Originally Posted by
Jofm5
Spanner is correct the firmware downloads are performed via satellite - it would be prohibitively costly for sky otherwise.
The phone line is used for 2 reasons, the main reason is for premium services such as sky box office (pay per view films etc) and the other is if you have a multi-room setup. The sky box will require a phone line if it is a multi-room setup to validate that both boxes are at the same location. Sky requires this on multi-room to stop cards being used at different locations and only a single subscription being paid.
Not sure about the multiroom aspect - the phone connection to our Sky box in our bedroom wasn't convenient, so as soon as the installation chap left we removed it, and in the 9 months since it has caused no problem. The one downstairs is hooked up to the phone line still.
If you go for the £20 card that Jofm5 mentions then you don't need a phone line at all - we got one when in Holland and didn't want to use the phone connection as you aren't supposed to have them outside the UK, and it was never an issue. On that tariff as well as the BBC/ITV/Ch4/CH5 channels and their subsidiaries (Fiver, FiveUS, ITV2/3/4 etc) you also get loads of shopping and religious channels - enjoy!!!
Get yourself a Sky dish from eBay, along with a satellite signal tester, and using direction/angle readily obtained via Google fix it to your house. As mentioned connect a co-ax from the LNB on the dish to the box, and a Scart from box to TV, and away you go.