Dish 500 antenna

Foxbat

Addicted to new HW
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Nov 25, 2003
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I think we are going back to Dish 500 days since Dish retired 129 and we do not miss 129 lol.
The one reason I switched to Eastern Arc was it was a two satellite solution and easier to tweak the signal, plus I didn’t need to deal with the neighbor’s trees trying to see 129°W. 61.5°W was a nice clear shot and 72°W was even clearer.

I did miss the Severe Weather Alert “feature” of aiming to the SW… ;)
 

blatimer1983

SatelliteGuys Pro
Apr 6, 2010
288
185
Mississippi
I would like for local channels from Meridian, MS to be added to Dish Eastern Arc in case customers who live in Meridian, MS market area have LOS issues on Western Arc in future.

With the sat 129 being gone that will help a lot to make things easier lol.


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Mister B

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Jun 3, 2008
443
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El Paso County Texas
Are new installations for the Western Arc using a Dish 500 type dish yet? I have been thinking about going back to DISH but would prefer not to have the larger 110/119/129 type dish when it is not even necessary now.
 
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dishrich

SatelliteGuys Pro
Sep 8, 2003
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Springfield, IL
Are new installations for the Western Arc using a Dish 500 type dish yet?
You COULD have this type of install now, by just getting a Dish 500 w/2 DP LNB's, going into a DPH42 switch, which would then work with any Hopper/Joey setup. Unfortunately, I HIGHLY doubt E* would foot the bill for (particularly) the DPH42 switch, so that would fall on you.
 

telstar_1

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Jul 14, 2020
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I was excited for HD and then they dropped 129 on us. Then when they came up with EA they pitched it like we could take our pick and have much more latitude (no pun intended) as far as tree blockages, etc. But then your locals are just on the one or the other. It was always something.
 
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NYDutch

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Dec 28, 2013
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Where our wheels go
I was excited for HD and then they dropped 129 on us. Then when they came up with EA they pitched it like we could take our pick and have much more latitude (no pun intended) as far as tree blockages, etc. But then your locals are just on the one or the other. It was always something.
The locals in many DMA's are on both arcs, although often only in HD on one of them.
 
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Mister B

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Jun 3, 2008
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El Paso County Texas
Well, I was not able to wait until a new two orbital dish is available so went ahead and had an installation yesterday. It is of course the 3 LNB type. I see on the signal diagnostics screen "conn" where presumably 129 used to be. I am getting a signal of about 60 on both 110 and 119. Is that good?
 
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telstar_1

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Jul 14, 2020
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Well, I was not able to wait until a new two orbital dish is available so went ahead and had an installation yesterday. It is of course the 3 LNB type. I see on the signal diagnostics screen "conn" where presumably 129 used to be. I am getting a signal of about 60 on both 110 and 119. Is that good?
Probably. I noticed some years back that they seemed to have downscaled the signal strength indication. No more 80s like in the old days. 129 always read quite a bit lower but still seemed to work acceptably. Right, they're probably not going back to a 500 dish at this point for installs.
 

dishdude

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Supporting Founder
Sep 7, 2003
25,519
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Phoenix, AZ
And IIRC the reason is 8PSK. The old mpeg2 broadcasts were QPSK.

They launched a satellite with higher powered transponders around 2000 or 2001 and moved signal meter from 0-100 to 0-125. They didn't want to adjust it and have people think they lost signal strength. At least that's what Charlie claimed on a chat back in the day, and the peanut gallery agreed!
 

DPP44?

Thank you Erik Carlson