Local installer options

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skierrob

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Sep 4, 2004
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I am on the HOA board for a condo complex with six buildings in Long Beach, California.

We have been very relaxed about letting satellite dishes on our roofs. We have 82 units, and at this point there are 60 dishes on the roofs (at least four of which are not being used by anyone with no wires plugged in). There is a mixture of both DirecTV and Dish Network satellite dishes.

We are going to have our roofs re-done, so I'm trying to find a local installer that can help us with the following. Note -- this company / person needs to be licensed, bonded and do a W9 for payment.

1. Identify which dishes are in use and which ones have been abandoned through the years. Remove all the abandoned ones along with corresponding wiring.

2. Help us formulate a plan for the remaining dishes. Where can we place them to be as unobtrusive as possible? What are our best options?

3. When the roofing is done, ALL dishes will temporarily need to be removed and will be placed in the former location or a new location based on item #2. After that, each homeowner will need to have the dish pointed by a satellite dish repairman. We are hoping this can be the same person that helped us with the first two -- except that they would have to charge each homeowner individually for this service.

4. After everything is done, if we like the work done, we'd like this company or business to handle all future installs for the complex so we don't have Dish and Direct placing dishes anywhere on the roof. This way they would know how we like to have dishes installed and they will follow our requirements.

Anyone have any ideas of who to call? The few people I've called so far that are still in business only work for Dish or Direct and not both and won't touch the others dishes.

BTW -- we don't want to mandate one company for everyone. We want each homeowner to have a choice between Dish, DirecTV, Charter or FIOS.

Thanks!
 
ideally you'd have an MDU contract so you only have one antenna for each, but you'd need two coax feeding each unit in case of D* for TV and charter for internet (as an example). duno if Dish can work an MDU the same way. but im not sure you'd ever get one company that would do that TBH.
 
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Your going to spend a ton of money to get the roofs done.

I would look into a master antenna system, and either run Dish, Directv or both. Very easily you can run everything on 1 Dish.

In the case of Directv, all you need is 6 lines from the Dish, and keep on amplifying it and placing taps on each building.

You really need 4 lines for directv, but run 6 to support 4K.

The Amps are like $100 each. It would be less money then to have a tech reinstall 60 dishes.

Pm me and I'll help you design the distribution system
 
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Sorry for the delay. I had some troubles logging in to Satellite Guys, but Scott helped me out.

So yes, I absolutely endorse Claude if he'll cover the area you are in. Or maybe you can use his designs with local techs. The stuff isn't magic, but it does require specialized knowledge to plan (which I know Claude has).

To find a local satellite installer, visit SatelliteTechnicians.com. I'd look for companies who can do Single Master Antenna Television (SMATV) systems which are recommended in your case. One dish, dozens or hundreds of receivers.

Detecting which dishes are active is (usually) as simple as finding if there is voltage on the line (13v to 21v) going to the dish. Though there are caveats.
 
Oh, and your question about identifying the unused dishes prompted me to write a complete article on the topic. Though this information may be more useful for the satellite technician you find.

In short, there are five ways to tell if a dish is still being used:

The LNB is Missing
The Cables to the Satellite Dish are Cut
Check for Voltage on the Cable to the Satellite Dish
Ask the Person Living There if They Get Satellite TV
Follow the Cables to the Unit
 
Oh, and your question about identifying the unused dishes prompted me to write a complete article on the topic. Though this information may be more useful for the satellite technician you find.

In short, there are five ways to tell if a dish is still being used:

The LNB is Missing
The Cables to the Satellite Dish are Cut
Check for Voltage on the Cable to the Satellite Dish
Ask the Person Living There if They Get Satellite TV
Follow the Cables to the Unit

That is a good place to start.

Asking the person is a good idea, but people can give some dumb answers.

Personally I would send out a survey to all the tenants and ask them if they have satellite. Give them till a certain date to respond and work with the ones who reply.

Depending on the condition of the dishes you may find a local dealer to take down the ones not being used for free in exchange for the dishes.
 
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