The Best FTA Receiver

[bic]

I need some help.

I'm located north of 53 degrees Lat. on the Pacific Coast. Any signals I get from the sats are a little weak so i need a good sensitive receiver; with blind scan and hopefully an accurate signal meter. I'm only interested in the Ku band as my back yard wouldn't handle a C Band dish.

I've got a 1 meter Fortec dish with an Invacom QPH 031 LNB mounted on a STAAB HH120 motor.

I should be able to get about 4 true FTA satellites but all my Nfusion will pick up is Galaxy 25; and it doesn't do blind scan. I don't like it.

What brand of receiver should I be looking at? I've been researching CNX, AZbox, and Sonicview but am open to suggestions.

Thanks.

 

[guapoharry]

A lot of people will say Coolsat 5000 is the best. It blinds scans well, but you have to pick up used ones.

Pansats are good too.

I use a Fortec Mercury II for blind scanning also. They sell it now under the name Fortec Dynamic...

Azbox doesn't blind scan.

 

[Sadoun]

I would second that the Mercury II or Dynamic receivers are some of the best Blind scanning receivers out there.

 

[turbosat]

Several people lately complaining about those nfusion things, and I"ll second the Fortec Merc/Dynamic boxes-got two of them now ( in case I manage to tear up one, so far that hasn't happened, haha). They are good blind-scan receivers and they don't lock up if they happen to find an HD signal when scanning, like some do.

 

[Lucky53]

I use VS Ultra,Coolsat 5000,Mercury II and Pansat 9200 hd...The Merc and Pansat are great..,but the coolsat 5K wins my vote..fast scan and very easy to use..just a overall great machine!..good luck on ur choice.

 

[Mr Tony]

Pansat
Fortec
Coolsat

top 3 in my book especially when it comes to blind scanning

 

[tdti1]

Traxis 3500 great for blind scanning.

 

[mr.crane]

Pansat
Fortec
Coolsat

top 3 in my book especially when it comes to blind scanning

Iceberg, is the Pansat 3500 good for BlindScan?

 

[updatelee]

I love my fortec mercury II and they are such an incredible price right now.

 

[Anole]

What brand of receiver should I be looking at?

The question has been discussed in a couple of threads before.
If you want to take a look, I'm sure you'll find plenty of pro and con on a number of FTA receivers.

Additionally, I'd like to sugest two more, which we have reviews of here on the forum:
Visionsat IV200 PVR Plus
Geosatpro DVR-1100c

 

[Phottoman]

I have both CNX (2 of the DUO's) and Coolsat 5000, the CNX duo and trio and painfully slow for blind scan (45 minutes or longer) but the mini is pretty good.

THAT said, the CS5000 is hands down the better for blind scanning.

(hope that helps)

Photto

 

[zamar23]

I think the OP needs to be explained, what type of sat signals and channels he would be able to ID, lock to, and watch using suggested above STB models, and if its possible to ID channels with one of suggested models, and watch using another model, if the 1st STB ain't capable to, and what tools and techniques to use for that.

 

[Cham]

I think I would look for an HD capable receiver such as the Pansat 9200 or Coolsat 8200, many feeds and channels are going mpeg-4 dvb-s etc, and they decode AC3 audio that many of the good standard definition channels have. 8PSK can be added on later if you want. Pansat and Coolsat make good real FTA blind scan receivers (IMHO of course).
-C.
EDIT: Coolsat 8100... No I don't think there is an 8200, sorry for the typo.

 

[guapoharry]

Do Pansat 9200 or Coolsat 8200 blind scan?

 

[Jim S.]

The Pansat 9200 blind-scans, even DVB-S2 supposedly if you buy the right 8PSK board for it. I didn't know there was a Coolsat 8200, but I don't think the 8100 blind-scans anything at all.

 

[tdti1]

Never heard of the Coolsat 8200?

 

[guapoharry]

Heh heh, Looks like you're correct about the Coolsat 8200, Jim...

Maybe it was only available in Canada.

 

[Mr Tony]

Iceberg, is the Pansat 3500 good for BlindScan?

yes. Its slow but thorough

 

[Mr Tony]

Do Pansat 9200 or Coolsat 8200 blind scan?

9200 yes
no such thing as a 8200 but the 8000/8100 does not (the 8100 had a PVR option...the 8000 did not)

 

[Cham]

Thought the 8100 did blind scan.. maybe I am glad I passed one up on ebay a few months ago
-C.