troubleshooting audio problems

[yusufg]

greetings.

i have this setup:
Mercury II Receiver
DG240 Motor
FS80P 31" 80cm Dish
cPanel® 0.4dBcPanel®
Universal wall mount

the system is wall mounted.
i have a verified the plumb of the mounting bracket.

lon: 118.3 w
lat: 33.9 n
zip code: 90250
my true south is 166 degrees.

my true south satellite is echostar7, 119 degrees.
i have locked on to and power scanned this satellite satisfactorily.

this set up is based on the good information supplied by this discussion groups of this board. thanks to all contributors!

i can receive signal on all satellites listed in the receiver that are on the universal lbnf from east to west and i am very sure i am on the satellite belt. my signal level is between 70 - 80%. my signal quality is between 50% to 75%.

in particular, galaxy 25 has 80% signal level and 70% signal quality depending upon the transponder.

the issue is that audio does not come in clearly. it sounds like a radio station that is out of tune or is just out of range.
the suggested dish elevation calculation is 35 minus the declination angel,which is about 5.51 degrees. this comes to about 29.5 degrees ~30 degrees. one thread recommended adding an additional degrees which brought me back to 35. this indeed did work because setting to ~30 degrees brought in no signal whatsoever.

so, i have been adjusting the dish elevation in very small steps above and below ~35 degrees until there is complete signal loss. in this adjustment process never is the signal clear. it's mostly clear or it drops out completely. but the video is awesome!

are there any steps i may have overlooked? are there any additional troubleshoot hints?
all suggestions are deeply appreciated.


regards,
yusuf

[pmb1010]

how are you getting the sound from receiver to tv?

Try using Coax cable (with TV on channel 3)

or

try S-video with RCA cables.
Try new RCA cables.
Pull left and/or right sound RCA cable to isolate one or the other.

I think there is optical output from Mercury II. Is that being used?
Is there a menu option to turn on the right output source for audio in the receiver's menus?

[rainman]

check the audio pids with those listed at lyngsat to see if they are the same if you are getting clear video sound should be ok. also are you using the optical(AC3) pass through or are you use the analog sound.

[yusufg]

thank you for your response.

i am feeding the satellite receiver into a home entertainment amplifier.
i will isolate the amp and go direct to the t.v. & see what happens.

[yusufg]

thank you for your response.

i picked a channel, 2m monde from morocco.

lynsat has this info:
frequency: 11991V
transponder: 15
spid: 705
video pid: 272
audio pid: 273

info from the receiver:
frequency: 11838/V/22031
video pid: 272
audio pid: 273
pcr pid: 272
sid: 705

the transponder frequencies do not match.
obviously i've still have an alignment problem. but what?
is it still an azimuth/elevation issue?

i've gone through the sadoun site repeatedly. i came across instructions on setting up a stationary dish and it spoke of twisting the lbnf in a particular direction. in the motorized instructions it says there is not need to twist the lbnf because the motor's morion while rotate the whole dish. however, the question that comes to mind is, how does one install the lbnf onto the dish in the first place. i could not find any particular instruction, so, i installed mines with the f-2 connector pointed down or at 6 o'clock. is this correct? i feel this installation is so close and i'm missing something very simple that it would make one say, "doh!"

[pmb1010]

I think your LNB is set to STD in the receiver settings, and it needs to be Universal (or vice versa)
Your frequency number is 150 off, typical of that problem.

What model of LNBF do you have?

[yusufg]

ok, i isolated the entertainment amp. the satellite receiver was feeding the amp with s-video & rca audio cables. as i said before the video was awesome and the audio bad.

i followed you suggestion, isolated the amp, ran brand new, tested rca cable directly to the t.v. and the video is washed out and the audio is still the same. it seems like the entertainment amp filters and sharpens the video.

so, going directly to the t.v. is worse for the vieo & the same for the audio.

btw, this receiver has a couple of games installed, tetris & push-push. even though they have a sound option, there is *no* sound from either game.

as for your reply at 4:13 pm my time, what was ordered was the cPanel® 0.4dBcPanel®. since i'm in troubleshooting mode, i've only enabled 2 satellites, 119.0°W EchoStar 7 [true south] and 97.0°W Galaxy 25. the galaxy 25 lnbf is set to universal and i get the strongest signals on that setting.



what if i have a standard lnbf? will i still be able to pick up galaxy 25?


with that line of though, here's what i did: i set the lnbf for galaxy 25 to lnb-10750. i did a power scan and locked on to more channels than with the universal setting. the test channel, m2 monde, now has the correct transponder frequency! however, the sound is still the same even though the pids are correct. bummer.



additionally, changing the lnbf setting to lnb-11250 returned channels but the transponder frequencies were greater than 12200.


so, my thinking is, i either have a mis-matched lnbf installed [there are no markings or tags] or i have a bad receiver or both. i've located someone who has a spare fortec classic receiver. i will see if i can eliminate my current receiver.


any other suggestions are always appreciated.



-y

[rainman]

go to the menu under TV setup and see if the SPDIF output is on or off if you are not using a optical cable for the audio turn this off. if you are running a optical audio cable make sure it is on.

[pmb1010]

Originally Posted by yusufg

what was ordered was the cPanel® 0.4dBcPanel®.

additionally, changing the lnbf setting to lnb-11250 returned channels but the transponder frequencies were greater than 12200.

OK on the LNBF link... the system here changes link items and I didnt know what a "cPanel" was.
It does sure seem as though you did get a standard lnbf as the frequecy now matchs what it should be...

And as far as changing to 11250, you cant do that. The setting must match the lnbf to work right, as you've found out.

I'm running out of ideas on the sound issue. Did you check for a menu option for sound in the reciever? Try another TV?

Sound issues (other than AC-3 sound problems from PBS stations) are just not that common of an issue for the time I've been around here. Maybe your box does have a bad sound output section.

Hopefully one of the other guys that hang around here have some ideas

[wejones]

Originally Posted by pmb1010

I think your LNB is set to STD in the receiver settings, and it needs to be Universal (or vice versa)
Your frequency number is 150 off, typical of that problem.

...

I think it's vice versa. Ie if it is a standard LNBF, 11991-10750=1241, and if the receiver is set for universal it will take that 1241 and add 10600, which will give 11841 .

Originally Posted by yusufg

ok, i isolated the entertainment amp. the satellite receiver was feeding the amp with s-video & rca audio cables. as i said before the video was awesome and the audio bad.

i followed you suggestion, isolated the amp, ran brand new, tested rca cable directly to the t.v. and the video is washed out and the audio is still the same. it seems like the entertainment amp filters and sharpens the video.

so, going directly to the t.v. is worse for the vieo & the same for the audio.

I know you answered this partially, but what "video output" setting are you using *in each case*, ie YPbPr or S-Video? And, which connection in the back are you using? And what type input on TV and home video setup. Ie strange things will happen to video if you use the S-video mode while connected as component, or if you use the component outputs going into a set with composite input, or it you use YPbPr with an S-video connection, etc.

Originally Posted by yusufg

btw, this receiver has a couple of games installed, tetris & push-push. even though they have a sound option, there is *no* sound from either game.

Ar you sure that you aren't using the component sound outputs thinking they are audio?

Originally Posted by yusufg

...

what if i have a standard lnbf? will i still be able to pick up galaxy 25?

Yes. And it is clear that you do have a standard lnbf.

Originally Posted by yusufg

with that line of though, here's what i did: i set the lnbf for galaxy 25 to lnb-10750. i did a power scan and locked on to more channels than with the universal setting. the test channel, m2 monde, now has the correct transponder frequency! however, the sound is still the same even though the pids are correct. bummer.



additionally, changing the lnbf setting to lnb-11250 returned channels but the transponder frequencies were greater than 12200.

First, the settings you use should always match your lnbf. Your lnbf is 10750, so any other setting is wrong. Second. If you are/were getting a good "quality" and good video, then your audio problem is between the receiver and your TV, and has nothing to do with aim of the dish, or lnbf settings (even though those will change the frequencies that the receiver thinks the signals are at). Either you have a malfunctioning receiver, or bad cables, or you have the settings wrong on the receiver, OR you are connecting the audio cables to the wrong ports, which is what I suspect. Ie this receiver has red/white/yellow composite ports right next to the YPbPr ports, and if you somehow have these crossed, then you are likely to get strange results.

Originally Posted by yusufg

so, my thinking is, i either have a mis-matched lnbf installed [there are no markings or tags] or i have a bad receiver or both. i've located someone who has a spare fortec classic receiver. i will see if i can eliminate my current receiver.

Again, your audio/video problems have nothing to do with the lnbf, other than the universal setting causing your freqs to be off.
Trading receivers might help to identify the source of the problem, however the Classic has different types of ports, and different setup menus, and I think your problem is in either the setup or how things are connected, so unless you are very careful with the setup, I'm not sure the results will be 100% certain.

Basically, however, as far as the receiver is concerned... if you can receive video well, then you should be receiving audio well, because both are coming from the same mux, provided that the PIDs are correct. So your problem is with respect to how the receiver delivers that audio to the TV or media center.

[yusufg]

greetings all!

just wanted to follow up on the state of this issue.

the last test conducted was with rca cables [yellow-red-white] connected in the correct jacks on the receiver directly to the t.v. as i said before, there was no sound and the composite video signal appeared washed out.

i got a hold of a fortec classic receiver, hooked it up, pointed it to galaxy 25 and there was sound.

i will request an rma from sadoun for repair.

this is a great place to discover all the overlooked steps and techniques.
my thanks to who have contributed to this issue and to the discussion group in general

kep up the great support.