Seattle to Bellingham VOOMERS where are you. Report in with Signal range@!

iceshark

SatelliteGuys Pro
Original poster
May 10, 2004
533
0
Pacific Northwest
GOT VOOM installed three weeks ago. Signal average 78-82 . when its cloudy it drops to 70-74 and no signal. Called VOOm and 30 inch dish being installed for free this weekend. will report back. First off if you are in the upper west coast. GOOD LUCK! this bird sits at the far east end of the clark belt. About 60 degrees east. damm dish nearly points down to ground here in WA state. Was lucky house is high two story and installer was cool and I helped or he could have easily gave up finding signal. I used to own a cband store so I helped him along cuase I wasnt giving up without a fight!
Well a hint to anyone thinking about getting voom. If you have a charley reciever go ahead and go to setup and choose 61.5 degree dishnet satellite. Then move dish just east of dishnets 61.5 satellite. You should get a locked signal that is actually the voom sat if you are just a smidgen left or east of real 61.5 sat.

If you do you should definatly order free install no contract VOOM!
I have a sony vega xbr HD 40 inch tube and all these 39 HD channels look SWEEEEEEEEEETTTTTTTTT!
only 39 bucks at that.
They also throw you a bone of normal cable channels and a off air anteanna free for locals in HD if available.
 
Port Ludlow

I have a 24" dish, and have had VOOM for about 1 week, so far so good. I haven't worked on OTA yet, anyone in the area with experience?
 
Hey, "iceshark",

Something is wrong with your current installation unless the antenna is shooting through Mt. Baker. We live down here in White Center just south of West Seattle and lived for over a year with an 18"er. Several rain fades in moderate to heavy rain with a sat signal of 95 in clear skies. With the 24" we get 98 and have yet to have any rain fade although we've only had one moderate rainfall since its install. Yep, our sat antenna looks like it is shooting into the ground as well.

Love all the HDTV. Since didn't have cable or sat before get to watch HBO now. Since we saw "Deadwood" last spring watching TV has taken on a whole new dimension.

Watching HDTV under very cold clear (but snow on the way?) Seattle skies, Gill
 
SeattleVoomer1 said:
Hey, "iceshark",

Something is wrong with your current installation unless the antenna is shooting through Mt. Baker. We live down here in White Center just south of West Seattle and lived for over a year with an 18"er. Several rain fades in moderate to heavy rain with a sat signal of 95 in clear skies. With the 24" we get 98 and have yet to have any rain fade although we've only had one moderate rainfall since its install. Yep, our sat antenna looks like it is shooting into the ground as well.

Love all the HDTV. Since didn't have cable or sat before get to watch HBO now. Since we saw "Deadwood" last spring watching TV has taken on a whole new dimension.

Watching HDTV under very cold clear (but snow on the way?) Seattle skies, Gill
Gill, That was way old post. I made them upgrade last May to 30inch dish and double channel master OTA. I have not had a rain fade that I know of since!
Too bad I am loosing patience with VOOM!
Really liking my new 921 :D
 
Whoops, gotta start looking at the dates!

Thanks, "iceshark".

Still watching HDTV (I think) under cloudless Seattle skies, Gill

P.S.: Will be interesting to see how much snow you'll get up there.
 
Thought I was the only one in Wash. Have VaVaVoom and Have the larger dish, which did resolve alot of the pix. problems. took 4 months to resolve issues, install is the worst. They even at one point sent out a (NEW)defective receiver which created a new problem. It's a testament to the pq, the sh*t we'll put with on the install end. Will hate it if V* goes under, love the pq, and can't understand all the bitching about useless channels, have had Voom for 6 months and never tire of simply plodding through their 21 channels, it's all good! It's all HD! Am in Sammamish, looking directly across the lake at Seattle's towers, so get all the locals. Biggest beef is having to subscribe to comcast just to watch the sonics(fsnw), crapola pic, even compared to sd on voom. Glad there's more of you out there. It's a big deal to me, Thanks to Mark Cuban for getting it started, thanks to Voom for kickin the ball outa the park. Will return here if I can find it again.
 
Port Ludlow

IceShark
I have a 24" dish now and have some issues so it seems I might need to go to the 30", not sure if I have reception or reciever issues so I might just wait and see.
What happens is that after watching Voom a while and going to change channels, almost all channels show that there is no signal, but I can always watch channel 100 or the channel I was just watching.
If I reboot they are all there again.
What type of OTA antennas to you have? Your message says dual, but do you know the model number? Not sure I will be able to get OTA channels but they will be updating my antenna next week.
 
Located in Ballard

Had Voom installed last weekend. I'm getting pixelation in rain and what not so maybe the 30in will help me out as well. Have had 2 installer visists so far and I gave both of them much more 'benefit of doubt' than I should have - the 2nd was stupider that the first - I think I'm DONE dealing with them.

Had a radio shack yagi up on my 2-stry roof (in Ballard just barely north of the locks) into a Samsung for OTA before Voom and got everything except for komo4 and q13. Actually for a while I was getting 13 - apparently they used to broadcast from the ch22 tower as well (and viceversa with 22 being broadcast on the 13 tower) but stopped a while back for some regulatory reason. I wish they'd continue because I just can't seem to get 13 to even BLINK because Magnolia is right in my way - if only I was just little higher and further north..

Anyhow, installernumerouno came out and disconnected my old vhf and the newer yagi and took down the mast - he replaced it with a shorter thicker mast and the POS Winegard antenna that came with Voom- he said it should do as good a job anyhow. I saw it and was skeptical but figured "he does this all the time so must know what he's doing". That was my bad.

Sufficeth to say few of the channels we pulled in with the yagi/Samsung came in with the winegard/motorola and those that did come in after he switched antennas were not reliable - even king5 which had always been rock-solid was heavily pixelated with drop-outs. And the guy LEFT - he LEFT it like that (I had gone to work while my lady stayed home while he was here). He also left me a broken old data jack (that I'd installed near the living room cable outlet previously) and just drilled a new hole next to where I had the damn data jack (phone/cable/cat5) mounted. He must have dropped the DVD player upstairs because hte front faceplate (I noticed much later that night when I went to "straighten" the upstairs motorola box because it sat crooked on the shelf) was nearly popped off and hte metal was dent on top - I managed to pop it back in place and had to fidget with the door a bit to get the dvd tray to open and close completely again. The best part though, and I wish I could've been here, was that he forgot his tools and had to come back from his next install to get them from our porch where my lady left them.

If you're reading this Mr. Installer whose name I'll omit, please figure out that professionalism goes a long way and know that it's a good idea to have more information about your install location and the hardware involved than your customer does.

The second installer who came out to give me the "upgraded" antenna evidentally had zero idea where this antenna was (though Voom scheduled all of it) and let me know that they "only have the supplied one unless tehy buy the upgrade out of pocket" - huh? I don't know and I don't care. In the end (I was at work talking to him on the phone) I told him to get back on the roof and install my old RadioShack yagi and get out of there. My lady was a little pissed even since he spent most of the time gabbing on his cell and when he did get on the roof HE asked HER if it was a directional and if he should "point it... that way?"!! What the hell? He's a satellite/antenna installer and does not know what a directional antenna looks like? An old yagi style that has been around for HOW many years? He was actually amazed at the the reception difference (ooh and awwing when he came back inside) started asking us where we got it and how much and "whoa that's.. that's... whoa".

So now, I get reception as good as I did when I started with the OTA. Satellite is usually in the 80s for signal and could also be improved. I'm thining of putting up a 4228 to pull in Komo - probably still won't get Q13 but at least I'll get the VHF signal from it. But now I've got this short stubby mast they put on my chimney strap. :(

Ug. All this stuff aside I must say that I'm digging Voom programming - pic is gorgeous and I think there's plenty of selection. Sure the Voom originals are bordering on lame but thye're fun to have and the Voom news sure looks good.

Sorry for the long windedness - had to vent a little - not really disappointed in Voom, mostly just the horrible subcontracting going on with their installations. I KNOW that had I know less than I do, I may have just gottten fed up and cancelled and would've called up Comcast to come out. You know?

Cheers all.
 
i live in spokane WA i have had voom for about a week now and i love it i have a 24dish my signal is at 96-97 we have had rain and it didnt efect it.
 
Rain in Spokane and not Seattle? Is this possible?

Welcome to VOOM. Glad to know about good VOOM reception over there. How many OTA stations do you receive? What part of Spokane do you live in? Considering retiring over there in a couple of years.

Still enjoying HDTV under rainless(none for 10+ more days) Seattle skies, Gill
 
i have about 7 locals and right now im not getting all of them so im upgrading on the first. i live close from downtown. its nice hearing that you are thinking about moving here it is preatty nice and alot calmer than seattle.
 
I live about 5 miles sw of Bremerton--I get 0 OTA locals(I live in a valley surrounded by hills.). My Voom signal usually is at about 93-95, 86 & up when it's raining.

Voom forever!
 
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