How did you get into this hobby?

[geordiejohn]

As the titles says, how (and why) did you get into satellite TV?

As a kid i was fascinated by DX radio, esp. medium wave, i used to be a member of the medium wave circle, sitting up all night so i could hear CJON from newfoundland, no wonder i never had a girl friend!

Time passed, beer, women and work get in the way and i lost interest.Then one day i was driving along and i saw a guy throwing out and old sky analogue system (amstrad i think, with a seperate decoder).I pulled up and asked him if i could have it, he was more than happy to be rid of it.I think the passengers on my bus thought i had lost my marbles!

I spent many happy hours in the garden pointing the dish at different sats (by hand), the only way to change polarity was by turning the LNB 90 degrees, watching french secam channels in black and white, seeing the odd match that others couldn't, i was hooked.

Things have moved on a bit to say the least, motorised systems are so much easier to set up and more affordable, it's great watching 3pm football but a big part of it for me is seeing the hard to get, weak channels, and seeing some of the bizarre offerings that are out there, i guess there is still a bit of nerd in me!

 

[Lazarus]

Needs must, in my case!

Although I started dealing with Satellite systems design, installation, operation and maintenance as far back as 1974 (not Digital TV, obviously!), it was only since moving to my current house that Satellite TV became of interest.

Due to poor Analogue signal, virtually non-existent DTT, totally non-existent DAB, I bought a Fortec Star Receiver (I now know much better ...................) to make use of a pre-existing "Sky" dish.

Intrigued by the Fortec Star (despite not having had a frontal lobotomy), I then got an 80cm Dish and a Monoblock, then a Motor, then ................. ad infinitum!

Great hobby. Lots of aspects to pursue. Lots of like minded people.

 

[Analoguesat]

Long time interest in sw & mw dxing with a variety of cheapish receivers. Then my folks got Sky analogue, and I found the German programming far more interesting than the rubbish put out by the British channels. I used to tune the box at least once a week to see if any more channels had appeared

In 2000 my folks had Sky Digital fitted, so they were given strict instructions that the old kit was to be salvaged for me

SInce then I begged, borrowed, bought and been given dishes, old receivers bits of cable and gawd only knows what. (Recycle reuse etc!) Much of it has been pressed into use to expand an ever more complicated system that even baffles me at times

 

[Jumpstart]

Years ago, before satellite TV was invented, I used to wait for the summer months that would bring foreign channels to the UK.

On a light sunny breeze so to speak. They'd fade in, and fade out. I cannot remember what this hobby was called...something like D-exxing. Anyway, it had its own fan club, and a monthy news letter was sent out in the post.

So when sat TV came along, I was one of the first to get it. Expensive then, but it was very interesting at the time. Then we only had fixed dishes, now mine is motorised.

 

[wod]

mine was to get the art channels for the football, only been around this for the last few years.

started with cheap triax dish and motor from a german seller but now use a channel master with 1224 motor due to getting sick of rubbish diseqc motors i went through about 3 of em.

quite amusing to see all the neighbours with the minidishes and me being able to watch what they cant or have to pay for.

 

[nelson_b]

hi -
my story is simlar to yours - "geordiejohn".

poor FM radio reception in the rural area where i live ---- led me to this hobby

Chatting with some-one at work i discovered that i could recieve all the radio stations i wanted - and more by satellite --
so i purchased a second hand analogue reciever and dish - and as shown by the chap who sold me it -i placed it on the ground using three housbricks to support it in the correct position at - 19 E .

Progressed from that to a rotatable platform - with pegs for positoning - and different sized wedges for elevation on different sats - l.o.l.

Then took the plunge properly and bought a second hand 1.8 channel master offset - motorised setup ---( analogue ) and had a lot of fun setting it up -and fine tuning it --- learned mostly by trial and error --- as i knew nothing about motorised installation at that time -----.

Converted it to digital about 8 or 9 years ago had loads of other kit since then -- but the old channel master is still the mainstay --
and as my recent posts on the forum show -- i,m using it to pull in C band signals recently -- as well as K.u.

and like you - "geordiejohn" - i enjoy locking onto those weak / hard to get signals --

great hobby --- and all-ways something new to learn from others

regards nelson.b.

 

[graham4877]

OK me!! I got it to this late 30/10/08! But had sly when it came out.( mam n dad did) Always played around with the dish when i was 13/14 .. Mam "what the hell have you done now" Am now 27 so can do what i like with my dish!! well wife has her say .. Anyway how i got in to this was at work this lad had just started and we got talking and he said he has SLY for free! His mate dose it from his shop up the west-end Oh right can he do it for me? yes! how much £90! right when will you see him? this weekend.gave my number to him had money for the bloke . No calls. Monday come's I asked the lad at work? oh i never saw him but i will call in and see him for you! ok. Next week come the lad had left!!!!! Bull Sh%ter!!!!! So i went to the ripoff shop maplin's!! £59.99 fortec star 60cm dish 20m cable Fs4200 .Then i got a new FS4200. About 2 weeks later i got bored with them.. And got my self a Tm3100/darkmotor /88triax !! Then a Tm5400ci! I have just got a skystar 2 pci card for my pc This week!! I got in to this because i love boxing and was sick of missing fights! People ask why i have a big dish/ why not just have a little sly one.. So my answer to that is. Well because i dont and wont pay £40pm+£11bt-line and £15.00 a fight! + I get all the stuff sly gets a lot sooner! And a lot more at that as well! Also look at the channels we get for free and what is for free from other country's IE last months boxing with the haymaker!! My only wish is that i got in to this allot sooner than i did!! Now when we go out i see allot more dish's up and allot of pubs getting setups like us!

 

[bigtee]

Ha ha ha!!! Damascene conversion of sorts!

As a basic Sly subscriber, there was a news story one day (late 90s-early 00s), concerning the Arab community; one thing mentioned in passing was that a particular family was watching 'Arab/Middle East TV' by satellite. Arab TV?? By satellite? Which is not Sly? Shirley, that must be illegal as it is not through Sly??? Thought no more of it for years.

Fast forward to 2006 and I went to live in Egypt for six months; when I wanted to rent a flat my official chaperone and others advised: "make sure it has satellite TV". Fair enough, found a lovely flat, went along with chaperone, chaperone particularly pleased on going through TV that it had "Nilesat" and especially "Hotbird" because according to him I could get European TV and even watch BBC Prime. I didn't think all these was a big deal. One thing was a big deal ---- this was football world cup year!

So I started getting used to the receiver in the flat, an Arion 1700, and soon realised that between Hotbird and Nilesat there were some 1500 channels some of which were encrypted. {I was so fascinated by this receiver that I immediately bought a personal copy} Anyway, I trawled through the circa 1500 channels to identify where to watch world cup; found some such channels including SF (Swiss), Lider (Azerbaijan) Slo 2 (Slovenia) and I think one or two others. However, after watching the first few matches, I started to lose these football channels one by one ----- first battle with encryption! Lost woefully! Ignorance again! Did not realise that it was a simple case of key change!!!!!

Put out the alarm; found a 'satellite guy' he advised that we can buy a dish, point at 27.5w and get Nigerian TV on C band which was showing all the matches without encryption. {In hindsight now he might have done better to suggest simply subscribing to ART or Showtime perhaps, though the dish was quite cheap!} Anyway, he also suggested buying another receiver which was more 'up to date'. In a matter of days, we had a dish set up on 27.5w; essentially, I went from having a Sly dish in England to having what I now believe to have been a 1.8m dish for Hotbird/Nilesat and a 2.4m dish for 27.5w combined into TV by something called a "diseqc switch"; also the proud owner of two receivers - my original Arion 1700 and a Hivion 9090x the latter which I absolutely adore (still!). Apart from the thrill of watching the world cup, I found all these fascinating ---- I guess there must always have been an innate interest because as a very wee one I used to make a 'radio' by connecting two evaporated milk tins with a thread and all that jazz.

Anyhooose, naturally I asked as many questions of the satellite guy as I could. Then went on t'Interweb, as you do, found this site and, especially, the forerunner of the current Techwatch forum and my eyes started to open.

When I got back to England I already had two receivers obviously, so first thing was to find a dish ---- and so the first dish was a (still beloved) Lidl special 80cm. Original plan: dish was to go on the wall (gable end) with monoblock for Hotbird and Astra 1 and go motorised later. Got an installer: because I had now learned about T &K brackets insisted he used that; he did put it up solidly but gave up on finding the satellite. Till today the T&K brackets with pole are still up. Mercifully, however, I asked him to bring the dish down. So with the aid of what I learned on t'Interweb, I started to fanny about with the dish in the garden and one day, to my utter amazement, the signal quality level on the receiver went up ---- and so I had found Hotbird!!!!! I soon discovered the best location.

So now where are we? One dish with 7 LNBs receiving 8 mostly eastern satellites and one motorised dish receiving Western satellites; two 90cm dishes at my second base in warmer climes; and about 8 receivers between the two bases. Talk of one small step and one giant leap ....

 

[Telia]

I started when i was about 13 years old getting Russian USSR and East German TV with my parents antenna which were stacked UHF antennas as we lived in a remote area where the signal was low even for Swedish TV.

I remember in the summer was the best time to receive foreign channels and i was thrilled once i could get Spanish TV and even RAI for a few hours.

After that dishes came out to the public and i bought my first 1.8m dish back in the early 80's to receive unscrambled Filmnet/Music Box/Sky channel from ECS at 13e and Premiere/screensport/cnn/lifestyle/children's channel from Intelsat at 27.5w

 

[BombedOne]

Well, my hobby progressed in the following way:

1. Sporadic/tropo for TV/radio signals.
2. selfmade analogue receiver.
3. DVB-S.

But in last years I found that this hobby is "dead", I mean - I've received everything possible in my area (with decent sized dish), checked almost all kind of equipment, etc. So now, back to AM/FM DX reception - field where much more left unexplored (if you're lucky, you can get something what is impossible in general situation, which is technically impossible in SAT TV).