What Receiving Equipment?

[JohnAd]

Now that things seem to be firming up and there will be some kind of HDTV broadcasts soon could somebody clarify what would be needed to get these signals. Since I probably plan to get the sat signal into a HTPC I'm particularly intersted in what sort of dish etc I would need.

Do you need a big motorised dish to get Astra 19E? How big is big, etc.

Cheers

John

[ReTrO]

Originally posted by JohnAd
Do you need a big motorised dish to get Astra 19E? How big is big, etc.

And could I stick it on a pole in my garden if my parents/the council won't let me put it on the roof?

Link for PC based receiver card:

Technisat Digital

[rogeralpine]

Although I have a HCPC for my pj, it ain't going to be fast enough by the sounds of it to process the HDTV data stream. (PIII500 Rad 7200......) Therefore, the quickest and easiest way would be to buy the HDTV set-top box. Can anyone explain what the the downsides of this route may be please?

[Chris Muriel]

The box you want does not exist.
The USA ones would be incompatible with their modulation system
etc. (ACT system).

I find it ok with a 2GHz P4, 512MB RAM, Radeon8500LE 128 MB VGA.
Admittedly after a couple of hours a reboot is required !
But YMMV depending on your own system, what else is running, the OS and other quirks.

Chris Muriel, Manchester.

[rogeralpine]

Chris - I thought that was the case, I presume one is on the cards though, no? If not, I presume I'm left with upgrading my PC? (I'd prefer that route to be honest anyway - just it may turn out a little more costly)

[jamesrich]

Can I use a Haupaige WinTV DVB-S. It's the one with the hardware mpeg decoder on it, or would i need to bypass this decoder and use software instead.

[Chris Muriel]

It's unlikely (IMO) that the hardware dedode will work - it will probably choke and stutter almost immediately - but do try it first !

Has anyone written 3rd party s/ware for the HP card that you have? If such exists and it can use an Elecard s/ware codec, then you have a chance - if your PC is half reasonable (I would say very minimum 1.5GHz CPU and 512 Meg RAM + 64M VGA card but YMMV).
I know ProgDVB can use an Elecard codec.
Let us know how you get on.
There is also an occasional WM9 stream on Euro1080 (at 4 Mbps or so) on PID1521 ; I have a Transport Stream Reader so I can tell when this is active. I haven't found anyone who has managed to extract/decode this yet (but haven't spent much time on it myself either). It appears to use a network ID of 228.0.0.84 if you want to try this (you'll also need Microsoft's Windows Media ( of course).


Chris Muriel, Manchester.

[ReTrO]

Chris

Do you have a list of cards that will work?
Also what size/type of dish is required?

Thanks

[Gordon @ Convergent AV]

19.2E is where Astra is sin't it Chris? That was old location of analogue Sky broadcasts wasn't it. If so I guess the old 80cm analogue dishes and 60cm dishes should be fine no?

Gordon

[ReTrO]

In which ase if they was ok, then would a current Sky stylee mini-dish and standard digital LNB work?

[Chris Muriel]

An old $ky analogue dish will be fine. A $ky digital LNB will also be fine - as will any so-called "universal LNB".
Yes, Gordon, it's at the old Sky analog orbital position of 19.2 degrees east.
2 PC cards that definitely work (as I have used them both this week) are Broadlogic BL2030 and Twinhan VP-1020.
The VP1020 is also sold under names in Europe. The manual I have says "VisionPlus VP-DTV" and is in German & English (although I purchased mine from the USA).
Broadlogic cards are normally only found on USA Ebay - but some sellers will ship to UK. Prices vary between $25- $50 (sometimes more when bidders get carried away). The BL cards are sometimes sold as network cards or modems ; they are designed as datacards for internet via satellite and install as network cards in Windoze Device Manager. They will also get the free push internet receive-only service from sat@once - http://once.csp.it/ after some tweaking of network settings and registry (unofficially & not supported but I have helped 3 other EU users get it to work).

Don't forget that the current 2 sets of transmissions (HDNET on 43W and EURO1080 on Astra) will likely vanish after IBC finishes
(end of next week) ; I would expect there to be more , especially from Euro1080, in the future though.

Anyone suceeeded with a Skystar or Skystar2 card yet ?
In theory they should work if one uses the Elecard codec.
(I don't have one of these myself but they are readily available over here).

Chris Muriel, Manchester.

[Muf]

The "Technical page" on the Euro 1080 site, which has been empty up to now has been filled in.
Promise of special set top box available before launch date.

Jim

[JohnAd]

Chris

Thanks for your answers, I'm still not sure I fully understand the whole dish thing though and am wondering if the following would be possible. I think this is what I want but I'm not sure if it's possible.

60cm Dish with universal quad LNB.
Motorised mount with three memories (????) one for Sky Digital, and two for the other satellites.
One dual coax link from LNB to Home Cinema room (To sat card)
One dual coax link from LNB to Living room (Probably to standard Sky Box but allow for Sky+ in the future)
Control of mount from Living room

Does this sound right?

Is this sort of set-up sufficently standard that I just call up some local bloke out of the yellow pages or would this require a specialist install. Also any indication as to what I should expect to pay? I'm guessing a few hundered.

Cheers

John

P.S. What' IBC?

[Chris Muriel]

IBC is the International Broadcasting Convention (in Amsterdam).

A proper installer (someone who has been at the game for more than 3 years) should not find the setup you describe too daunting.
I am not sure what you mean by "dual coax link" but yes you can run separate coaxes from each output of a quad universal LNB and mount the LNB on a 60 cms dish (a 90 cms offset dish would be better).
Whatever is controlling the dish will need feeding to your motorised mount.
You really should ask for more advice on this in the Digital Satellite TV and Cable forum (under the A/V hardware groupings).

Chris Muriel, Manchester.

[JohnAd]

Chris

Thanks again for your help. By "Dual coax link" I think I meant the twin core coax cable that I think gets used for sky+ installs.

Cheers

John