Dish to pick up the other 16 transponder at 72.5w?

[rocatman]

I doubt it. Look at what Directv ended up doing several years ago when they got the 3 transponders at the 110 orbital location from I believe was USSB.

They could have easily let the licenses expire, or worked out some sort of transponder swap with Dish, instead they went ahead and launched something to keep the licenses active and to not loose them to DISH Network.

Same thing will happen here, I wouldn't be surprised if they launched their new 3D HDTV service from this slot, or put something insigniciant up there just to keep the licenses active and not allow them to go to Dish.

16 Transponders could easily launch HD Locals in an additional 30 Cities, something which Directv does not want to see happen

DirecTV is paying significant lease fees for each TP so there is so incentive for them to release the TPs they aren't using. If Dish does get access to some additional TPs, I would think Dish would use these for CONUS programming.

 

[Jim S.]

If Dish does get access to some additional TPs, I would think Dish would use these for CONUS programming.

They don't have 16 transponders on 119/110 to mirror them.

 

[rocatman]

They don't have 16 transponders on 119/110 to mirror them.

Dish will when they start the Western Arc conversion to 8PSK then MPEG-4. It has been reported that the 8PSK conversion will start in 2010. This is needed for Dish to utilize the full spotbeam capabilty of the E-14 satellite scheduled to be launched in early March to 119 W. Moving more national programming to 72.7 W on Nimiq 5 will reduce the power demand on both the E-3 and E-12 satellites at 61.5 W which both have power related problems.

 

[nelson61]

Dish will when they start the Western Arc conversion to 8PSK then MPEG-4. It has been reported that the 8PSK conversion will start in 2010. This is needed for Dish to utilize the full spotbeam capabilty of the E-14 satellite scheduled to be launched in early March to 119 W. Moving more national programming to 72.7 W on Nimiq 5 will reduce the power demand on both the E-3 and E-12 satellites at 61.5 W which both have power related problems.

Going to take a pile of new customer antenna installs if they do that.

 

[stardust3]

There is still a huge number of Directv customers who are receiving locals from 72.5. That alone presents an enormous undertaking for Directv to provide upgrades for those people. It will be expensive & time consuming.

 

[Mr Tony]

There is still a huge number of Directv customers who are receiving locals from 72.5. That alone presents an enormous undertaking for Directv to provide upgrades for those people. It will be expensive & time consuming.

D* has been updating folks to the slimline 3 LNB (99/101/103) for a while now in those markets. I doubt there are many folks left

 

[photoman76]

Looks like Dish Network has taken over transponders 6, 16, 22, 28 and 32 from Directv. I assume these are now coming from Nimiq 5.

 

[Fitzie]

Looks like Dish Network has taken over transponders 6, 16, 22, 28 and 32 from Directv. I assume these are now coming from Nimiq 5.

I checked the uplink report a few minutes ago and noted those TPs were shown with test HD channels. Also checked on my receiver to see if I was showing activity on those TPs, which I am. I believe your assumption must be correct!

This is a positive step.

Fitzie

 

[Fitzie]

As I recall, Charlie said in his last chat there would be 12 or 13 additional HD channels available by (or before) the next Charlie Chat (early March), and more HD added a couple of months after the next sat launch. This might be the first step in that process, with part of the capacity used for local HD stations that have been hung up on capacity issues. If that is correct, more HD channels could come any day now, with testing and uplinking on the new TPs completed as quickly as possible.

Fitzie

 

[photoman76]

TSReader shows no channels on those transponders at this time.