Can a FTA receiver help me?

[mitchel taylor]

What is the smart card reader on the FTA receivers for? Can I insert my DirecTV LA access card in a FTA receiver to subscribe to DIRECTV Latin America? Can the viewsat 2000 extreme replace the DTV LA receiver? I ask the local dealers at DTV AL if it can be done, but they are not sure.
My reason for wanting to do this, DTV AL here only leases they equipment.
$420us. Say I am away after 3 months DTV will come for they equipment. I think u guys know how the leasing thing works.
I am in Guyana South America.
PS: if it can work the dealers here will activate the card with the FTA receiver so I can start subscribing.
Thanks for all of your support. Mitchel.

 

[techno935]

EDIT:


Go and buy yourself a fresh new DirecTV receiver from a store so you can avoid the leasing BS. That's the only legal advice I can give you. There are gold sponsors on this forum who MAY sell Direct TV receivers and MAY ship them to where you are. Good luck.

 

[Tron]

FTA receivers won't work on DirecTV (or vice versa), DTV uses a proprietary stream (non DVB) and everything is encrypted..

 

[rdel]

You may want to go up www.lyngsat.com and check out the satellite feeds, there are sats that cover that area. Look to the right as you scroll down the list and it will say BEAM click on that to see if Guyana is covered in the beam. Directtv and Dishnetwork are nag 2 encrypted. I only know of their own units that will work for their programming. ( I maybe wrong, check with Ice or PSB or one of the elder sat guys here ) You should be able to pick up some free tv of FTA there.
I tried to check the beam on g10r but their web page was down, you may want to try it later.
http://www.panamsat.com/global_network/galaxy10R_ku.asp
here is g10r sat which alot of us use for programming.
http://www.lyngsat.com/g10r.html
be sure to scroll down to the area which has 5 numbers. 4 numbers is c-band (large dish)
rdel
ps. if your into soccer then you will want gol tv, sat 119 FTA

 

[mastermesh]

Yep, a fta receiver won't help you...

FTA receiver won't help you with your subscription, but will let you access free to air signals that dish network left unencrypted... A

Here's a thread on what fta you can get with 18" dish, but you need an fta receiver to get these:

http://www.satelliteguys.us/showthread.php?t=34131

Other than that, you'd need a bigger than 18" dish to receive other fta channels, and a real directv receiver to receive directv subscription...

 

[Mr Tony]

a 18" dish won't work in Latin America. The beam doesn't go that far. There may be some signal but you would need a 6 foot dish to pick up the few free channels

 

[techno935]

I know your interests are getting DirectTV Latin America. I just checked Lyngsat, and wow, what a plethora of channels viewable in Brazil.

http://www.lyngsat.com/freetv/Brazil.html

Now, your in Guyana, no listing on Lyngsat for that area, but bordering you is Brazil and Venezuela. Here also is a list of free channels from Venezuela.

http://www.lyngsat.com/freetv/Venezuela.html

Plus, an entire list of free channels viewable from South America

http://www.lyngsat.com/freetv/South-America.html

You may not even need Direct TV with all those free channels. You can pick all these up on your Viewsat.

 

[dzinkin]

Unless I'm misreading something, this is the subscription satellite company that serves Guyana:

http://www.canalguyane.com/

Of course, if you're not into French channels -- as in from France, not merely French-language -- this won't do you much good. If you are, you get TF1, M6, Eurosport and a bunch of others.

Not sure if your Viewsat will do you much good as the site refers to a Mediasat (is that Thomson?) box, but I thought it was worth mentioning nonetheless.

 

[mitchel taylor]

I manage to locate a complete receiver and dish for DirectTV Latin America system from Venezuela (costing $300us) I will be picking it up tomorrow. The dish is 24" and it is an off set dish. the dealer said i should start at 30" up. i have a 1.2m prime focus with matching LNB <-- this LNB is universal
what if i take the LNB from the 24" dish and put it on my 1.2M dish will this make any difference or my 1.2m dish and universal LNB work with the DTV LA receiver together? Thanks to all you guys for your help.

 

[PSB]

Try it and see!

Many members have reported good results using LNB's designed for off set dish with a prime focus dish.

Universal LNB's use a L.O. of 9750-10600

(Standards use a L.O. of 10750)

Let us know your results!

 

[techno935]

You should be in good shape. Keep the viewsat, as you can still get free channels where you are. You will like the 1.2, it can be modded for C-band, so I hear. Check out cascade's thread. Pete (PSB) has a thread on it as well.

 

[mitchel taylor]

Ok I put everything together, the 24” dish with its matching LNB that came with the DTV LA receiver.
The signal I get from this setup is not so good. The highest signal is 65 and the lowest is 22.
I take the LNB from the 24” offset dish and put it on a 1.2m prime focus dish with no improvement. Comparing the two LNB, they have a lot of different between each other so I cut down one ring off the flange of the 24” LNB and my signal improved form 60th to 80th.
I was thinking if I cutoff the neck of the 1.2m LNB and fit it to the 24” LNB body, to used the flange of the 1.2m dish’s LNB.
Now my 1.2m dish will be seeing its own flange and my receiver will be working with it owns LNB it came with for optimum performance.
I get this idea from here http://www.satcure.co.uk/tech/lnb.htm