Re: Satalite dishes.

Am Fri, 10 Aug 2007 20:37:58 +0100 schrieb mike/lisa/claire:

"Andreas Schulze-Bäing" <mibmab@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:14ms8gt04saf9$.12175feuac654$.dlg@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Am Fri, 10 Aug 2007 18:07:32 +0100 schrieb mike/lisa/claire:

"Andreas Schulze-Bäing" <mibmab@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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Am Fri, 10 Aug 2007 14:41:32 +0100 schrieb mike/lisa/claire:

I used to have a satellite dish to get more than 50 German channels for
free from Astra 19.2. After a while I got bored with that and installed
another LNB on 13 degrees East to get about the same amount of Italian
channels for free - meaning FTA. Then a bit later the BBC and
subsequently
ITV went FTA on 28 deg E, so i got a third LNB for that - all on the
same
cheapy 60cm dish bought for 10 pounds in a diy shop :-)

Forgive my gross ignorance, whats an LNB?

That's a Low-noise block converter. It's this little box sitting at the
end
of the "arm" of a satellite dish.

Thank you for the information and for your patience.

My husband has now shown me a satellite dish and receiver set he wants me to
get him! Its by a company called Silver Crest and seems to be pre programmed
for European stations but I cant see anything about UK channels at all.

Silver Crest? That sounds like one of those satellite systems sold
occasionally by Lidl. In terms of the programming - most of the FTA
receivers are preprogrammed for Astra/Eutelsat, which is to a large extent
German and Italian channels. If you put the satellite dish towards the
Astra2D you get many of the UK channels which includes all BBC and ITV
channels. You just have to do scan. For the BBC channels sometimes you have
to scan manually the specific tansponder as the automatic scan does not
find all channels, at least on my box.

If he puts this thing up and connects it into our main TV I take it we loose
all our current digital channels ? Will he be better served with a TV set of
his own to go with this rubbish?

You can just keep the existing freeview in parallel. No problem with that
as long as you have enough Scart connectors.

Further, is it possible to put this system onto a PC? I have a TV card in
this computer I am writing from but its not connected because I haven't got
an aerial connected in. Can a satellite be connected onto this or would I be
better off just buying a TV?

Yes, you can use a so-called DVB-S card, provided your computer is fast
enough. The Skystar2 card works smoothly on my ancient PC with 1.5 Ghz. But
you need at least a Twin-LNB to run this in parallel to the FTA-box. But as
I read below, the set contains a Twin-LNB.

There also seems to be a "Satellite finder"
kit. Will he need one of those too?

With the old analogue receivers it was possible to find the right position
juding from the quality of the picture. With digital that's more difficult,
so a satellite finder is good for the exact positioning.

he is determined to have this. I am determined he will not spoil my viewing
by ruining our main TV in the sitting room. That is currently on a freeview
box.

If he wants it as an additional feature to play around with - you could
call this a hobby - then that's fine. But you have to make a decision as to
which satellite position you want to aim at. This is mainly a decision
between UK, German and Italian channels. The programs of most other
interesting countries are usually scrambled (France, Spain, Netherlands).
He might even consider updating it at some point with a motor which can be
controlled from the FTA-box - so you can automatically move to different
satellite positions when switching channels. The receiver box needs to
support at least DiSEqC 1.2 for that. See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DiSEqC

Just keep the existing setup with the terrestrial freeview box - so in any
case you will have the UK channels.

The set consists of a digital satellite dish, a receiver set ( free to air)
, remote control, wall bracket, Twin LNB 4xF plugs, coaxial and s- VHS
connection, pre programmed for astra 19.2 EAstra 28.2E EutelW216E Hotbird
13ESirus 2 4.8E Amos /Atlantic 4 - 5 WHe4;;as sat39ETurksat42Eand Hispa
sat30W Make any sense?

Ah, ok. A more extensive preprogramming covering most of the relevant
satellites for Europe. Despite that a rescan might be useful as program
transponders change occasionally.


The set apparently is also plug in and play, Auto search programmable
channels MPEG2 and DVD compatible - any one care to put that in simple
English for me?


Well - plug and play sounds good. But installing this kit requires a bit of
DIY-enthusiasm, I would say. It's important that you have a free view
towards the satellite. The signal is much more prone to obstacles than a
terrestrial aerial. Even some leaves in the line towards the satellite can
make the signal break up.
MPEG2 is the compression algorythm of digital TV. I'm not sure what DVD
compatible means... maybe another SCART connector?

Are these things complicated to set up?

Well - with some patience, a compass and some basic DIY-skills it should be
possible.

Andreas
.

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