Seems one dish begats another

[walkerjs]

Looks like at least around here the people are really saying 'to heck with cable'. The guy who lives in the apartment below mine apparently saw my dish up for the past three weeks and determined that if I could get DirecTV, so could he. My wife informed me today that he was getting a dish installed, and sure enough when I got home I saw an installer hooking up his new DirecTV 18" round single LNB to the balcony support.

Now you should remember that we have a grove of very high trees seeming to loom up very near our back patios/balconies, and they are evergreens so they're thick. Most people would take one look at that and say 'no clear view to the south, oh well', but I'm pretty sure he figured that since I put up my dish and it stayed that meant that I was enjoying the wonderful world of D*, and decided to take the plunge.

Talking to the installer guy (didn't talk to the neighbor) he was saying he was getting about a 70 signal on the A Sat since he's clipping the tops of the trees, so he'd be more suseptible to rain fade (I get 100 signal on the 101 since mine clears the trees a bit higher, with 91 on the 110/119) but it would appear that since he got the NFL package, he's willing to live with it.

Also looking around the complex in which I live, there are some pretty elaborate dish setups. There are a group of townhouses at the top of one hill where people have balconies which face due north, but since they are on the top floor they've installed their dishes so they point back south over the roof. There are a good smattering of dishes all over this area both D* and E*, and it just seems more and more of them are popping up!

 

[Alan Gordon]

Also looking around the complex in which I live, there are some pretty elaborate dish setups. There are a group of townhouses at the top of one hill where people have balconies which face due north, but since they are on the top floor they've installed their dishes so they point back south over the roof. There are a good smattering of dishes all over this area both D* and E*, and it just seems more and more of them are popping up!

A cousin of mine used to live in an apartment, and his apartment had a deck/patio on the back which was tiny, and it has a wooden fence around the deck/patio. The apartment manager or whatever told him that he could put up the dish if the dish wouldn't be seen so he took the dish and attached it to his deck/patio and aimed the dish straight at the fence. Darnedest thing I've ever seen, but he got a steady signal with it.


~Alan

 

[walkerjs]

And yet another...

So today I come home from work to see yet another dish pop up where once there was none. Except this one was in a pole in a bucket sitting on the front lawn of an apartment with a south facing front door! Wires strung from the dish into the ground floor apartment window across the lawn! Should've taken a picture, think I will if it's still there tomorrow.

That one will probably be moved or taken down in the near future, but dang that NFL Season Ticket must be some powerful stuff!

 

[slacker9876]

Hey if a bucket and a pole is what it takes ... that's what it takes! I tried to sell my dad for YEARS. His response was I only have a 32" TV, it wont be that great. So that is what he got for Christmas last year, and still has not quit thanking me!

Most don't KNOW that cable (even digital cable) has 225 horizontal lines ... the 400 horizontal by satellite will look better on a 20" TV, plain and simple. More is better.

 

[Neutron]

My new next door neighbor has his phase-III dish attached to a 4X4 fence post in the ground. I will be doing the same. Fortunately I can drill the mast in just like it's on the fence post at the old house.

Since I'm hooking up the dish myself when we move everything over I will be using his dish as a reference. From what I've learned on this forum I will be lining up Sat 101 Transponder 1 and getting that lined up. What should I cover the other two LNBs with?

 

[walkerjs]

If that is what it takes indeed. Hopefully there will be even more units converting from cable to satellite in this complex as the year goes on. I did note, after closer scrutiny of his dish, that it was mounted directly to the building. According to our lease terms this is verboten.

My wife used to work for the property managers who own this complex. Her take on this is that the pole-in-a-bucket-on-the-front-lawn guy will probably be told to take it down, but the influx of D*/E* will probably be inevitable as people see that it can be done, and more permanent installations take hold. Between the deals D* is providing for new subscribers and the Feds backing the consumers pretty soon some sort of DBS will be standard with a new rental agreement.

Quite a change from "No dish, no way, no how."

 

[walkerjs]

It's still there, here ya go

 

[beast37799]

just seems to be asking for problems

 

[Camplate]

Maybe a D* person will read this. If I owned an apartment complex or a house with four apartments; could I contract with D* so that I install one dish and hook up all apartments? One apartment I lived in during college was just the second floor of a house with a separate outside entrance. Everything except phone was his service. He'd yell, jokingly, if he thought the electric or water bill was high, but otherwise everything was included in the rent. He was against paying for hookup and disconnect fees. My first year of college, in a dorm, we had to pay cable and phone hookup fees. What a goldmine!

What if I owned a motel? What do motel owners pay a cable company for each room?

 

[justsatellites]

A rule of thumb we have found is most of the motel owners in Tennesee pay somewhere around $12 per room per month for cable service. That includes one premium such as HBO.

 

[injury]

"If I owned an apartment complex or a house with four apartments; could I contract with D* so that I install one dish and hook up all apartments? "

Not an expert, but no need to contact D* for that. The Recievers and cards deal with subscription, the dish can belong to anyone (as long as you have appropriate lnb, multiswitch setup for serving multiple recievers that is).

I imagine if one owned and apartment complex, the smart thing would be put up a dish pointed for DTV and one for Dish, a multiswitch to cover the current building. Maybe have a "Switch room" where the multiswitch and a patch panel set up for the coax is located. Tenant could jsut say Hey..I'm getting whatever service, and maintence man could go screw the cable for that tenants apartment to the appropriate switch.

I drive past a complex almost daily that has gotten the DTV bug, and seeing a satellite mounted outside every patio up the side of the building really boggles the mind, especially when there is a much "neater" way of doing things.

"A rule of thumb we have found is most of the motel owners in Tennesee pay somewhere around $12 per room per month for cable service."

If I was said motel owner in that situation I'd probably try to go with DTV's add a reciever for 4.99 a month...hey it's the same location