Can't get G10R 123

[wdiddy]

I am in Surrey BC which is close to Vancouver. I have a 30 inch dish with HH90 rotor and viewsat extreme. I am trying to get FTA channels and I have 4 questions:

(1) I pointed my dish at approximately 162 degrees for true south using compass. At this starting postion I think I should be able to get Galaxy 10R 123 as my longitude for where I live is 123.1 correct?

(2)When I use USALS to get AMC4 101 it picks it up fine, strength about 75. I am able to get other sats too like Intelesat and others. When I use USALS to get G10R it gives me E*119 at about 76 signal strength, when I try using disecq to move a bit west the signal goes down to about 70 and channel scan picks up nothing. How many seconds approximately is it to get from 119 to 123?

(3)Does anyone know where I can get more info on the viewsat extreme IRD. I have no idea what I should be doing with regard to freq, transponder etc. when blind scanning.

(4)Right now I leave the lnb at standard and leave everything else as is and then I do blind scan for FTA channels, is this right?

If there is a sticky or file that explains all this please just direct me to it, I have spent about 12 hours now trying to get this up and running. I'd appreciate any help.

[brentb636]

Originally Posted by wdiddy

I am in Surrey BC which is close to Vancouver. I have a 30 inch dish with HH90 rotor and viewsat extreme. I am trying to get FTA channels and I have 4 questions:

(1) I pointed my dish at approximately 162 degrees for true south using compass. At this starting postion I think I should be able to get Galaxy 10R 123 as my longitude for where I live is 123.1 correct?

(2)When I use USALS to get AMC4 101 it picks it up fine, strength about 75. I am able to get other sats too like Intelesat and others. When I use USALS to get G10R it gives me E*119 at about 76 signal strength, when I try using disecq to move a bit west the signal goes down to about 70 and channel scan picks up nothing. How many seconds approximately is it to get from 119 to 123?

(3)Does anyone know where I can get more info on the viewsat extreme IRD. I have no idea what I should be doing with regard to freq, transponder etc. when blind scanning.

(4)Right now I leave the lnb at standard and leave everything else as is and then I do blind scan for FTA channels, is this right?

If there is a sticky or file that explains all this please just direct me to it, I have spent about 12 hours now trying to get this up and running. I'd appreciate any help.

Your lnb settings should be the same as AMC 4. If that is the case, you can't be picking up echostar at 119W because it's a circular polarity bird. You might be hitting echostar at 121W ( it is a linear bird ). Looking fo G10R, set your default transponder to 11800V SR 26657, rather than 11720V . 11720V is a notoriously hard to acquire transponder, and it will give you fits. 11800V is more powerful and easier to acquire.

Once you have a decent quality signal on G10R, transponder 11800V , THEN set up your FTA blindscan of the bird. I can't see blindscanning without any confidence that you're actually aimed at something.

[elgemcdlf]

If your longitude is 123 then G10R is the sat you should be lining up on as your true south sat as your beginning step in your motor alignment. I am not familiar with Viewsat receivers so I can not help there as far as settings are concerned.

We should most likely start with basics. What is your latitude and longitude? What type of lnbf do your have?

[boroda1]

Another strong TP is 11805 H 4580 (put "0" before 4580): it's University of Washington channel.
I agree with elgemcdlf in that the 123 G10R should be your starting point.
However, if you are getting other satellites, scan them and see the channels:
they may be wrong satellites, and you will figure out your error.
Yesterday, I tried to point dish (with no motor) at 97W T5, and when some signal came in, I scanned it and it happened to be Azteca TV from 93W.
It was easy then to move then 4º to the West and raise an elevation a bit.

[radiobob]

The only blind-scan parameters you have to set on the Viewsat Xtreme are:
*In what increments you want the receiver to tune (i.e., 5 MHz, 7 MHz, 16 MHz, etc.) and...
*Do you want to scan horizontal, vertical, or both polarity transponders?

Now, I admit that I'm a little confused about what difference 5 MHz steps would be from 6 MHz steps when you're dealing with a 54 MHz-wide transponder. I e-mailed Viewsat's tech support and asked them that (among other questions), but have received no reply.

Also, I have noticed that the highly-touted Viewsat Xtreme hardware-based blind scan can sometimes miss even very strong and very well-known transponders; it'll just step right past 'em. Go figure.

But, anyway, to blind search...from the Antenna Setup screen, just hit F2; the prompt will ask you for what frequency steps you want to scan in (choose your poison), and what polarities (use "all"). It will step through the various frequencies--from way below to way above where most activity occurs. If you get any hits, they'll pop up in the TV and/or radio boxes at the top just the way they do when you do a satellite scan (F1) of the pre-programmed transponders. Of course, it goes without saying (but I'll say it anyway), just make sure your antenna is actually pointed where it should be before blind scanning.

I've found that I get much better results by hand-entering transponders via the remote using info from Lyngsat.com and other sources. It can be a pain in the neck to load in the data for 35 transponders one digit at a time, but the payoff is worth it.

G10R has some very strong signals and some puny ones. As others told me (as my hair fell out in clumps from the frustration), "hang in there"!

If I ever hear back from Viewsat, I'll send you a message with what I've learned.

Regards,
Bob

[wejones]

Originally Posted by radiobob

The only blind-scan parameters you have to set on the Viewsat Xtreme are:
*In what increments you want the receiver to tune (i.e., 5 MHz, 7 MHz, 20 MHz, etc.) and...
*Do you want to scan horizontal, vertical, or both polarity transponders?

Now, I admit that I'm a little confused about what difference 5 MHz steps would be from 6 MHz steps when you're dealing with a 54 MHz-wide transponder.

Not sure why the 54 MHz is a factor? My question is how the manage to find 2 MHz wide signals when they are only checking every 5 MHz. My Ultra is even wider, ie the narrow search is every 8 Mhz, yet it can find signals 2 Mhz wide. Perhaps it has some kind of AFC that goes into action at each step so it's actually searching through the whole band represented by each step.
My ultra has three search modes, one where it finds signals less than 7.5 MHz wide, ie the 8 MHz step, and another mode where it finds wide signals greater than 7.5 MHz wide. I can't remember what the step value is in that mode, probably 20 or 25 MHz. It also has an "ALL" mode, where it's supposed to find both wide and narrow, but I've found that it will miss transponders in that mode. I'm not sure exactly what it is doing in that mode.
I guess the odd thing about YOUR receiver, is that 5 and 7 are so close together, there wouldn't be much difference. Although I guess 7 would be a bit faster than 5.

[radiobob]

Originally Posted by wejones

Not sure why the 54 MHz is a factor?

It's not, really. Other than, as you say, perhaps speed of search: I'm just saying that the difference between a 5 meg step and a 6 meg step when you've got to cover that much real estate isn't worth fretting about. Assuming, of course, that they both can resolve signals in a similar fashion.

And, by the way, the Viewsat offers the choice of 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, or 16 MHz steps. It would be interesting to find out what each of these steps can resolve (can 5 really do 2 MHz? can 8 MHz? and, how far does, say, the 11 MHz step swing?). I'm probably missing something, but I don't quite see the utility of having all these incremental choices.

Nah, 54 MHz itself isn't a factor, but having a dozen ways to swim across that pond is, if nothing else, interesting.

[wdiddy]

thanks everyone, I did finally get some of G10 123 last night, haven't done full scan yet though. At least I know what it means when it asks for "steps" now thanks to you guys. I was able to get the University of Washington channel and a couple others, then I went to bed.