129 Has No Spotbeams! Ok? :)

[M Sparks]

Don't we have a FAQ or something? Why are there so many threads with so much misinformation and misconceptions about HD locals?

Echo X at 110 will be the home of most to all HD locals. It's loaded with spots. It was designed for HD locals. DISH is not going to waste a bunch of leased CONUS beams at 129 with HD locals. We are in a temporary holding pattern right now, that's all.

Now 61.5 is the wild card- there's a bunch of spots there too. But 129 is NOT going to be the resting place for most HD locals. Period.

Just trying to educate

 

[lakebum431]

I just hope Atlanta HD Locals get off 129. I'll take 110. 119, 61.5, Anything but 129 as it is TOO HARD TO SEE.

 

[mike123abc]

The confusion at 129 is that the current satellite is CONUS only, but a new satellite is being built that is spot beam. The full story behind the new satellite is not known. It is being built for Canadian DBS, but E* has a deal to use some of the capacity for the US. It is unknow if the capacity will be spot beam or CONUS that dish will have access to and/or what mix of spot/conus.

 

[BCH]

I just hope Atlanta HD Locals get off 129. I'll take 110. 119, 61.5, Anything but 129 as it is TOO HARD TO SEE.

AMEN to that! I turned my 61.5 dish in an attempt to see 129 and the results were dismal. There are just too many trees in this area and a 28.7 elevation is going to be quite restrictive to many dish customers. I have looked for alternate locations to place the dish and as my dad use to say "it just ain't gonna happen".

 

[Stargazer]

That would make good sense to get a spotbeam satellite to 129 to widen their offerings of HD locals. I wonder if they will ever put spotbeams at 119 eventually as well. I am thinking they will not since their is where their conus offerings are at and the will need more conus space to have the basics in HD.

 

[Pepper]

There are already several spotbeams at 119.

 

[TNGTony]

That would make good sense to get a spotbeam satellite to 129 to widen their offerings of HD locals. I wonder if they will ever put spotbeams at 119 eventually as well. I am thinking they will not since their is where their conus offerings are at and the will need more conus space to have the basics in HD.

Stargazer,

You may have forgotten that Echostar 7 at 119° has 25 spot beams right now. Transponders 1, 3, 5, 7 and 9 are spot beams, each is used in 5 different spots. See http://ekb.dbstalk.com/297

Echostar 8 at 110° is a "twin" satellite with 5 spot beams on each transponder 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10.

Now my question is if Dish might move E*8 to 119° to have a total of 50 spot beams in combo with E*7 and all the AT120 programming shoved into the 11 remainig transponders. Right now the answer is no. E*8 will be used for Conus tps at 110 and E*6 will be in orbit backup.

See ya
Tony

 

[M Sparks]

The confusion at 129 is that the current satellite is CONUS only, but a new satellite is being built that is spot beam. The full story behind the new satellite is not known. It is being built for Canadian DBS, but E* has a deal to use some of the capacity for the US. It is unknow if the capacity will be spot beam or CONUS that dish will have access to and/or what mix of spot/conus.

Interesting...this is the first I've heard of this.

However, it doesn't change the fact that many people don't seem to understand Echo X or 129. I don't know why I care, but I'm going nuts with all the statements and questions like "All HD locals will be at 129" or "Are the LA HD locals on spotbeams?"

 

[RVD420]

The confusion at 129 is that the current satellite is CONUS only, but a new satellite is being built that is spot beam. The full story behind the new satellite is not known. It is being built for Canadian DBS, but E* has a deal to use some of the capacity for the US. It is unknow if the capacity will be spot beam or CONUS that dish will have access to and/or what mix of spot/conus.

I really wonder about the configuration of the bird being built for Ceil at 129.
I would think that the best configuration for everyone involved would be to have the some of the Spot Beams serve the Southern US. this way Ceil could re-use those TPs for Spots serving Canada, as well as Conus Beams.

Dish is guaranteed 16 TPs at 129 after Ceil gets it's bird up there.

 

[Stargazer]

I should have said "MORE" spotbeams at 119 instead of spotbeams at 119. If they had spotbeams for FSS could they get away with a smaller dish?

 

[wied]

What satellite is at 129?

 

[BFG]

Echo 5

 

[wied]

Then it used to be at 119. I had good signal strength from it at 119. So why when it moved to 129 did the signal strength go down?

 

[BFG]

It hasn't been used at 119 for a while, it's power is significantly less then when it was launched.

Also it had a footprint for 119, so shifting it to 129 has altered that