the world free-to-air television channels are broadcast unencrypted on UHF or VHF bands.

Although these channels are described as free, in some cases the viewer does in fact pay for them. Some are paid directly by payment of a licence fee (as in the case of the BBC) or voluntary donation (in the case of educational broadcasters like PBS), others indirectly by paying for consumer products and services where part of the cost goes toward television advertising and sponsorship (in the case of Japanese television broadcasters like TV Asahi and TV Tokyo which relies on sponsorship heavily, similar to Philippine Television like ABS-CBN, and GMA). One further variation is in Canada, where the CBC Television/Télévision de Radio-Canada network is partly funded by taxpayer dollars, and otherwise supports itself with commercial advertising revenues as it competes with other free over-the-air commercial networks.

Free-to-air is often used for international broadcasting, making it something of a video equivalent to shortwave radio. Most authorized FTA retailers list free to air channel guides and content available in North America for free to air use.

There are a number of competing systems in use, with early adopters having used C-band satellite dishes of several feet in diameter to receive signals which were originally analogue microwaves, and then digital microwave using the 3.9-4.2 GHz band. Today, in the 11.7-12.2 GHz Ku band, which enables the use of under one-meter dishes, with most often the DVB-S standard, FTA can be used from apartment balconies.

The most common North American sources for free-to-air DVB satellite television are:

• NASA TV Multi-channel(NASA HD, NASA Public, NASA Media, NASA Education) Broadcast on AMC 6 (72°W)
• Retro Television Network on AMC 9 (83°W)
• TVU Music channel and This TV on AMC 3 (87°W)
• ABC News Now on Galaxy 28 (89°W)
• Eternal Word Television Network on Galaxy 17 (91°W)
• My Family TV on Galaxy 3C (95°W).
• AMGTV and BYU Television on Galaxy 19 (97°W)
• English and foreign language broadcasters RT (TV network), MHz Worldview, Ebru TV, IRINN, Al Jazeera English and more up-linked by GlobeCast World TV on Galaxy 25 (97°W)
• Christian broadcasters The Word Network, Emmanuel TV, Daystar Television Network, JCTV, Trinity Broadcasting Network, The Church Channel, God’s Learning Channel and more promoted by Glorystar & Spiritcast Satellite Systems TV on Galaxy 25 (97°W)
• Pentagon Channel on AMC 1 (103°W)
• Jewish Life Television, ResearchChannel, and University of Washington TV on Galaxy 18 (123°W)
• Montana Public Broadcasting Service on AMC 21 (125°W)
• Louisiana Connection Network on Galaxy 13 (127°W)
• White Springs Television on Galaxy 27 (129°W)
• Classic Arts Showcase on Galaxy 15 (133°W)
• Football, Basketball, Baseball, Soccer, and Hockey Wildfeeds on various satellites

Most of these signals are carried by US satellites. There is little or no free Canadian DVB-S content available to users of medium-size dishes as much of the available Ku-band satellite bandwidth is occupied by pay-TV operators Shaw Direct and Bell TV, although the large style dish (over 3 feet/90cm) does have a few choices. FTA signals may be scattered across multiple satellites, requiring a motor or multiple LNBs to receive everything.

The largest groups of end-users for Ku-band free-to-air signals were initially the ethnic-language communities, as often free ethnic-language programming would be sponsored by Multilingual American Communities and their broadcasters. Depending on language and origin of the individual signals, North American ethnic-language TV is a mix of pay-TV, free-to-air and DBS operations. Today, many American broadcasters send a multitude of programming channels in many languages, spanning many new channels, so they can get National support, which ultimately leads to carriage by cable systems, to additionally support the high costs of broadcasting signals in this way.

Nonetheless, free to air satellite TV is a viable addition to any home video system, not only for the reception of specialized content but also for use in locations where terrestrial ATSC over-the-air reception is incomplete and additional channels are desired.