Local Channel Reception Range

[FickleFinn]

We just got home from a trip to IA, NE, KS, CO, MT and received out local Sacramento stations on the entire trip. I thought there was a 250 mile limit on reception?

On previous trips we had to call in with a local address.

Has something changed? We have a 722K receiver I take out of the house (I bought it) and we have another that stays at home.

Thx,

 

[Bobby]

I am unsure why but Sacramento main local channels are on a nationwide transponder on the 110 satellite. So, if you can see 110, you can receive those channels wherever you are.

 

[FickleFinn]

Have they changed Transponders? We always had to call before!

I am happy as we were on a 3 month RV trip and were able to keep in "touch" with home!!

Thx,
Mike

 

[Brussam]

I ran into Ft Wayne Indiana being a EA CONUS city. I used it through Michigan into Wisconsin because I didn't have to change my Service Address. I don't care where the Locals come from, I just want the HD Locals for PTAT.

 

[pattykay]

Have they changed Transponders? We always had to call before!

Yes, they had to do a lot of shuffling around, back in December, after one of their satellites at 110 blew up real good (or to be more accurate, it had some technical difficulty that caused them to lose the use of some transponders) and they no longer had the spotbeam capacity for all of the locals that used to be on spotbeam. Most local markets affected by this got moved to in-orbit spare back-up spotbeams, but Sacramento was the lucky city that got to stay on CONUS.

 

[NYDutch]

Here's my most recent listing of CONUS beamed locals:

 

[Brussam]

The real joke is putting HD Locals on Satellite 77 for people with a Hopper 3 and using the EA Hybrid LNBF head. Those must have future homes on a different satellite.

 

[Bobby]

The real joke is putting HD Locals on Satellite 77 for people with a Hopper 3 and using the EA Hybrid LNBF head. Those must have future homes on a different satellite.

That's one of the reasons that they came up with the 42 switch. You can use the standard 3 LNB EA dish and the 42 switch will add the hybrid function.

 

[pattykay]

The real joke is putting HD Locals on Satellite 77 for people with a Hopper 3 and using the EA Hybrid LNBF head. Those must have future homes on a different satellite.

The EA Hybrid LNBF has an input for a third satellite, unlike the old DPP 1000.2 EA LNBF. For the few (very few) markets that are only on 77, it is probably not that much trouble to just add a second dish, if the installer is out of stock of EA 1000.4's and/or DPH42's.

 

[Brussam]

That's one of the reasons that they came up with the 42 switch. You can use the standard 3 LNB EA dish and the 42 switch will add the hybrid function.

I use a DPH-42 Switch on the Winegard Trav'ler roof dish. For the ultra few times I would even think of using satellite 77, putting a DPH-42 Switch on the tripod just would make sense

 

[NYDutch]

As said, there are so few 77 only locals that it's really a non-issue unless you want the extended coverage of one of the CONUS DMA's on 77. The CONUS locals on 77 are also spot beamed on other sats.