AMC-15 on the move

[KE4EST]

She is now on the move to 105. I can't wait to see the difference, when they throw the switch. I hope it is in the next couple of weeks.

It sure will help out with poor sig. here in the Chattanooga DMA.

 

[Joe Armstrong]

I just moved to Cleveland. Is the quality of the locals poor?

 

[Joe Armstrong]

I just moved to Cleveland. Is the signal quality of the local stations poor?

 

[rocatman]

I just moved to Cleveland. Is the signal quality of the local stations poor?

The Cleveland locals are not on the satellite at 105 W. Most are on 110 W that you would get with a D500 dish and two channels are at 61.5 W. I don't have them by my parents do and they look okay to me. If you are interested in the HD Voom channels, you can order the locals and get the second dish for 61.5 W installed free.

 

[rocatman]

She is now on the move to 105. I can't wait to see the difference, when they throw the switch. I hope it is in the next couple of weeks.

It sure will help out with poor sig. here in the Chattanooga DMA.

Based on the tracking on the LyngSat website, it is being moved quite rapidly so it wouldn't be suprising if AMC-15 is operational at 105 W by June 1.

 

[KE4EST]

Joe are you?...... I am assuming you are in Cleveland, TN...If so yes you would get the Chattanooga Locals from 105 Super Dish, 1 channel is from Cleveland, TN. And no the locals are great, but I was talking about the signal from the dish is low, so they get more rain fade then the others. But if all is well you want notice it. However when the new bird fires up the rain fade will go away if your dish is installed properly, except for maybe a minute or so of heavy down pour.



I hope it is June 1st but, you know how things work could be middle of June or even July 1st

 

[rocatman]

Sorry, I assumed Joe was in Cleveland, Ohio.

 

[KE4EST]

no prob rocat....clev.,Tn is next door to chattanooga, TN.

we'll wait and see what he says though......

 

[rnesky]

You should live in Northeastern PA where winters are bad with wet snow. Hope your right about this being activated at 105. We were afraid with the advent of dish 1000 they would po-po giving us a new sat at 105 and use it somewhere else!

 

[Pablo_New]

Greetings fellow NEPAite (or should I say heyna-ite). I've been tracking the progress of 105 for close to a year, glad to see it's finally on the move. Problem with NEPA and Dish is that they are still getting the signals for all (except WNEP-the uplink) OTA. I'd like to see a fiber feed. Supposedly DirecTV has a fiber feed to their uplink (WVIA) for all of the locals. WYOU especially is still a little grainy and has some ghosting. But I'll still be glad to get more than 52% on 105.

 

[Mistress]

But, but . . . isn't the power of a satellite at 105 limited by (International?) law? I thought that was why we were treated to regular drizzle fades.

 

[Pablo_New]

But, but . . . isn't the power of a satellite at 105 limited by (International?) law? I thought that was why we were treated to regular drizzle fades.

My understanding was that it was weak because is was using a different band (Ka or Ku, not exactly sure), plus it is an older sat. in the "twilight" of its life cycle.

 

[rocatman]

The current satellite that Dish uses at 105 W is AMC-2. Dish leases this satellite from SES Americom and uses the regular Ku band. The Ku band amplifiers on AMC-2 are 60 watts/transponder and it was originally designed to work from 85 W. AMC-15, another SES Americom satellite will soon replace AMC-2 at 105 W. AMC-15 was specifically designed for 105 W and its Ku band amplifiers are 140 watts/transponder. I do not think that SES Americom would design a satellite with higher powered amplifiers than they could use at the intended orbital slot so I have to believe that the Ku band from AMC-15 will be transmitted with the full 140 watts/transponder.

Dish will lease not only the Ku band on AMC-15 but also Ka band spotbeam capability although Dish has not announced the use of the Ka band for video. There has been some discussion on Ka band use for broadband.

 

[nhs510]

Thank you!! This cannot happen soon enough for me. I'm barely hanging at 50% out here. Okay, so I'm not supposed to get 105 at all, but it does work about 75% of the time. This new bird should solve my dropouts completely.

 

[Stargazer]

This new bird WILL solve your dropouts completely if its due to lack of signal strength.

 

[KE4EST]

Now that the bird had landed, does anyone have an idea how long it will be before they throw the switch.

Scott, if you read this do you have any ideas.
Or anyone else who knows more than me.
They have already done testing at other locations, do you think they will test here for a week or a month before they throw the switch.

Thanks in advance.

PS. I assume nobody knows what charlie and echostar is up to, because as I understand they don't know most of the time.

 

[Stargazer]

I imagine that they will want to test at 105 for about a month and get all of the channels arranged the way they want them before they do the swap.

 

[KE4EST]

Thanks Stargazer, I thought the same. Oh well at least it is closer to being on-line than it was. Since it is now parked at 105.

 

[Stargazer]

Its not like we are doing without service (for most people anyways) as a result.

 

[rocatman]

The Ku band on AMC-15 has already been tested right after it was launched and it was reported on this or the other forum that the Ku band signal strengths for all the TPs was very strong. The Ka band spotbeams have been tested at two different orbital locations and could be tested further at 105 W without impacting the Ku band signals. It shouldn't take Dish a month to switch over the channels from AMC-2.