Building A KU

[Dan Wilson]

Someone on here had mentioned taking an older DISH and making it into a KU man receiver someone explain the steps to do this I'd like to add that to my system set up I need a NBC and that's at LEAST one way to get one all the rest are outta reach....plus get some f the subs

 

[MrPogi]

I would NOT recommend an old Dish/DirecTV dish. It's just too small. The only thing that does work is a DirecTV "Slimline", and only for the stronger feeds.

 

[Dan Wilson]

Mr P your have experience with Ku? What all do u need to get started after u posted the above post I went to several locations on the web that sold Ku....tell me I use to have a C Band is this simular?

 

[n2rj]

Best thing to get apart from a proper FTA dish is an old primestar dish if you can find one.

 

[Dan Wilson]

primestar ? never heard of it I'll search EBay now the LNB should be.....LOL yeah I'm scalping ya'll cause I'm cheap/broke anyway but Im' looking here at a Master List of Ku I found......

Your telling me they have room for all this up there and I don't see ONE standard.........I'm not even sure why the US doesn't promote this more as an option............all the networks and subs shoul locate to this...and shoot up and expanded but where JUST the locals where

 

[n2rj]

Primestar is now defunct.

Primestar was one of the earlier DBS providers in the late 90s, owned by the cable companies. They had one bird at 110. They were sold to DirecTV and DirecTV converted everyone over to their platform. Dish eventually got most of the 110 slot. There was also USSB, also acquired by DirecTV.

 

[n2rj]

I also believe you can use the prime star LNB

 

[nbound-au]

The most common Ku LNBs, at least in this neck of the woods, are 10600 (mainly) and 11300 (10.6Ghz and 11.3Ghz) LO (Local Oscillator) types. Depending on the satellite, you may need a certain LO to receive a certain channel.

For the LNB to work, the transmission frequency (generally ~11-12Ghz) minus the LO frequency, must be in a range the tuner can accept (generally 950-2150Mhz).

I would not recommend aligning a dish without proper equipment.

 

[Dan Wilson]

sooo I found a site on this other site that had a "master list" of all the Sats and Channels for KU....and suddenly I'm wondering WHY u would want one....yeah I'm funny like that I originally though just TONS of the Networks where on here...apparently not I only see like two NBC and PBS the rest are variety religious or spanish etc.....or am I seeing this wrong.......

 

[nbound-au]

Things are on many different sats... Were you after anything specifically?

 

[MrPogi]

sooo I found a site on this other site that had a "master list" of all the Sats and Channels for KU....and suddenly I'm wondering WHY u would want one....yeah I'm funny like that I originally though just TONS of the Networks where on here...apparently not I only see like two NBC and PBS the rest are variety religious or spanish etc.....or am I seeing this wrong.......

There is a lot up there, but - don't expect too much. It's not like the old free-for-all days of C-band, most of the "good stuff" is now encrypted. FTA is more of a hobbyist thing nowadays. Now, if you can have a C-band dish, it opens up a lot more possibilities, but it's still no "free cable package". There's a lot of totally useless stuff - TONS of religious propaganda and lots of foreign language programming. However, if something you want is available on FTA that you can't get any other way, it's worth the investment of a few hundred dollars. My wife watches a network that would cost us $25 a month to get from Comcast or DirecTV - on top of what they charge for a "base" package. At that rate, I can recover my cost in less than 8 months. Then it's all free...

In many countries, and in places where it's hundreds of miles from the nearest TV transmitters, Ku band is a lot more common than it is in the USA:

 

[n2rj]

FTA is popular among ethnic communities. I saw a FTA dish on a Croatian church in NYC. I think it was Croatian anyway.

 

[Dan Wilson]

yeah see after taking a cCLOSER look here I only really see PBS and NBC as the Majors that are on here.....what's up with that see the Network should embrace this ....I think I'm gonna end up passing after making such a issue of it