I came late to the cband game...1998 when I moved to the sticks (or styx, depending on your viewpoint!;^) ) The 10ft Weingard and GI V5 or 8 or something with a really cool remote were FREE from a friend living on an island...I know! What a way to waste an afternoon...have to take a ferry ride to a pretty island on a nice summer day, to pick up a 10 foot dish (we took it apart into nice bite-sized triangles,) a pole, and the receiver! Oh, the Horror!! hahahahaha. We got it home and the receiver's VCII board didn't work. Replaced with a newer one (from an actual INSTALLER,) and then the power supply in the receiver went out after a year. Replaced it with a Drake ESR (built to LAST...still using it!) and bought 905 in 2003 or 2004 for 179.00 from Skyvision (was told it was one of the last ones they had!) Total spent including various calamities which I'll elaborate on later, $700.00 for 12 great years of fun TV. 58.00 month, not including programming of course! Since we literally have no cable service and no DSL hub, there is no other option for TV other than the STELLAR new-and-improved OTA ***DIGITAL*** (sarcastic fanfare, please!!!!!) TV. I count my blessings that I have reliable service and EXCELLENT tech support between providers and good info gleaned from forums! Long Live AFFORDABLE TV, or I guess I could just read a book!

after all, it still is ONLY TV! (llok up Frank Zappa's Slime on the Video.)