I am confused

[zebra2955]

New to this forum.
Which provider is *D* and which is *E* and why?

 

[rcdallas]

D* is DirecTV and E* is EchoStar (DISH NETWORK) - as far as why, just a abbreviated form.

 

[kstuart]

The asterisk symbol is a "star" (in fact that is the root of the word "asterisk").

SO, when the 90's craze of trying to type the least number of letters occurred, people decided to abbreviate EchoStar as "E Star" or visually " E* ".

Since DirecTV starts with a "D", then someone started to call it " D* ", as in E* and D*.

Anyone who was interested in who did this and when could search the archives of "rec.video.satellite.dbs" newsgroup. Probably 1997.

 

[webbydude]

Yes,it is an abbreviation.

"...in the beginning..." (LOL) there was Primestar and Echostar. Just to abbreviate things, people used the E* and P* tags. Just for the sake of consistency, D* was added when Direct came around (and pretty much gobbled up most of the Primestar refugees).

 

[kstuart]

... even though, logically, it should have been DTV instead of D* ...

 

[KE4EST]

I hope these guys have answered your question, and

Welcome to SatelliteGuys

 

[Pepper]

Do you remember A* (AlphaStar)? coz I don't.

 

[Cyclone]

So for all this time I had thought that D* was the DeathStar. Don't I feel dumb?

Still, whenever anyone posts "DTV" short for DirecTV, someone will follow up within minutes to point out that DTV is short for Digital TV (ie ATSC OTA terrestrial broadcasts).

 

[zebra2955]

Thanks for the insight