*C: signal on 1 receiver but not other

[doddles]

Hi all,

First time posting here. I would very much appreciate any advice with my problem, so thanks in advance.

I have had a *C subscription for a while now, with 2 DSR205 receivers and a quad LNB elliptical dish. Recently my signal quality went down due to a growing tree so I decided to move the dish. When I did that, I had all sorts of problems, and to cut a long story short, ended up resetting one of my receivers.

Now I have 1 reset receiver on channel 284 (receiver A), and one non-reset receiver on channel 299 (receiver B). The signal meter shows about 65, with an SNR of +8.2 on receiver B, but I can't watch any channels. And receiver A has a signal strength of only 15 (SNR of -3.0). Whichever way I point the dish, I seem not to be able to get a signal of more than 15 on receiver A.

So, any idea what might be going on?

1. why can't I watch any channels on receiver B when it has such a good signal?
2. Why is the signal on receiver A channel 284 so bad when receiver B shows good signal on channel 299?

I have brand new RG6 cables from the dish to both receivers.

Once again, thanks for any ideas or suggestions!

 

[Mr Tony]

you might need a rehit from StarChoice. Since you did the master reset (to get back to 284) it may need the signal sent back to the box

swap recievers and see if you get signal on the other spot. If so, then it sounds like a bad cable

 

[doddles]

Tried a rehit, but it didn't work (the trip counter stayed at 0). When I double checked my new dish alignment, it seemed a little low and too far north, so now I'm thinking I might have been on the wrong satellite - is that possible, and still see +8.2 on the diagnostic C screen?

All my cables are brand new, so I doubt that's the problem, but I'll double check.

Thanks for your response!

 

[Mr Tony]

If you get +8.2 on Diagonstic C it sounds like the dish is aimed right.

Can you see 299 on the "virgin" receievr (the one you reset)?

 

[doddles]

Nope - wouldn't let me change to that channel, which isn't surprising I guess, since I couldn't get any signal on 284.

Now I'm starting to worry that I have a defective LNB or something. How can I test that - are there some diagnostics I can run/look at?

 

[Mr Tony]

then something isnt aimed right. Reason is once the receiver acknowledges signal for 5 minutes 284 goes away and 299 pops up.

Did you try different ports on the LNB?

 

[doddles]

Yep - tried different ports, but made no difference.

Just to clarify:

On the receiver that wasn't reset, I can go to 299 and get good signal, but the trip counter didn't change when *C hit it.

On the receiver that was reset, I cannot get any signal above 15 (or non-negative value on diag. C) on channel 284, and cannot change to ch 299.

 

[Mr Tony]

Where are you located? This sounds goofy but want to make sure the numbers are right (elevation/azimuth/skew)

 

[doddles]

Madison, WI. I don't have the numbers here at work, but from memory (I was checking them this morning), I have elevation about 36.5, asimuth 207 and skew 105.

 

[Mr Tony]

you're not too far from me (Mpls)

For Mad Town I get the following

35.7 elevation
210.2 azimuth
112 skew

so the numbers are a little off which might be way its not working right.

 

[doddles]

mmm - ok. I'll try making some adjustments tonight and see how it goes. Thanks.

 

[doddles]

I got my problems resolved, with some very helpful advice from Mike at Global Communications. Seems the dish was pointing at one satellite, but the receiver thought it was pointed at the other one. Hence although I could get a signal on ch299, it wasn't producing a picture. And since I was pointed at only one satellite, I wasn't quite right to pick up both signals.

With this insight, I was able to reorient my dish and get both satellites.

Thanks for your help Iceberg - seems you were right about my aim being a little off.

Tom

 

[Mr Tony]

cool. Glad it worked out for ya