I tried 3 things with Direct. I started out with the 18" on 101 it was a joke. Then I took a Slimline since the Direct guys boast about that dish being so great slapped a single DBS LNBF on it and tested. It did better then the 18 but still went out. Then I slapped a DBS LNBF on my Primestar 90 and squeezed out every bit out of it it was better yet but forget it when the heavy cells roll in. The only thing the 90 has going for it over the Direct dishes is it will play a bit longer and come back sooner. It also can hang in there with moderate rain at threshold where the Direct supplied dishes would be out.
I talked with my friend at a company that does commercial installs using dishes on c band 15 meters big about Direct. He said that when they do commercial Direct they use a 1.0m or 1.2m but it still goes out. He said the 90cm was pretty big for Direct though.
I did a lot of research last summer about all this looking for a 100% solution, there is none. What ticks me off is if you have hours of rain with flare up's Direct will be up and down all day or night. Kinda useless to enjoy Tv that way. The bud well crack open a cold one and enjoy it 100%