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mr.crane said:

Does the Elite come pre-programmed with the Correct Satellites Location installed.

I bought a used pansat 3500, but it is outdated, name of satellites not correct.

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Mr. Crane,

I assume that the stock list of satellites and transponders for the Elite and the Premium models are going to be identical. With the Premium model that I have, I found that the satellite names and some of the transponders are incorrect. They are usually simply outdated names of sats, but there are some TPs that are listed incorrectly. Example: 123.0°W is listed as Galaxy 10R and not Galaxy 18.

The actual positions of the satellites are correct and that is the most critical.

For the majority, the list is just fine and just a satellite name or a transponder frequency being wrong here and there won't cause any functional problems. Editing the correct transponder frequencies or adding updated ones is very simple.

However, you cannot edit the name of any satellite from what I have found. You must delete it and reenter it with the name you desire, which means reentering the entire list of TPs for that sat.

The fact that the stock list contains nearly every satellite in the world is the problem that I found the most troublesome. Because of this, when you would go in to set up or edit a satellite in the menus, you might have to wade through so many to get to the one you desired.

Therefore, I intentionally deleted every satellite that was from the eastern hemisphere and many of those that were in the western hemisphere, but that I could not view from my location. This helped considerably.

I am very particular about how my list appears. The most recent thing that I did was attempt to delete ALL the satellites from my list. DON'T DO THIS! THe AZBox doesn't like this. I found that it actually won't really let you do this, but it will sure scare the heck out of you if you try! So, you can delete all but one. Leave that one last satellite alone until after you add one back, then you may go ahead and delete that last one. This is a LOT of work, but I found it worthwhile in the long run. I guess.

RADAR

Radar, thanks for the excellent explanation. so deleting all the eastern birds from europe, would be ok to delete.

mr.crane said:

Radar, thanks for the excellent explanation. so deleting all the eastern birds from europe, would be ok to delete.

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Mr. Crane,

Yes, this is fine to do. It sure made the process of searching through the entire list much easier. We here in N.A. cannot view those eastern hemisphere sats anyway, so why have them in the list?

I did quite a bit of work cleaning up my own Premium AZBox satellite list and after all was said and done (and I had scanned the Ku Band channels that I was able to receive) my satellite list resulted in appearing like this (see attachments).

EDIT: I noticed that when you edit a satellite (enter a new sat) that you are not allowed to enter as many characters for the sat name as some of the stock satellite names originally had. I don't understand why this is. You would think if they had a satellite name as long as 101.0°W AMC 4 North America that you could reenter the same name if desired, but it doesn't allow this. For instance, on Hispasat 1C/1D I could only enter "Hispasat 1". Maybe if I tried this editing or adding using an editor program it woud allow this or maybe there is something unique about he text font or size that is different. I am not certain of this yes.

RADAR

Re the original question, I have never seen ANY sat receiver that came with an updated satellite/transponder list. The Elete is no different. It needs to be edited.

Re Radar's response, we've posted on this matter before, and it may depend upon what firmware version your receiver comes with, and what particular set of channel data that comes loaded, but in my opinion, it proved to be next to impossible to get the satellite/transponder data sorted out by just using the remote, and the reason was that the data was corrupt in the files that came with the receiver. It may be that the ability to fix things with the remote may depend upon what files are installed on the Azbox when you get it. I found that the ONLY way that I could get a good set of satellite/transponder data into the receiver was to use the channel editor.
The MAIN problem, was that in MY Elete, and I've seen several other posts from people with the same problem, is that there was a satellite that I think was at 1.0W longitude. I forget the name of the sat off hand {I think it is INTELSAT 10-2, THOR 2,3,5} , but I would look to see if you have a sat at 1.0W, and try to delete it. If you CAN'T delete it, then the odds are good that you have corrupted satellite/transponder data, and in my opinion, it is a waste of time trying to correct it using the remote, because as long as that satellite is in there, the Azbox will do some strange things. Even though the editor has problems, and can't be used to edit many/most of the sat/transponder parameters, it WILL allow you to enter an uncorrupted list of satellites, and it will allow you to change the names of those satellites, and it WILL allow you to then upload those satellites into the Azbox. Once you get them there, THEN, I wouldn't touch the editor again, because it has bugs. Do thing with the remote after that. OR, some people have used the MAZ program, which does seem to have promise, however before using MAZ, I'd really suggest using the regular editor program first to get a basic sat list, and SAVE that list, so you will have something to come back to if things go wrong.

Anyway, I can't remember where I got the editor, but there may be a version saved on this forum, I'm not sure. There are a few versions of the editor. The one the finally worked for me is one called AzboxEdit_0.9.2880. This is for use with firmware versions after 0.9.2880 obviously. There was another editor for earlier versions. This editor didn't work for me. I've seen posts referring to a AzboxEdit_0.9.2880a , however I think I used the one without the a. If you can't find this editor, I have a copy. I'd also recommend reading the editor thread over at Rick's forum, ie :
AZBox HD Channel Editor - Ricks Satellite Wildfeed and Backhaul Forum This thread starts out talking about the earlier editor that didn't work, then talks about issues with the 2880 editor. But most importantly, it discusses how to get a valid satellite list into the editor, and that is by using a web site that generates a .xml file that can be imported into the editor. The web page is at:
satellites.xml generator
This site will allow you to select which sats you want, and it will create the .xml file that can be imported into the editor.
Actually, I didn't use that site, because in the above forum thread, someone posted a link to a sample .xml file, which I downloaded and edited myself with a text editor, THEN imported this list into the editor. Once in the editor, I was able to do some generic add/delete/change name things to the sat list, but I avoided trying to make changes to the actual sat parameters.
Once the list is in the editor, the editor will upload this list to the Azbox, replacing the corrupt file that comes with the Azbox.
After getting the file up on the Azbox, I'd really suggest just using the remote to make changes after that, because one of the 3 files that the Azbox uses for sat/transponder/channel data is kept in a protected partition, and if the Azbox detects a problem, it puts this file back in, in place of the one you've generated, and it messes stuff up again. However, despite some issues with the editor, I really think it is the only sure way to get a non-corrupt version of satellites into the Azbox. After getting the non-corrupt satellite list in there, I think that some of the other issues that people report don't happen.

If you DON'T want to try the editor, then, I'd really recommend using a USB keyboard, either wired or wireless, because using the remote to type in names can take forever. However, if you DON'T use the editor, and start seeing strange behavior, I would really start suspecting that it is due to the corrupted satellite list.

BTW, the 2880 editor I mentioned works with the 0.9.3877 firmware, which is the most recent "semi-tested" beta version, which I am using. Most people here have added more recent " weekly update versions that aren't tested. I don't know if the editor works with those or not, but I think it should.
If you get an Azbox with prior to the 0.9.2880 firmware, I'd recommend upgrading to the 3877, then use the editor, then try upgrading to newer versions, since that is pretty certain to work. If your azbox comes with 2880 or later, then you may not even have the corrupted file issue, and you can use the editor immediately.
Also, if you decide to use the editor, you will probably need to enable FTP and TCP in the Azbox setup in order to upload/download files to/from the Azbox. I'd advise making copies of these 3 files regardless of whether you use the editor. THe files are:

antenna_list.dat ,
DVBS.dat , and
antenna_list.dat .

The DVBS.dat file is the one that is kept in a protected backup partition that the Azbox will revert to.

If all else fails, you can get a copy of the above 3 files from someone who has loaded in satellites sucessfully, and manually upload them to the Azbox.






http://www.sat-universe.com/showthread.php?p=425470