New to Satellite-General question

[lyze40]

With the digtal deadline looming, I need to make a decision. I have not had cable TV in my house since I built it over 10 years ago. I ran RG-6 coax to each room of my house down to the basement. I use an indoor antenna located in the rafters. My question is, If I go with a satellite hook-up do I need a receiver for each Tv set or can I have one receiver in the basement and distribute the signal from there?

Phil

 

[alebowgm]

You could have one receiver in the basement, but you are going to be distributing the same signal to all of the TVs. Whiel Dish Network now has recievers that can dual output, hence allowing one STB to output to two different TVs different content, if you have multiple TVs and want to watch different programming on each, you are going to need to have multiple recievers.

Why would the Digital deadline make you need to have a decesion? You will still be able to recieve OTA broadcasts when that day comes in Februrary, they will just be -DT instead of analogue.

 

[harshness]

DBS receivers don't load up the wire with all of their programming at once. They tune only one or two channels at any one time. It is most convenient to have one box per TV, but if you've got a lot more televisions than viewers, you may be able to centralize things a bit.

DISH offers RF modulators in their receivers and DVRS that will allow you to distribute standard definition (SD) signals using your central system.

 

[mike123abc]

If you want to continue your free OTA, just pick up some of the digital OTA converter boxes and you will be good to go... They are very cheap/free if you use the government coupons. If you decide to go with either satellite or cable I am sure they will be able to get something to work. With RG6 home runs to each TV satellite TV boxes could go in each room.

 

[lyze40]

Thanks for the help, So just to make sure, the best bet would to get a receiver of each TV, I only have 1 HD ready TV. I have 9 tv's in the house but no more than 3 are ever on at the same time. I do have a couple of the hd converters, but I was just trying to justify satellite.

Thanks again

 

[mike123abc]

It depends on what you want. Satellite will work fine, but of course you will have a monthly bill. If you go the OTA converter box, you have 3 TVs working now (one HD TV and 2 boxes), it would take 40x6 or $240 more to have free TV on the other TVs.