Which sat do my locals come from?

[Phils]

Last summer I upgraded to a 622 from Dish500 with PVR. As the installer was aligning the new dish (to pick up the third bird 129W) he said I had some trees in the way. I trimmed them until he said "ok, I got the signal".

Over the past few months pixalation interference (best I can describe it) has been getting worse and worse, but only on some channels, mostly my locals from northern CA. I looked and sat 129W had a signal strength of between 50 and 56. The 110 and 119 birds were about 85 to 100.

Yesterday I trimmed trees some more in the same area the installer had me trim. The 129W signal is up to 65 and the pixalation 'interference' seems to be gone now. I was trimming to increase signal strength on all birds before I called tech support to complain about the 622 pixalation knowing an early question is about signal strength.

Finally to my question: I never used to get sat 129, but I've gotten the local stations for years. I thought the 129 bird must only be for my HD programming but this tree interference situation indicates otherwise. Do I NOW get locals from 129? Or is there something else I'm clueless about? Or is this just coincindence and my locals will start pixalating again soon?

Phil

 

[bhelms]

Here's your best resource: (kudos to TNGTony and others responsible for this site!) A lot of your "national" HD channels including voom are coming from 129 so you must have been receiving it since your upgrade (assuming you're sub'd for HD).

http://www.dishchannelchart.com/

There are some Los Angeles HD local channels at 129. Are those what you're referring to? I don't see anything else listed for CA at 129...

 

[RandallA]

Since you're located in Northern California, is your DMA Reno or San Francisco? I know that the SF DMA has the locals on 110 and the HD locals on 119. Nothing on 129.

Like bhelms suggested check that site and look for your market.

 

[Phils]

Thanks bhelms & RandallA,

I appreciate the link and didn't think my locals came from 129. I really figured it was a receiver problem. I just wasn't prepared for the problem to disappear after clearing the path to 129. I've still some more tree parts to remove and hopefully get a better signal on 129, but I'll expect the pixalition on our locals to return.

Phil

 

[BobaBird]

Which sat do my locals come from?

Since you already have them, tune your receiver to one of them, then go to Menu > 6 > 1 > Point Dish/Signal. That will give you the signal strength, satellite and transponder for any sat channel.

 

[Phils]

Thanks, Charles. I was wondering if that was the case. Actually, my wondering was when I'm "booting" up the 622 and it's "acquiring satelitte" through its five step program, if the sat and trans that showed was the one for the station that first appears (which would be the one that was on when we cut power to the 622). I've suspected that and what you say would confirm my suspicion. Since it's almost always on local channels when we power down, it's definately NOT sat 129 for our locals.

I mention that we power down the 622: we are 'off-grid' and use solar power so nothing stays on all night in order to preserve battery power. A couple of times a month I'll leave the 622 with power to get downloads but the rest of the time if we aren't watching TV then there's no power to any of the entertainment equipment.

Thanks for all the help.

Phil