Is it true that new Astra1N channels are to move again in late 2012/2013?

[Juan69]

Brilliant, except for the megaphone bit, it was placards; we called him the board man, or was it the bored man?. Both me thinks.

 

[PaulR]

What everyone should remember is that 1N was never designed for 28E and the beam pattern makes more sense when you realise that at 19E it will basically cover western Europe. I think to describe 2E/F/G as merely being tweaked versions of 1N which can be altered as of moving a seat runner is simplistic. If we are going to continue with a car analogy maybe you can think of them as being different versions, say a saloon compared to a hatchback. Recognisably similar but not the same.

There is no amount of hiding your head under the blankets that will stop the advance of beam shaping technology. We have already seen that at the edges the signal strength drop off is rapid. Equally narowing down the beam more than 1N does is, in my opinion, a high probability.

My own personal opinion is that 2F's spot beam will, in order to serve the UK properly, extend into Europe at a high signal strength for quite way. But, and this the point, it won't go as far as 1N's does.

 

[Huevos]

My own personal opinion is that 2F's spot beam will, in order to serve the UK properly, extend into Europe at a high signal strength for quite way. But, and this the point, it won't go as far as 1N's does.

Paul, what I am getting at is both have 2.7m antennas. The antenna can be distorted a bit to make the footprint tall and narrow, or short and wide, or even turn a circle into a square, etc, but it can't change the gain of the antenna. Only an increase in antenna size can increase the gain, and hence make the beam more concentrated.

 

[Analoguesat]

I assume at last some of the snide remarks from a couple of your posts back are aimed at me Huevos.

Fair enough I dont really care if you dont like some of the stuff I post or disagree with it. Im not going to lose any sleep over it. You can put me on your ignore list if you want to

I will point out that our predictions for the new birds were at least partially correct. The 1N coverage is much less extensive than even that of 2D. Cyprus, Romania / Bulgaria have lost the "UK / west Europe" beam stuff completely. We know this and its been confirmed by our unfortunate friends out east. Scandinavia has suffered too.

BUT as 1N isnt optimised for the UK and was designed for covering western Europe there was always going to be additional coverage somewhere. Spain and Italy seem to have been the winners here.

The new series 2 UK spot map which was released last week shows what is at first glance a worrying lack of coverage from our European members point of view, but as it only showed down to the 55dbW line theres going to be good signal strengths over much of France the Benelux area, Iceland and probably into western Germany. Whats going to be interesting is how fast the drop off is into Eastern Europe, Spain/Portugal and Italy. And with the increased power will SES start playing with the FECS to make distant reception more difficult.

There was a very interesting programme on the BBC a few months ago which showed 2E & 2F in the factory - they showed how the computer simulations of the beam shaping work in a short clip, and the beam shapes changed radically with a few clicks of the mouse (No dont bother asking ask how it looked for Europe as they were very careful not to show that bit!)

At the end of the day its all guesswork until the new birds go into service (a point Ive made many times over the years) and your guesses are as valid as mine, which are as valid as the newest member of the forum who contributes to any particular discussion.

 

[Channel Hopper]

Paul, what I am getting at is both have 2.7m antennas. The antenna can be distorted a bit to make the footprint tall and narrow, or short and wide, or even turn a circle into a square, etc, but it can't change the gain of the antenna. Only an increase in antenna size can increase the gain, and hence make the beam more concentrated.

Rubbish (as some with experience would say).

The orbital position will (at Ku band) determine the rate at which signals drop off at the edges of the footprint. The designers of the satellites have been quite open about this in the technical journals released. A satellite positioned at 19 East for example will have a far better cut off in Western Europe than a satellite poitioned at 28 East, and vice versa.
Additionally gain (as you like to call it)is not determined by antenna size alone either, the efficiency of the receiving system as a whole is required to determine the overall sensitivity of a packet coming in at the sharp end and docoded at the blunt end. If you are talking about domestic equipment installed to collect a signal, then you are at most just under half right in your claim.

 

[Huevos]

There was a very interesting programme on the BBC a few months ago which showed 2E & 2F in the factory - they showed how the computer simulations of the beam shaping work in a short clip, and the beam shapes changed radically with a few clicks of the mouse

Yes, I saw it too. But I think what is being confused is beam shaping and gain. When the guy changed the shape of the beam the area stayed the same, it's just the pattern of illumination that changed.

On the rest we can just agree to differ, but personally I'm not going to make any comment to encourage anyone to pay 25€ a month to a rogue rebroadcasting company when they could just pay 50€ and have a working setup. If you're correct and the beam is impossible to receive here the rebroadcasting companies won't be any help anyway, and if I'm right the people that bought a 50€ dish will just able to continue viewing in a seemless way. And if we are both wrong the vast majority already have 1.8m and 2.4m dishes.

 

[joddle]

When people say "rubbish" about another persons comments or make snide remarks it make me feel a litttle uncomfortable because, what they are indicating is that they know more then the other person (as I don't want people who know more than me to mock me if I make a comment which does not live up to their superior knowledge)- yet in the posts above where such a comment is posted, it seems to me that the people concerned are actually talking about quite different things! One the one hand one is stating that sats in in different orbits will illuminate parts of europe in different ways whilst the other seems to be saying that sats in the same orbit using the same size antenna and power will have broadly similar sized footprints (in area), albeit the shape of the footprint may change a little - which may then have an effect on perimeter reception. Both arguments seem valid and plausable.

Overall I love this forum and read all contributions with equal interest - and like many people I suspect, some I don't happen to agree with and others I do but I don't think it is my place then to deliver a verdict on those "opinions" - after all I know nothing of the qualifications of any of you!!! Voicing an opinion is one thing but dissing people in public is quite another.

 

[satelliteman]

Quite agree. Can we tone it down a tad and keep it civilised please.

 

[Lazarus]

Lots of civilised chat about 1N elsewhere, so now Closed