Do you remember the music that accompanied
the test card on the BBC and ITA?
Well now you can hear it again
Just click the logo to tune in to
TEST CARD MUSIC
From LIVE365

Satellite Television

It doesn't seem possible that BSkyB has been transmitting for over 10 years,
from the Astra satellite and even longer from low power communications satellites.
Below is a selection of videos and pictures from satellites' early years.

All images below are jpeg files and the videos are MPEG 1 format

 


Click above for video

 

This is a clip taken from Thames Tv's "TV Eye" and shows an early
test for satellite television.
The full backing music for this ident will be posted on this site later.

File size 849KB


Click above for video

 

Another early station was "Superchannel", on Eutelsat, 13° East.
This was a consortium that at one time contained amongst others,
the BBC and Anglia Tv. The station's aim was to broadcast the best
of British tv to mainland Europe. This clip is of the station
identification in use, just before the format changed to mainly pop videos.

File Size 1.51MB


Click above to enlarge

 

After officially launching less than 24 hours before,
all of the the BSB circuits were lost between Marco Polo House (BSB HQ)
and the IBA's uplink site at Chilworth.
The break lasted about 20 minutes.
This caption was shown on all channels.


Click above to enlarge

 

The official British satellite broadcaster was BSB,
on Marco Polo I and II at 31° West.
Sadly, it only lasted a few months before "merging"
with Sky to become BSkyB.
Each of the 5 channels had their own test card,
these will be posted here later, but they also used
the card shown here for engineering tests.


Click above for video

BSB's pop channel was "Power Station".
Programmes used to start with 'Power Up' each day.
The presenter was none other than, Chris Evans.
It's interesting to note that when BSB commenced broadcasting,
they did not feel they had to clutter their screens with
permanent on-screen logos on any of their channels.
How times have changed.

File Size 1.44MB

 

Index