garym71
Regular Member
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2007
- Messages
- 92
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 6
- Age
- 52
- My Satellite Setup
- Pace TDS470N Sky+ Receiver, Technomate TM-5400CI+ FTA Receiver, Raven Gemini 70cm Mesh Dish with East & West offset LNB brackets, 2 x Inverto Black Ultra Single LNBs, Inverto Black Premium Quad LNB, Eurostar 4x1 DiSEqC Switch, Webro WF100 Cable
- My Location
- South Oxfordshire, UK
I am just about to go ahead and order the satellite equipment I will need for a fixed-dish multi-sat system. As a complete novice, I was originally going to just order all the equipment from a local satellite company and get them to install and set it all up but I realised that I would get a better deal on the equipment and get exactly what I wanted if I purchased from an online supplier which is what I've now decided to do.
Although I'm a novice with satellite systems, I am more than competent at fixing up the dish onto the wall of my house and wiring up / routing the cables to the DiSEqC switch and receiver. However, what I'm not feeling so confident about is my ability to then align the dish and the 3 LNB's correctly to their respective satellites (Astra 2 [28E], Astra 1 [19E] and Hotbird [13E]).
The first question I have is that as a novice, am I likely to end up in a world of pain by even contemplating an attempt at the dish and LNB's myself? I have a rough idea about the Azimut angle and understand that the centre LNB should point towards the weakest satellite although I don't actually know which of Astra 1, Astra 2 or Hotbird is the weakest(??) I also have no real clue about what Elevation angle I will need. Is there anywhere I can find this out or calculate it based on my location (I'm in the south of the UK)? As for the Polarisation / Skew of each LNB, I also have no idea what this should be either so is there also a scientific way I can calculate these too? With a bit of help from the experts on here I would like to try and have a go myself first and only if it all goes badly wrong will I resort to calling out a local satellite installation company to complete the job.
Also, one of the options offered by the online supplier I'm buying the equipment from is that for £15 they will automatically program in channels for all 3 satellites before they send the receiver to me. This can apparently aid with the setting up of the dish/LNB alignment as there will already be channels in the receiver which I can use to check picture quality when trying set the alignments. Do you think this pre-programmed receiver option is something worth having / paying for?
Although I'm a novice with satellite systems, I am more than competent at fixing up the dish onto the wall of my house and wiring up / routing the cables to the DiSEqC switch and receiver. However, what I'm not feeling so confident about is my ability to then align the dish and the 3 LNB's correctly to their respective satellites (Astra 2 [28E], Astra 1 [19E] and Hotbird [13E]).
The first question I have is that as a novice, am I likely to end up in a world of pain by even contemplating an attempt at the dish and LNB's myself? I have a rough idea about the Azimut angle and understand that the centre LNB should point towards the weakest satellite although I don't actually know which of Astra 1, Astra 2 or Hotbird is the weakest(??) I also have no real clue about what Elevation angle I will need. Is there anywhere I can find this out or calculate it based on my location (I'm in the south of the UK)? As for the Polarisation / Skew of each LNB, I also have no idea what this should be either so is there also a scientific way I can calculate these too? With a bit of help from the experts on here I would like to try and have a go myself first and only if it all goes badly wrong will I resort to calling out a local satellite installation company to complete the job.
Also, one of the options offered by the online supplier I'm buying the equipment from is that for £15 they will automatically program in channels for all 3 satellites before they send the receiver to me. This can apparently aid with the setting up of the dish/LNB alignment as there will already be channels in the receiver which I can use to check picture quality when trying set the alignments. Do you think this pre-programmed receiver option is something worth having / paying for?