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rfisher1228

Last reply Aug 18, 2009 · posted in DISH Network Support Forum

Need Help! Poor HD picture quality on VIP 222

Hello All,

I am new to this forum, but have used some forums in the past. I just got a Toshiba 40" 1080P and Dish sat system. I believe i have all the settings set up correctly, but the image quality seems blotchy. It does look OK from a distance, but not THAT great. I am hoping that someone here will be able to point me in the right direction before I call Dish to come out and take a look.

dish VIP 222
Toshiba 40rv525u

I appreciate the help.

Thanks

R

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rfisher1228

Jun 17, 2009

I have noticed that there are differences from station to station. do you think it could be signal strength. The only thing that has looked great is Kung Fu Panda on HBO HD. there also seems to be some banding/bluring/stepping on fast moving action, could that be the TV or the Sat?

Thanks again for your help

highdefjeff

Jul 19, 2009

rfisher1228 said:
I have noticed that there are differences from station to station. do you think it could be signal strength. The only thing that has looked great is Kung Fu Panda on HBO HD. there also seems to be some banding/bluring/stepping on fast moving action, could that be the TV or the Sat?

Thanks again for your help

If you aren't sitting too close, then it is most likely signal strength.

What are your signal strength readings?

Follow this list for"WOW!" HD:
HD Do's & Don'ts

And this will explain how picture quality and signal are related:
Signal and HDTV

Agonizing Fury

Jul 20, 2009

highdefjeff said:
If you aren't sitting too close, then it is most likely signal strength.

What are your signal strength readings?

Follow this list for"WOW!" HD:
HD Do's & Don'ts

And this will explain how picture quality and signal are related:
Signal and HDTV

And most important of all: ignore HighDefJeff when he talks about digital signals and HD Quality. His conspiracy theories have been disproved again and again and again, and yet he continues to spout the same gibberish. If he talks about grounding, LOS or anything other than picture quality, he's almost always right and I would quote him any day (and love his graphic showing where the signals actually come from on an offset dish). It's a digital signal so it's either there in it's full pristine quality, or it's going to pixelate horribly and be gone.

BuddyBoy

Jul 22, 2009

There's a real easy way to prove to yourself that these two clowns don't know what they're talking about. Create an MPEG-2 transport stream containing H.264 compressed video. Introduce random single-bit errors into the stream, say 1 per 10e6 bits to start with, increasing to 1 per 10e4 bits. Decode the stream and view it, and tell me what you see.

Anyone with a technical background (EE preferred, but I'd accept CS or even Applied Math majors) can tell you these two don't have a clue what they're talking about.

TheKrell

Jul 22, 2009

BuddyBoy said:
There's a real easy way to prove to yourself that these two clowns don't know what they're talking about.

Sir, you are both outgunned and outclassed.

To those with open minds, I recommend the following taken from the federal government website here:

New Digital Video Impairments:
Digital video systems produce fundamentally different kinds of impairments than analog video systems. Examples of these include tiling, error blocks, smearing, jerkiness, edge busyness, and object retention. To fully quantify the performance characteristics of a digital video system, it is desirable to have a set of performance parameters, where each parameter is sensitive to some unique dimension of video quality or impairment type. This is similar to what was developed for analog impairments (e.g., a multi-burst test would measure the frequency response, and a signal-to-noise ratio test would measure the analog noise level). This discrimination property of performance parameters is useful to designers trying to optimize certain system attributes over others, and to network operators wanting to know not only when a system is failing but where and how it is failing.

In other words, there is no easy way to prove much of anything about DTV, even if you do have the specialized equipment recommended above.

Edit: Almost forgot this amusing comment.

BuddyBoy said:
Create an MPEG-2 transport stream containing H.264 compressed video.

The last time I checked, H.264 is MPEG-4 part 10.

sca

Jul 24, 2009

TheKrell said:
Sir, you are both outgunned and outclassed.

To those with open minds, I recommend the following taken from the federal government website here:
In other words, there is no easy way to prove much of anything about DTV, even if you do have the specialized equipment recommended above.

Edit: Almost forgot this amusing comment. The last time I checked, H.264 is MPEG-4 part 10.

oops. respomdend to the wrong post of yours, but anyway...

try disney hd. that will make you irate no matter what tv/ configuration you have.

rush? well, its been a bit since i used that as a 'showcase channel' it was on 129 for sure, and looked far better than all other hd programming ive seen.
ill look for it tommorrow.

so signal quality eh?
your saying that, if the signal is 20 percent lower YOU can notice a picture difference, or are you saying that anything in the system (switch, cable, etc can cause a degraded picture without signal loss or pixelation?)

anyway i was i making sure the OP had receiver set to 1080i (not some setting on the tv)
and hopefully he's not judging the quality by watching dinsey hd or something.
ive seen that channel on cable, dish and direct, its awful.

TheKrell

Jul 24, 2009

sca said:
your saying that, if the signal is 20 percent lower YOU can notice a picture difference, or are you saying that anything in the system (switch, cable, etc can cause a degraded picture without signal loss or pixelation?)

anyway i was i making sure the OP had receiver set to 1080i (not some setting on the tv) and hopefully he's not judging the quality by watching dinsey hd or something. ive seen that channel on cable, dish and direct, its awful.

Yes, good point on the receiver setting to 1080i. Takes some of the variability out of the equation. I think we've all seen HDTVs, even sets that are good on HD programs, do a terrible job of upconversion. (My cheap Sylvania 32" comes to mind.)

I claim Rush is a Rainbow Media channel broadcast overseas and fomerly part of the Voom package no longer on Dish. I don't think you'll find Rush on the air or cable or satellite anywhere in America, and certainly not on Dish network. Since I didn't upgrade to HD before Voom was gone, I can only imagine the quality. But I hear it was quite good.

I'll have another look at Disney HD (looking for crappy SD upconverts?) but I don't recall the HD programs in the morning looking bad at all.

People talk about the "cliff effect" and digital being all or nothing, but in fact it is not. I am not saying "20% loss" at all; interesting error compensation techniques are employed when we get a signal, but the bit error rate is higher than the rate at which the errors can be corrected completely. All the good/bad picture degradation happens in a relatively small range of signal strength I think... But any component could cause this, and the signal stength could actually be too high (such as with my channel 24 which is 2.5 miles away). Anything that causes the BER to go up in the range where compensation is possible can cause visible degradation in PQ short of freezing all (or part of) the picture.

Now if I'm looking at a particular degraded digital picture, I don't necessarily know if it's error compensation I'm seeing, or the operation of a statistical multiplexer, or overcompression, or a crappy conversion, or an awful source to begin with. Several of these problems can produce the same effect. But, based on my knowledge of what each step in the process does, and while watching my error rate meter (they raraely show signal strength these days), my best guess is that sometimes I'm seeing error compensation part of the time, and not the other causes. But I also didn't give up and accept crappy PQ, or ignore the "signal strength" mete, as others in this thread have suggested. I kept at it, peaking my dish, changing components, and in particular for OTA broadcasts, fiddling with my antenna position and orientation and amplification for many hours over the course of a couple of months, until I have good "signal strength" on all channels we want. And I almost never see these effects. Had a big thunderstorm go through last night and I was quite amazed at how well the picture from Dish stayed perfect.

sca

Jul 24, 2009

dont know much about ota. i do notice that some dish hd channels always look great, no matter the signal, and some always look bad.
history, discover, hbo, max, sho, these always look good.
disney hd, tnt, and some others LOOK hd, but there are pixels visible, blocky picture if you know what i mean. the face will look nice, but the body looks like a picture taken then blown up. or whatever.
our locals look much better off the antenna than they do off 61.5. its a shame, and people notice.

johnwadams

Jul 25, 2009

sca said:
dont know much about ota. i do notice that some dish hd channels always look great, no matter the signal, and some always look bad.
history, discover, hbo, max, sho, these always look good.
disney hd, tnt, and some others LOOK hd, but there are pixels visible, blocky picture if you know what i mean. the face will look nice, but the body looks like a picture taken then blown up. or whatever.
our locals look much better off the antenna than they do off 61.5. its a shame, and people notice.

Over compression by Dish to save space. When AAD started offering DNS, the feeds were so compressed they looked about like a .jpg photo compressed down to 10%. OTA? I Have 2 friends in Memphis that swear the locals OTA look better than what DirecTV gives them. They switch to attic antennas for network sports.
(I mention D*, because i am the lst person in my circle of friends still with DISH)

OP:
Try to set the output of your VIP222 to 720P instead of 1080i. See if that makes a difference since your Toshiba will only have to upscale/convert a "P" to a "P" instead of an "i" to a "P". See if you can find a review in Home Theater, Sound and Vision or other sources. See how they rate the processor used in your model or series. (different series usually use different vidio processors). If the VIP222 can be set to "native output" try that also. (I don't have a VIP222 so I don't know) Then your Toshiba will tell you what it is being fed off each channel, 480i, 720P, 1080i.
I can't speak for DISH HD, but most OTA stations are only 720P on their HD feeds. NBC and CBS are 1080i.
Just my 2 cents worth.
John

highdefjeff

Aug 18, 2009

Agonizing Fury said:
And most important of all: ignore HighDefJeff when he talks about digital signals and HD Quality. His conspiracy theories have been disproved again and again and again, and yet he continues to spout the same gibberish. (Not so fast...)

If he talks about grounding, LOS or anything other than picture quality, he's almost always right and I would quote him any day (and love his graphic showing where the signals actually come from on an offset dish).
Thank you for the very kind compliment!
So, if that is the case, then let me ask you this...
If what I say otherwise is good information, then why would I jeapordize that good information with what you say, is a lie (and a really big crazy lie?)

To get people to the website? How stupid and shortsighted would that be?

The Lord is my provision, not the website. The website offers free information that many people use and benefit. I do not ask for money or donations from anyone.

I tell it so that the truth be known and more people get to see good HDTV!

It doesn't take much digging to see who I am; that I abhor lying, and seek justice and truth in all things. Here are links to myspace and youtube:

Warrior Of the Word (Jeffrey Johnston) | MySpace
YouTube - warrioroftheword7's Channel

It's a digital signal so it's either there in it's full pristine quality, or it's going to pixelate horribly and be gone.

And I'm working up a new graphic I hope you'll like...

highdefjeff

Aug 18, 2009

TheKrell said:
Yes, good point on the receiver setting to 1080i. Takes some of the variability out of the equation. I think we've all seen HDTVs, even sets that are good on HD programs, do a terrible job of upconversion. (My cheap Sylvania 32" comes to mind.)

I claim Rush is a Rainbow Media channel broadcast overseas and fomerly part of the Voom package no longer on Dish. I don't think you'll find Rush on the air or cable or satellite anywhere in America, and certainly not on Dish network. Since I didn't upgrade to HD before Voom was gone, I can only imagine the quality. But I hear it was quite good. I'll have another look at Disney HD (looking for crappy SD upconverts?) but I don't recall the HD programs in the morning looking bad at all.

People talk about the "cliff effect" and digital being all or nothing, but in fact it is not. (You are correct! The "cliff effect" describes a very small portion of the graph of the BER curve. The digital cliff is actually in the form of a "waterfall". I am currently changing orientation and marking up one of these BER graphs to show where we all stand...http://www.aero.org/publications/crosslink/winter2002/images/04_side1_02.gif
I am not saying "20% loss" at all; interesting error compensation techniques are employed when we get a signal, but the bit error rate is higher than the rate at which the errors can be corrected completely. All the good/bad picture degradation happens in a relatively small range of signal strength I think...(Right again! Small increases in signal strength create large reductions in BER. The reverse is also true, meaning that small decreases in signal strength make large increases in BER.) But any component could cause this, and the signal stength could actually be too high (such as with my channel 24 which is 2.5 miles away). (That counts only for OTA. With the current "standard" satellite equipment, you will never achieve near the amount of signal for linearity(pixelation/signal loss) to occur.) Anything that causes the BER to go up in the range where compensation is possible can cause visible degradation in PQ short of freezing all (or part of) the picture. (Right again. Since 2006, I have studied, researched, and observed low signal digital television. Daily, I have watched marginal signal in my home. I even took the amplifier back off my Dad's antenna (they're always on Dish) so that I could watch the effects of marginal signal on his HDTV's when I visit. Guess what...there are more artifacts with digital than with analog!

CAN CAUSE is subject to two criteria.
1. The viewer's perception.
You first have to have eyes to see. If you haven't ever regarded the differing picture qualities between sets/systems, or you aren't searching for better quality, then you probably wouldn't even see it.
2. What part of the information is getting corrupted or lost? (I'm talking OTA, for now...)
A. You could see nothing at all wrong with the picture. (But if you turned on the closed captioning, you might see jumbled and mispelled words.) Closed captioning information corrupted.
B. If you left your HDTV on Auto format (as my Dad will attest) your picture can "scale" in size on your TV. Meaning the TV picture will go from say, full screen to postage stamp, during a program or commercial, and the format won't change it. (Satellite receivers do not use Spatial scaling, but I believe most, if not all, TV's and converter boxes do use spatial scaling.)
C. You could have lip sync problems. Timing information corrupted.
D. You could see a lower resolution picture. Video packets corrupted.
E. The brightness of the picture may vary.
It depends on what information gets corrupted or lost and how much gets corrupted, as to the resulting picture quality or plain old system performance.
Now if I'm looking at a particular degraded digital picture, I don't necessarily know if it's error compensation I'm seeing, or the operation of a statistical multiplexer, or overcompression, or a crappy conversion, or an awful source to begin with. Several of these problems can produce the same effect.(Yes) But, based on my knowledge of what each step in the process does, and while watching my error rate meter (they raraely show signal strength these days), my best guess is that sometimes I'm seeing error compensation part of the time, and not the other causes. But I also didn't give up and accept crappy PQ, or ignore the "signal strength" mete, as others in this thread have suggested. (Found the truth!) I kept at it, peaking my dish, changing components, and in particular for OTA broadcasts, fiddling with my antenna position and orientation and amplification for many hours over the course of a couple of months, until I have good "signal strength" on all channels we want. And I almost never see these effects. (BINGO!) Had a big thunderstorm go through last night and I was quite amazed at how well the picture from Dish stayed perfect.

(That's right! I'd like to get a record of your signal strengths to compile with a couple other systems.)

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Scott Greczkowski

Staff member HERE TO HELP YOU! Cutting Edge

Last reply 4 minutes ago · posted in The Chit Chat Club

Song Name Game Part 3!

Sometimes a thread gets so many posts in it that is can cause issues for the server so that why today we introduce The Song Name Game Part 3!

So let the game continue!

The last song was added by Bobby who posted...

One Meat Ball - Andrews Sisters

CONTINUE ON AND HAVE FUN! WELCOME HOME TO SATELLITEGUYS.US!

Here are the original rules for the game as posted by WebbyDude back in 2006. http://www.satelliteguys.us/threads/68645-Song-Name-Game

Just name a song title and the band who performed it. The next person does the same thing, but needs to list a song title or band name which includes a word from the previous entry. Pick songs from any genre.

Example:

Long Live Rock and Roll -- Rainbow

Rainbow in the Dark -- Dio

Another example:

Ride the Lightning -- Metallica

Lightning Strikes -- Ozzy Osbourne

Get it?

An additional note: we all know that song titles, sometimes, use profane words. Because this is a family friendly website it is advised that you clean up that title up a bit. This is accomplished by using something like sh!t instead of the real word. Thanks....

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dfergie

Staff member HERE TO HELP YOU!

Last reply 7 minutes ago · posted in The Chit Chat Club

Gas Price Info With National Gas Temperature Map

Stumbled across this ... http://www.gaspricewatch.com/USGas_ZipSearch.asp
I found no local prices, although it did show stations at my location...
Added these to this post...
USA National Gas Temperature Map
State By State Gasoline Taxes
Gas Buddy

Ethanol Free Stations

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Bobby

Sunday at 10:27 AM

Regular$5.999
Premium$6.399
Diesel$7.999
at Costco, Rohnert Park.

Reactions: harshness

dishstaller

Sunday at 12:32 PM

Bobby said:
Regular$5.999
Premium$6.399

Odd that out there, Prem is only 40 cents higher. Here it's a full dollar more.

Last night it was about $4.17 gas, $6,19 diesel.

harshness

Sunday at 2:04 PM

dishstaller said:
Odd that out there, Prem is only 40 cents higher. Here it's a full dollar more.

On the West Coast, a 40-cent differential is common. It used to be 30 cents before the prices rose above $3.

A "full dollar more" sounds like it may be boat gas (non-alcoholic), which is a whole different discussion.

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Foxbat

Sunday at 9:43 PM

Here in Indiana, the difference between Regular and Premium is usually a dollar, but some charge even more:

Reactions: dishstaller

dishstaller

Sunday at 10:06 PM

harshness said:
A "full dollar more" sounds like it may be boat gas (non-alcoholic),

Both non-ethanol and prem run about the same....buck more. When we were up in TN it was a buck more up there as well.

harshness

Yesterday at 9:34 AM

In Oregon, our premium boat gas is about a dollar more than our corn premium. Several stations only offer the non-corn premium grade.

Bobby

Today at 11:14 AM

Regular$5.899
Premium$6.299
Diesel$7.999
at Costco, Rohnert Park.

dishstaller

7 minutes ago

Diesel is all over the place around here. Saw it yesterday from $5.37 to $6.17...not sure what the obsession was with ending in 7

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TWiT Tech Podcast Network

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iOS Today 825-826

Time for another AWESOME video from the TWIT Network!

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_t6DHoWkL4

Direct YouTube Link - iOS Today 825-826
TWIT's Website
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Hopefully they are better then the current highly insecure junk boxes that are out now.

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Comb your hair.

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Foxbat said:
I guess even the patience of us laid-back Hoosiers has its limits:

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Can we expect to see a new coach if we say "pretty please?"

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Foxbat

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b4pjoe

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Be nice to see a Cowboy headline like that.

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Howard Simmons

Lifetime Supporter

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John Travolta & Robert Carlyle Lead New JFK Assassination Movie in November 1963 Trailer

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TvMind

Last reply Today at 10:22 AM · posted in C-BAND Satellite Discussion

SES 1 101° W Horizontal "Issues" a.k.a "I want my M(e)TV"

Howdy folks long time no write.

Issue(s): Horizontal transponders (esp. Weigel mux) breakup/mosaic/sputtering audio, JTV less so (but received perfectly up until a month or so ago.
Vertical is fine (Daystar). Up until recently couldn't even get any signal on Weigel Mux but JTV was perfect.

What I did to improve things: A slight westward move improved reception but only slightly (approx 72 on the micro HD, sorry no dB to post). I removed the 3-way C-Band splitter and used a 2-way to get a 1-2 db signal gain ( the power port goes to the Startrak - the micro HD doesn't have enough juice ! (1st clue) even after swapping the switching power supply it came with with a heftier linear 12 V supply (less RFI too !).
I have had issues with the uHD before signal breaking up that a reboot would clear up (clue #2 = dying tuner?) - FYI, I reinforced the IF input and removed all flux from the pcb completely with a Flux Removal Pen (MG Chemicals Cat No. 4140-P) which definitely makes a huge difference.

I went outside and pushed and pulled reflector slightly and no improvement. Pole (actually tower in yard - the neighbours love me..NOT) is plumb, checked with carpenters level. Dish was last peaked in 2017 or so, after overhauling 24" Von Weise, new Acme, fresh grease, etc. Focal length, f/d ratio etc meticulously adjusted. One panel has a tear so planning to repair that this weekend when my cousin comes over ( to help me out (old guy here) forecast calls for sunshine.

What has changed: My utility company has installed new high tension line poles (one smack dab in the middle of 101°W target! But they put it in last year and reception (of JTV (HOR) at least) was fine, BUT when they came out to transfer the wires over this year from the old (sawed in half) pole that's about when the troubles started (coincidence?), but again Daystar (VER) was fine. I always had this pole in the light of sight of 101° before with no issues. (fyi my zenith sat 74° is unobstucted, but can't test)

In the meantime Weigel mux is trying to break in MOSTLY in LATE at night (less cell usage?) (audio not video except for a frame here or there) so don't know what has changed with this mux which suddenly "woke up". I have never had to fuss with dish moves on this satellite ( the slightest move +/- motor clicks loses lock, wheres normally on C-band I can go significantly wider east or west and still have a strong signal ( have these gone "spot beam" or narrower somehow and what is the slight difference in Az listed on Lyngsat to 100.9° affect things ( isn't that the declination i.e. requiring a tweak of declination?).

Long story short (too late, ha), if I had another DVB-S2 box to try and / or a newer more stable PLL lnb ( I have been meaning to upgrade many a time but never got arround to it) I could determine if it's my antiquated receiving equipment, or my dish/feed alignment ( doubtful as it tracks everything from 55 °W to 133 ° W nicely.) or the dreaded 5G! (BUT only on HOR and not VER?).
I read another post where the OP (with his smaller 7.5 footer) played around with the illumination to peak desired transponder and reduce qrm on interfering/ stronger xpndrs (even on 103° W). So will play with that too - and cut away the RG-6 a and pull up a fresh section with new PPC and coax Seal. Open the throat cap see if any cobwebs are there and check servo operation (also changed in last maintence 10 years ago).

Finally, this will probably be the last chance I get to play with the BUD from the looks of it (providers leaving, auctioning off rest of spectrum imminent above 4.0 Ghz, and to keep the peace with neighbours so it would be nice to have that mux back for the long, cold and dark winters to comfort this old man before I call it quits and buy a VHF/UHF/FM Yagi and get MeTV, H&I from my Vermont local stations (checked at a friends today and they come in nicely - except ABC) .
Only one guy in town (Montreal) I may be able to get a receiver or PLL lnb from to try (RPS Sat) so hopefully with elimnate that as a possible culprit. Be nice to pick up a cheap or used PLL lnb to try w/o 5G BPF (money is tight )

Like others I couldn't care less about "tv" (well maybe just a liitle or a lot) it's the challenge that excites me , I can get MeTV other ways OTA (no pirate crap).

So what do you guys (and gals) think ?. p.s. I don't have a spectrum analyzer and there are def/ cell towers nearby (half a Km or so away).
Oh and time permitting will hammer out dings too and wire damaged mesh on one section for an extra dB or two. Hesitate to touch Declination, Elevation and pole mount but will play around with those a little too... Why is this mux for finicky suddenly ?(8psk, 5/6 fec, beamwidthetc.. man wish they went back to VER I think everthing would be fine! For the engineers out here does 5G QRM affect one poliarization (HOR) more than another (VER)? I understand the strong interference swamps out the input mixer/local oscilator in the hapless old C-band lnb (I think it at time affect KU too esp. LPB on 101°W KU - incidentally thos were weak or "gone' but are back almost at the time MeTV improved..hmm Terrestrial interference?

Any thoughts or suggestions ( cheap or free solutions please) greatly appreciated. Cheers.

p.p.s. Micro HD can't display Decades and Toons but records them fine so I can watch on another box/media player (Ali chip set issue). Another reason to upgrade.

Anybody interested in a nice C/KU system free ? (for next Spring/Summer 2027)

[Sami 10' mesh, Corotor II+, Eagle Aspen (very old) C-band lnb, Norsat Ku lnb, Channel Master C/Ku (H/V) switch, Startrak 400 Analog receiver w/ motor control, Geosat uHD DVD-S2, CW600S for Mpeg-2]

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cyberham

Sep 30, 2026

With the microHD connected this afternoon and tuned to the Weigel mux, I can receive the mux well.

My conclusion is that the sensitivity of the receivers in descending order of sensitivity is as follows:

V9 Prime (best)
microHD
Edision osmio4k+

Either the V9 or the microHD could be used to watch Weigel but the Edision really could not with my given dish situation, at least during the daytime. At night, the signal is stronger here and then maybe the Edision could be used.

Titanium

Oct 1, 2026

What is the SNR readings for these transponders? Is the signal breaking up due to low SNR or interference?

Did you inspect the feedhorn throat and wave guide for wasp nest or other blockage? Good SNR with frequent drops in decoding ( loss of SQ readings) could indicate interference from 5G.

TvMind

Oct 13, 2026

Appreciate you checking. I should be picking these up with the tenner so still not done tuning up the bud - fell off ladder last week and hit my head!

Started over from scratch, N/S alignment, El/Decl extreme West sat, played with feed f/d checking everything and getting nice signals but still 101 west is PIA. New lnb was defective and returned it. My old one is fine but would have liked to A/B with a better lnb.

Thought it was the servo there because I was out and set everything up by the dish and flipping to HOR made a strange noise -BUT ONLY on 101 W ! All other sats skew is fine..hmm ( I have the skew almost perfect, use "Arrow" template on Zenith Sat (well nothing on 74 W to check with but Nimiq 5 at 72.6 W is closest and luckily picking up R- Pol channel from Canada to test with. Anyway picking up a new servo to try (the obvious polarity culprit).

Q. Back in the day PAS9 (74 W) was used but now I have to use closest zenith sat (Nimiq 5). I can't perfectly peak on that one which is 1 degree off (N/S alignment error). I used my trusty Brunton compass and even true noon shadow off pole to hit south.

I did have to peak extreme west by rotating mount ever so slighty so tracking extreme pretty good, but top and middle can use an elevation tweak (esp. Ku) to bring them back to where they were. No fun as the weather has been miserable and still dizzy from fall.

Oh and the Freesat V8 is crap (the tuner pixelates when the uHD is solid!) but love that SCART connector for S-Video out ! (I record to my Pio DVR and burn to DVD classic tv shows).

Stay tuned

cyberham said:
With the microHD connected this afternoon and tuned to the Weigel mux, I can receive the mux well.

TvMind

Oct 13, 2026

Titanium said:
Did you inspect the feedhorn throat and wave guide for wasp nest or other blockage? Good SNR with frequent drops in decoding ( loss of SQ readings) could indicate interference from 5G.

Thanks for chiming in here. No wasps (or hornets nests) but good suggestion.

I am getting 70 and over Quality on uHD which is good but as you say the signal drops out (70 to 0 ) occasionally and much worse by day (even JTV which I used to get solid is a mess in the day. Again Daystar (VER) is fine but still not what it used to be.

I will will either have to get a BPF or go VHF/UHF for these channels but not giving up just yet!

p.s. Isn't there something between your feedhorn/lnbf BPF model and Norsat's 1500$ BPF and 5G filtering lnb's? Heck almost ready for a diy (reverse engineer) job here (microwave BPF hack) Ah where is Radio Electronics when you need it! If it wasn't for losing Ku I'd buy your lnbf in a heartbeat! Are these hard to add Ku to?

Titanium

Wednesday at 1:19 PM

Our LNBFs are integrated with the feedhorn and no KU option. Maybe install an inline waveguide BPF such as:

www.ebay.com/itm/158077455896
www.ebay.com/itm/960059145385
www.ebay.com/itm/158007483799

brownsfan1

Yesterday at 9:22 PM

TvMind said:
Howdy folks long time no write.

Issue(s): Horizontal transponders (esp. Weigel mux) breakup/mosaic/sputtering audio, JTV less so (but received perfectly up until a month or so ago.
Vertical is fine (Daystar). Up until recently couldn't even get any signal on Weigel Mux but JTV was perfect.

What I did to improve things: A slight westward move improved reception but only slightly (approx 72 on the micro HD, sorry no dB to post). I removed the 3-way C-Band splitter and used a 2-way to get a 1-2 db signal gain ( the power port goes to the Startrak - the micro HD doesn't have enough juice ! (1st clue) even after swapping the switching power supply it came with with a heftier linear 12 V supply (less RFI too !).
I have had issues with the uHD before signal breaking up that a reboot would clear up (clue #2 = dying tuner?) - FYI, I reinforced the IF input and removed all flux from the pcb completely with a Flux Removal Pen (MG Chemicals Cat No. 4140-P) which definitely makes a huge difference.

I went outside and pushed and pulled reflector slightly and no improvement. Pole (actually tower in yard - the neighbours love me..NOT) is plumb, checked with carpenters level. Dish was last peaked in 2017 or so, after overhauling 24" Von Weise, new Acme, fresh grease, etc. Focal length, f/d ratio etc meticulously adjusted. One panel has a tear so planning to repair that this weekend when my cousin comes over ( to help me out (old guy here) forecast calls for sunshine.

What has changed: My utility company has installed new high tension line poles (one smack dab in the middle of 101°W target! But they put it in last year and reception (of JTV (HOR) at least) was fine, BUT when they came out to transfer the wires over this year from the old (sawed in half) pole that's about when the troubles started (coincidence?), but again Daystar (VER) was fine. I always had this pole in the light of sight of 101° before with no issues. (fyi my zenith sat 74° is unobstucted, but can't test)

In the meantime Weigel mux is trying to break in MOSTLY in LATE at night (less cell usage?) (audio not video except for a frame here or there) so don't know what has changed with this mux which suddenly "woke up". I have never had to fuss with dish moves on this satellite ( the slightest move +/- motor clicks loses lock, wheres normally on C-band I can go significantly wider east or west and still have a strong signal ( have these gone "spot beam" or narrower somehow and what is the slight difference in Az listed on Lyngsat to 100.9° affect things ( isn't that the declination i.e. requiring a tweak of declination?).

Long story short (too late, ha), if I had another DVB-S2 box to try and / or a newer more stable PLL lnb ( I have been meaning to upgrade many a time but never got arround to it) I could determine if it's my antiquated receiving equipment, or my dish/feed alignment ( doubtful as it tracks everything from 55 °W to 133 ° W nicely.) or the dreaded 5G! (BUT only on HOR and not VER?).
I read another post where the OP (with his smaller 7.5 footer) played around with the illumination to peak desired transponder and reduce qrm on interfering/ stronger xpndrs (even on 103° W). So will play with that too - and cut away the RG-6 a and pull up a fresh section with new PPC and coax Seal. Open the throat cap see if any cobwebs are there and check servo operation (also changed in last maintence 10 years ago).

Finally, this will probably be the last chance I get to play with the BUD from the looks of it (providers leaving, auctioning off rest of spectrum imminent above 4.0 Ghz, and to keep the peace with neighbours so it would be nice to have that mux back for the long, cold and dark winters to comfort this old man before I call it quits and buy a VHF/UHF/FM Yagi and get MeTV, H&I from my Vermont local stations (checked at a friends today and they come in nicely - except ABC) .
Only one guy in town (Montreal) I may be able to get a receiver or PLL lnb from to try (RPS Sat) so hopefully with elimnate that as a possible culprit. Be nice to pick up a cheap or used PLL lnb to try w/o 5G BPF (money is tight )

Like others I couldn't care less about "tv" (well maybe just a liitle or a lot) it's the challenge that excites me , I can get MeTV other ways OTA (no pirate crap).

So what do you guys (and gals) think ?. p.s. I don't have a spectrum analyzer and there are def/ cell towers nearby (half a Km or so away).
Oh and time permitting will hammer out dings too and wire damaged mesh on one section for an extra dB or two. Hesitate to touch Declination, Elevation and pole mount but will play around with those a little too... Why is this mux for finicky suddenly ?(8psk, 5/6 fec, beamwidthetc.. man wish they went back to VER I think everthing would be fine! For the engineers out here does 5G QRM affect one poliarization (HOR) more than another (VER)? I understand the strong interference swamps out the input mixer/local oscilator in the hapless old C-band lnb (I think it at time affect KU too esp. LPB on 101°W KU - incidentally thos were weak or "gone' but are back almost at the time MeTV improved..hmm Terrestrial interference?

Any thoughts or suggestions ( cheap or free solutions please) greatly appreciated. Cheers.

p.p.s. Micro HD can't display Decades and Toons but records them fine so I can watch on another box/media player (Ali chip set issue). Another reason to upgrade.

Anybody interested in a nice C/KU system free ? (for next Spring/Summer 2027)

[Sami 10' mesh, Corotor II+, Eagle Aspen (very old) C-band lnb, Norsat Ku lnb, Channel Master C/Ku (H/V) switch, Startrak 400 Analog receiver w/ motor control, Geosat uHD DVD-S2, CW600S for Mpeg-2]

I had the EXACT same problem happen to me with 101w, MeTV mux (Weigel). Working great when about 3 weeks ago I started to get the pixelating, especially at night. Sometimes Jewelry TV would also do it, sometimes not. Tweaked my dish. I have a Titanium 240 feed with the 5G filter 4.0-4.2 band pass. Every other satellite is working fine. Something on their end for sure. Power reduction? My signal seems fine like always. Running a Winegard 8.5 ft dish using a GT Media UHD V8. I'm sure my receiver isn't maybe sensitive enough for lower signal levels. Frustrating here too. I'm in the Canton, Ohio area. Thanks!

arlo

Today at 10:22 AM

To me it looks like all of the intelligent things to diagnose the problem 'on the cheap' are being done.
I have my own thoughts of lnbf's using an external filter between the feed and coax. It would be cool to see what Brian could add.
Do his units have the filter before the actual LNA chip in the circuit? In other words, signal is focused at the lnbf throat. The probes for h & v polarity send the signal to.......filtering......then to the lna IC......
Or probes, lna, then filtering. Makes sense to trap the bad stuff before amplification to me.

On the cheap sometimes leaves questions. Enosat and El Bandido both use dvb-s pci cards and TBS USB receivers.
With those, and software. Signal analysis becomes sort of easy. Or tapping into your coax with a dc pass splitter, decoupling capacitor, and using a spectrum analyzer. Tuning across the LO band. Finding signal spikes. Digging deep.

Still making my decision on a (most probably) TBS PCIe tuner card. But I have tapped into my coax with my ancient but quite impressive HP spectrum analyzer and tinysa.
I don't have 5G interference so far that I know of. But have my suspects because I'm only able to snag signal from 131W in the winter when the leaves drop. But out of curiosity do scan it in the fall. And seem to be getting a signal that 'shouldn't' be there and a scan shows no channels. Far as I got.

An idea pops up to rig up an LNBF on a stick. Along with the tinysa and power supply and do some rogue signal searches. War Driving, of sorts. But. I wouldn't think that a chinabox, firmware based receiver would be of much help.
From what I see scanning across the frequency band. 5G cell transmission is always on and is very wide spectrum.
Whether anyone is actually using talking, texting, watching stupid human tricks on YouTube Makes no difference. The RF is there. So why would a C Band setup come and go? And what if you dumped the corotor and went modern voltage controlled polarity?

Another thought. Since you've learned the optimal position to place the scalar to illuminate out to the dish rim. And peaked the feed. There's most of a roll of aluminum flashing out in my garage that would most definitely wrap around my dish perimeter. That and a bag of large binder clips from the office supply. wally world. Ideas?

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Today at 9:52 AM · posted in BooredAtWork.COM

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Therm

Last reply Today at 8:46 AM · posted in DISH Network Support Forum

Am I the only one that hates what Dish did to their mobile app?

I thought I would come here and find lots of complaints about the update to the dish anywhere mobile app, but am not seeing any. It used to look just like the desktop webpage. Now you can no longer filter by sports channels or movie channels. Plus that they made it look like a big button telephone and you see fewer channels in the screen which requires more scrolling. Yes I realize you can look at sports then select which sport you want to look at, I just liked being able to see all sporting events in the guide with all other channels being filtered out. Am I alone in the wilderness on this?

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Reactions: dishstaller

dishdude

Friday at 2:51 PM

I like the new look, it's a lot cleaner. I'm using it on one of those Onn streaming devices when I travel.

Reactions: charlesrshell

Therm

Friday at 3:39 PM

dishdude said:
I like the new look, it's a lot cleaner. I'm using it on one of those Onn streaming devices when I travel.

Yes a lot cleaner, glossier, and less functional. Someone trying to justify why they are making a big salary. "See look shiny"

Reactions: charlesrshell

navychop

Friday at 3:53 PM

"Big salary." Charlie. "?Big?"

Reactions: charlesrshell and dishdude

Tampa8

Friday at 4:01 PM

Seems in some ways better. Nicer layout, as others said maybe cleaner. Moving ahead in the guide is better.

Reactions: KAB and charlesrshell

scoob83

Today at 8:46 AM

Therm said:
I thought I would come here and find lots of complaints about the update to the dish anywhere mobile app, but am not seeing any. It used to look just like the desktop webpage. Now you can no longer filter by sports channels or movie channels. Plus that they made it look like a big button telephone and you see fewer channels in the screen which requires more scrolling. Yes I realize you can look at sports then select which sport you want to look at, I just liked being able to see all sporting events in the guide with all other channels being filtered out. Am I alone in the wilderness on this?

I think most are using it on a firestick or other device as an extra receiver, rather than their phone. Just a guess based on how I use it. 99% thru my firestick, 1% phone.

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