DigiWave 7200s Need Help

[FX77]

I have a DigiWave 7200s with the 33" dish and LNB I also got the sat finder.

I'm in Ontario Canada and I'm trying to get ANY dish at this rate, I spent all day saturday trying to get SOMTHING. With no avail. I did notice there are some pre programed sats in the reciver but couldnt get any of them. When I do have a sat, and I hook the reciver to it, I notice the signal strength is 70 and is never steady, its up and down at random. If I try to "Scan Sat for channels" I get no PROGRAMING FOUND.

My LNB is 0.5 (digiwave) and the firmware in the reciver is ver 303 (if I recall correctly)

My goal is to try and get some North American Sats and or a Russian one as they seem to have most FTA channels (inlaws are russian so I'm trying to bring in some channels for them)

Also, I wonder just how good these sat finders are. Seems it will give me a signal if i point it straight up into the sky....or if I but my hand between the LNB and dish. Is it possible my LNB is fubar? How can I tell if I have a bad LNB ?

Anyhow would really like to get some help resolving this.

Thanks kindly

 

[W_Tracy_Parnell]

Don't know anything about your receiver, but if you get it going Russia Today is a good channel on IA5.

 

[Tron]

LNBF is NOT the problem 99.999 percent of the time. As far as the signal strength meter, it is better to use a small TV and your receiver at the dish site to align your dish. The receiver's meter is far more accurate (the cheaper handheld meters don't show weak signals very well)...

 

[simulated]

I agree with Tron, that cheap satfinder will be drounded out by the DBS satellites at 91w, left to IA5 at 97w, and 101w at the right making it pritty much useless. Bring a tv outside

 

[jayelem]

Sorry guys but I had success with the satfinder after giving up on using the onscreen menu quality meter, not for IA-5 specifically since I was trying to hit IA-8 on a motorized setup, after I had a bird locked in, PSB's offset diagram made a whole lot of sense because I was overshooting all sats by thinking my lnb's arm angle was in relation to true inclination, not the case.

After having success sometimes we forget why we had problems setting up in the 1st place, for me it was a couple different things, Inclination and not having a Live TP properly setup in the menu, just that combination alone can lead to alot of frustration not to mention winter weather on a sloped roof in Jan-Feb.

I'm sure FX 77 would be happy pulling in anything in at the moment, with some time and effort he'll eventually hit other birds.

FX 77 is your setup motorized and do you know your true south yet ?
Skew I believe is also important here.
When you are a newb FTA seems so Foreign, I'm still learning..... Thanks Guys.

 

[FX77]

Hey Guys thanks for all the feedback!

I was talking to a friend of mine and he said it could be my Transponder, and if its not set right I wont get squat. But how do I know what transponder to use on what bird? I've been going to the lyangsat site but its not much help in that deprtment.

Also, when I gave up on the sat finder, I did run extention cords outside to a 23" tv and my reciver and used it to try and lock but I find that my Singnal is never much the 70% and the Quality meter is always 50 or less. Also is there a site where I can find my LAT and LONG ?

So far I havent been able to hit ANY birds to get a signal, as I said before, when I goto "scan" the sat for channels I get squat.

A friend is coming over tonight to give me a hand, so i hope we can get somthing!

I currently have the sat screwed down to the picnic table out side so I can keep testing with it till i get somthing.

The only thing I DONT like about this 33" dish from DigiWave is the LNB holder, its plastic and rocks to the left and right abit. I did my best to try and line it up dead centre.

I tell ya way back in the early 90's when the folks had a Cband sat, I had way less problems.

Oh and one other thing, is it possible to set the DigiWave so I can just SEE what comming down to the reciver, kinda like a visual to see if I'm getting somthing rather then just relying on the signal meter? So far, all it does is boot up and its always in the setup menus. Or Do I have to lock and pull down some chans first?

 

[FX77]

Jaylem

My setup is just one LNB not motor (yet) I wasnt going to drop alot of cash on the equipment until I got my hands on it to test with etc. I'm currently just using a Compass to get my directional bearings, then tiliting the sat up/down left/right. As I said, I lost faith in the sat finder as I can point it right up or down at the ground and get a very strong signal (and yes I trim the sesitivity as I go) so with it acting like that I've lost confidence in using it.

Right now I'm just running the reciver and tv outside as I mentioned in my post above.

I've yet to find my TRUE SOUTH as you mentioned, as I'm still trying to figure out how to get my accurate Lat/Long and all that fun stuff.

Also I find the meter in the reciver never seems to just lock/sit on a signal level. It tends to sit at a level for a few seconds or so, then jump up then down then back again etc. So as you can see, I'm not feeling very confident in the quality/accuracy of the reciver meter either

If I can just get somthing, so I know that its really working to some degree I'll be much happier!

Any suggestions to birds I should shoot for that are high in the North American Sky? The Higher the better as I have tall trees in my surroundings.

Thanks

 

[PSB]

The below link should help you work out your Lat and Long.

http://www.satelliteguys.us/showthread.php?t=55285

 

[FX77]

Hi PSB,

Sorry, I did noticed you had that link/Post in the FAQ after the fact! D'oh!

 

[FX77]

Ok, well I really think its the LNB that is an issue. My friend came over and we hooked up his PanSat and had the same problem. 70-74 Signal Strength and no quality no matter where we pointed the dish, at a bird or at the ground the signal was always the same.

So, he is going to bring my reciver to his house and try it on his dish that is setup to see if he can get a real signal and quality reading.

At this rate I'll be a pro and know just about every problem that can go wrong! =] But hey, what better way to learn then by having problems to fix eh!?!

 

[scottc98]

if you really think its your LNB, bring it over to your friends house and put it on his dish. Then it would rule it out (still possible that your dish is misaligned)

 

[FX77]

Well what I did was let my friend take my reciver home. He was able to get 4 FTA channels from ECHO 119. But it found out was our ANTENNA setting, I was always setting it to 1 (this is logical) but he set it to 2 and it was working! Why the heck dont they tell you this...and why wouldnt ANTENNA 1 work as I only have one Dish/LNB ?

Its that kinda thing that puts serious kinks in NOOBIE armour! =]

I got the reciver back but I have to hook it up and test this out on my reciver. I expect it to work fine now but hey, Murphys law has a tendancy to show up at my door step way too often!