Question about FTA install

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SA Holly Springs GA

SatelliteGuys Pro
Original poster
Sep 10, 2010
391
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In the woods
1st. I know nothing about FTA rcvrs or how to install. I don't think I've ever seen one.(pretty sad I know) I install Direct for a living and i have a customer tomorrow morning that wants me to me to take a look at his setup. He purchased a FTA for 19 bucks and he has a big Ant on his house. The rcvr has never been hooked up.

Can anyone give me the basic setup for this? Any info will help. Sorry for the limited info.

I'm sure I can figure it out when I get there but I wanted to get a heads up 1st. I'm just not sure if it'll be piece of cake or hard as a rock.

All inquiries appreciated.
 
SA, Where does one start lol...Assuming it is a fixed system not a motorized setup, it depends on what sat they want to get? 97West has the most. Has to have the correct lnb..dish or direct lnb won't work...A 30" dish or a 36" is recommended as well. The signals on the FTA stuff are a lot weaker than the DBS stuff, as far as lining the dish up. It depends on what type of equipment is there, guess you won't know til you see it....good luck...Blind
 
He purchased a FTA for 19 bucks
Nice price if it's a decent receiver
and he has a big Ant on his house.
Do you mean a BUD, as in 6 to 10 ft dish?
To align the dish, the receiver needs to have a working transponder/SR, on the desired satellite, programmed into it. Is this a fixed, one satellite setup or a polar mount that tracks the arc. Is it for C band only, Ku band only, or both? For more detailed instructions, the receiver model, The LNB(s) model # and feed type, Or maybe it has an LNBF? Answering the above, and also the dish size and mount type will result in better answers.
To see what's available. and good transponder/SR's for aiming, check out SatelliteGuys.US_TheList - TheList
A great tool to find a satellite of interest is Satellite Finder / Dish Pointing Calculator with Google Maps | DishPointer.com
 
When I said big Antenna, that's just what he told me.

It's a 3 lnb E* dish. Photo attached. 4 lines from dish.

The rcvr is a Nuvenio
 

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If the center lnb is linear, you might get some G19Ku. Can't say for sure. Did you get the LNBF's model numbers? IF they are circular polarization LNBF's, they are no good for FTA.
 
Lol didn't take a good look at it. Just through my phone. I'll ask a question that I do know something about.

What's the best D* sat to use to hit FTA birds if possible?

I got tons of them laying around.

This guy also wants to get German channels. (someone told him he could) Possible?

I like to complicate things.
 
That is a Dish 1000+ dish....the LNB's are pretty much useless for free to air since they are all circular. FTA uses linear
What it sounds like he wants to do is steal Dish Network using a free to air receiver and downloading software into it which isnt tolerated here.

If he wants German channels he would need to subscribe to Dish Network :)
 
Iceberg said:
That is a Dish 1000+ dish....the LNB's are pretty much useless for free to air since they are all circular. FTA uses linear
What it sounds like he wants to do is steal Dish Network using a free to air receiver and downloading software into it which isnt tolerated here.

If he wants German channels he would need to subscribe to Dish Network :)

Not sure what his intentions are and really don't care. I'm just trying to help him out. He just cancelled Dish and switched to D and D doesn't have German channels. The E installer sold him the FTA box with intentions of getting German channels legally but never finished installing it. I guess he was under the impression that the 1000 dish could be used for that. I have no idea, hence, me starting this thread.
 
I don't think there are any free German channels receivable with a small dish in North America. I'm not even sure if there are any receivable with a really big dish.
 
DW-TV USA is on AMC-1, on C-band, unless I'm looking at outdated information. I don't do C-band, so I don't know how big a dish you'd need. Usually, 6 feet or more.
 
1st. I know nothing about FTA rcvrs or how to install. I install Direct for a living and i have a customer tomorrow morning that wants me to take a look at his setup. He purchased a FTA for 19 bucks and he has a big Ant on his house. The rcvr has never been hooked up. Can anyone give me the basic setup for this? Any info will help.

It's a 3 lnb E* dish. Photo attached. 4 lines from dish. The rcvr is a Nuvenio

What's the best D* sat to use to hit FTA birds if possible? I got tons of them laying around. This guy also wants to get German channels. (someone told him he could) Possible?

That is a Dish 1000+ dish....the LNB's are pretty much useless for free to air since they are all circular. FTA uses linear What it sounds like he wants to do is steal Dish Network using a free to air receiver and downloading software into it which isnt tolerated here. If he wants German channels he would need to subscribe to Dish Network :)

Not sure what his intentions are and really don't care. I'm just trying to help him out. He just cancelled Dish and switched to D and D doesn't have German channels. The E installer sold him the FTA box with intentions of getting German channels legally but never finished installing it. I guess he was under the impression that the 1000 dish could be used for that. I have no idea, hence, me starting this thread.

Holly Springs,

I will vote with Iceberg on his assesment of the situation. The fellow (your customer) is either naive, or he believes that you are.

First of all, FTA reception is totally unique from Dish Network and DirectTV broadcasts. Most of their stuff is circular polarized (maybe not all) but it is certainly all encypted, or at least everything that an ordinary person would desire to watch is. You could detect their signals with the proper LNBF and if they offered any "In The Clear" channels. You could actually view them. Most were the test cards for alignment purposes for DN techs.

It used to be nice for some of us FTA'ers to use DN's test card signals to help locate our position in the sky for aligning our dish and motors. The DN signals were boomers and that made it very convenient when aligning a FTA dish. FTA uses a much larger dish pan (reflector) because the signals are weaker and either vertically or horizontally polarized.

With the stronger, circular polarity signals, you didn't have to fret much over the polarization angle of your LNBF and you could scan or pan the sky pretty quickly and pick up a signal on the move.
This allowed you to get into the ball park area quickly. With just linear FTA signals, you have to sweep your dish much slower since you are trying to detect a much weaker signal. Not only that, but if you don't have the V / H polarization of the linear LNBF spot on, you'll miss it just on that account alone. Compared to setting up DN or DirecTV, FTA is more challenging.

In totally honesty, if an elderly couple asked you to do the same so that they could watch some of the religious FTA programs or ethnic programs on G19 or something and wanted you to install their dish and an inexpensive receiver and set it all up for them, I would say OK. If someone goes out and buys a Nuvenio and wants you to just align the dish for them, I have a pretty good idea of what they have in mind. It isn't anything that you wish to be involved in, not if you wish to stay out of trouble with your employer.

Back to the point regarding the "elderly" folks. Except for this scenario or someone who is not able to physically do certain things on their own, no one involved in FTA eandeavors should be looking to hire someone else to set up their dish and align it. Except for a major C-Band Bud installation or having your friend come over for a few beers to help you play around. These FTA installations are primarily a DIY project for good reason, this is a hobby. Doing everything yourself, including seeking out the information and setting the dish up and running the cables and programming the receiver is all part of why FTA is a hobby.

Good Luck, but be careful what you get into.

RADAR
 
AcWxRadar said:
Holly Springs,

I will vote with Iceberg on his assesment of the situation. The fellow (your customer) is either naive, or he believes that you are.

First of all, FTA reception is totally unique from Dish Network and DirectTV broadcasts. Most of their stuff is circular polarized (maybe not all) but it is certainly all encypted, or at least everything that an ordinary person would desire to watch is. You could detect their signals with the proper LNBF and if they offered any "In The Clear" channels. You could actually view them. Most were the test cards for alignment purposes for DN techs.

It used to be nice for some of us FTA'ers to use DN's test card signals to help locate our position in the sky for aligning our dish and motors. The DN signals were boomers and that made it very convenient when aligning a FTA dish. FTA uses a much larger dish pan (reflector) because the signals are weaker and either vertically or horizontally polarized.

With the stronger, circular polarity signals, you didn't have to fret much over the polarization angle of your LNBF and you could scan or pan the sky pretty quickly and pick up a signal on the move.
This allowed you to get into the ball park area quickly. With just linear FTA signals, you have to sweep your dish much slower since you are trying to detect a much weaker signal. Not only that, but if you don't have the V / H polarization of the linear LNBF spot on, you'll miss it just on that account alone. Compared to setting up DN or DirecTV, FTA is more challenging.

In totally honesty, if an elderly couple asked you to do the same so that they could watch some of the religious FTA programs or ethnic programs on G19 or something and wanted you to install their dish and an inexpensive receiver and set it all up for them, I would say OK. If someone goes out and buys a Nuvenio and wants you to just align the dish for them, I have a pretty good idea of what they have in mind. It isn't anything that you wish to be involved in, not if you wish to stay out of trouble with your employer.

Back to the point regarding the "elderly" folks. Except for this scenario or someone who is not able to physically do certain things on their own, no one involved in FTA eandeavors should be looking to hire someone else to set up their dish and align it. Except for a major C-Band Bud installation or having your friend come over for a few beers to help you play around. These FTA installations are primarily a DIY project for good reason, this is a hobby. Doing everything yourself, including seeking out the information and setting the dish up and running the cables and programming the receiver is all part of why FTA is a hobby.

Good Luck, but be careful what you get into.

RADAR

Radar,

Thanks for some good info. I really don't think that his intentions were negative, in sense, of anything illegal. Also - I, in no way think that he is in any way trying to take advantage of me. He and I both have too much to loose for any of that. He was just under the impression (from a E installer) that he could get German channels with that dish and recvr. If it cant be done physically & legally with that dish(as mentioned above) then I'm done with that.

On another topic, the more I read and hear from FTA users, the more I want to get into it for MY use.

Again, thanks for your all the input and I'm sure I'll have more questions to come.
 
Radar,

Thanks for some good info. I really don't think that his intentions were negative, in sense, of anything illegal. Also - I, in no way think that he is in any way trying to take advantage of me. He and I both have too much to loose for any of that. He was just under the impression (from a E installer) that he could get German channels with that dish and recvr. If it cant be done physically & legally with that dish(as mentioned above) then I'm done with that.

On another topic, the more I read and hear from FTA users, the more I want to get into it for MY use.

Again, thanks for your all the input and I'm sure I'll have more questions to come.

Holly Springs,

You are welcome for the information, for what it was worth. I may be incorrect on the German Channel availability as I don't go through every FTA channel and check them all out. There may be some German broadcasts up there, but I am not personally aware of them. C-Band would probably be the most likely source if there are any which are FTA. I get a great many ethnic channels from a few Ku Band FTA satellites (primarily 97.0°W) but have not detected any German channels there personally. Of course, I was not looking hard for them in the first place, either.

If you decide to jump into the FTA hobby yourself, I guarantee that you will find it to be a great deal of fun! It will certainly prove to be very educational and informative to you. It will also surely help you improve your skills on the job because it will expand your knowledge of the satellites and the available broadcasts that are "up there". You could also help us FTA'ers out with your technical background in DirecTV installations. So please, keep coming here to visit us and play with us! :) We enjoy the company of many playmates and it's a lot of fun! I think you will enjoy it, too!

RADAR
 
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