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In my opinion, this transition is driven by greed, not need...

The investment in the Blue filter LNBF production has been more like my donation to the satellite hobby. Have recouped only a portion of the C140 / C240 development cost, but in the bigger picture, the larger housing may prove to be suitable for a new reduced bandpass PCB. Too early to make decisions based on speculation. I'll wait for an auction and implementation schedule.

Hobbyists are often a strange group to sell to. Will spend $8 daily on a coffee, $25 for a McDonald's meal, $800 on a phone, Thousands on cellular/Internet/streaming, but refuse to spend $80-100 on an occasional hardware upgrade...

Titanium said:

Hobbyists are often a strange group to sell to. Will spend $8 daily on a coffee, $25 for a McDonald's meal, $800 on a phone, Thousands on cellular/Internet/streaming, but refuse to spend $80-100 on an occasional hardware upgrade...

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I Don't waste money on Coffee. Haven't touched Mc Donalds for over 26 years. I cook at home. Rarely eat out. Only special occasions. I spend no money on Cellular. I don't own a cell phone. I have no streaming services. I would totally pay $80-$100.00 for a hardware upgrade for a hobby that brings me lots of joy and fun.

iBoston said:

I Don't waste money on Coffee. Haven't touched Mc Donalds for over 26 years. I cook at home. I spend no money on Cellular. I don't own a cell phone. I have no streaming services. I would totally pay $80-$100.00 for a hardware upgrade for a hobby that brings me lots of joy and fun.

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A lot depends on how much money you have, how much you're willing to spend, and what your priorities are.

WhiteBeard said:

A lot depends on how much money you have, how much you're willing to spend, and what your priorities are.

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In my humble opinion, most people have screwed up priorities.

Then there's also the consideration of whether or not it's worth it... As the spectrum allocated to C-band has shrunk from 800 MHz to 500 MHz to 400 MHz to 200 MHz and now could possibly shrink to 20 MHz, at one point does C-Band go the way of the telegraph and telex...

We have the dishes etc., and yes we can certainly consider spending $100-200 on a new filtered LNB, as it's just a hobby and we do this for fun.

But from an broadcaster's perspective, would it still make any sense to maintain any C-band equipment with expensive filters for just 20 MHz of available bandwidth? What content could we expect to find on a 20Mhz C-band? Would any of it be likely to still be FTA? At some point it's a bit like asking if there would still be a market for sports cars if the speed limits were reduced to 25mph/40km/h everywhere (and strictly enforced)

Now, we all know there's still Ku band, that it typically uses smaller dishes, which of course is much easier for us, but that it is very susceptible to degradation in inclement weather. One thing I don't know though - is the "rain fade" just an attenuation of the signal, in which case a much larger dish might bring enough margin to make that problem irrelevant? Or does it also bring other degradations like phase noise, to a point that the signal is just so messed up that it cannot be used even with a very large dish?

Brct203 said:

But from an broadcaster's perspective, would it still make any sense to maintain any C-band equipment with expensive filters for just 20 MHz of available bandwidth?

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They'll likely just jack everything up to at least 32PSK, which will kill off smaller dishes from receiving them...

I agree that a 20MHz band would effectively kill the C-band hobby, as the grade of narrow bandpass filter would be cost prohibitive and only be effective in a mechanical waveguide configuration. Single transponder pass type filters have existed since the 80's and a hobbyist could retune one of these custom filters for the narrow band.

We will wait and see what spectrum is offered and who purchases (or if it is sold).

Unfortunately, the FCC has once again ignored international standards and proposed a standard or range that is unique to CONUS. Over and over, the FCC have been bought out and the rarely does "Joe Average" benefit. NTSC, ATSC, QAM, NextGen, CEA-608, CEA-708, this list goes on... This means that we have to develop hardware that has a limited distribution and cannot benefit from global mass manufacturing.

Follow the $$$

primestar31 said:

They'll likely just jack everything up to at least 32PSK, which will kill off smaller dishes from receiving them...

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but even with 32psk at a high FEC, there's just so much you can fit in a 20 MHz bandwidth

Titanium said:

Follow the $$$

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Almost like the FCC doesn't exist to protect the public trust (airwaves) of US citizens but the highe$t bidder.

comfortably_numb said:

Almost like the FCC doesn't exist to protect the public trust (airwaves) of US citizens but the highe$t bidder.

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spectrum is the golden goose, they can keep selling it again and again and they didn't even have to buy it in the first place

iBoston said:

In my humble opinion, most people have screwed up priorities.

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Well, that's your opinion. No one is going to tell me what my priorities should be since they don't know my situation. Just sayin'.

I suppose that I could re-purpose my 12 footers for Ku but only if there are enough services that are worth watching on Ku.

The FCC talked about auctioning off up to 180 MHz of C-band, but ended up settling on 160 MHz. The frequencies from 4160 to 4200 MHz will remain available for satellite downlink. That's 40 MHz of bandwidth.

The deadline to clear the frequencies from 4000 to 4160 MHz from satellite use is December 31, 2030 in the 75 largest markets in the contiguous United States and June 30, 2031 in the remainder of the contiguous United States.

This is all laid out in the FCC's Upper C-band Auction Report and Order, Order of Proposed Modification, and Order on Reconsideration published in advance of the July 2026 Open Commission Meeting. Technically, what's mentioned in the document still requires approval by a vote of the commission on July 22, but these votes are usually just formalities, leaving the draft text more or less a done deal.

Brct203 said:

but even with 32psk at a high FEC, there's just so much you can fit in a 20 MHz bandwidth

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And everyone is still presuming that any remaining C spectrum will still be unencrypted FTA.

Rightsholders are likely to increasingly demand that signal paths - be they via the remaining C spectrum or through cross-strapped Ku - are encrypted and are only viewable by specifically-authorized terminals.

Everyone else's mileage may vary.