Noob looking for advice.

[aneuryzm]

OK, so I just discovered FTA only 3 days ago, and have spent close to 4 hours a day since then reading this forum and some other helpful sites I have found. At this point I think I have a pretty basic understanding of things and would like to take this hobby up, I just need someone who really knows what they are doing to give me an 'ok' on my hardware choices, so I don't waste my $$$ on something that will be of no use.

(note had links to each item in this post, but had to remove them because of my noobish status here :/)

Receiver:
VisionDTV USB-Sat (StarBox)
cost: around $99
- I found Cascade's review on this, which did put my mind at ease a bit.

Dish:
FORTEC STAR FC100CM
100CM Ku Offset Dish Antenna
cost: around $99
- no reviews here that I could find.

LNB:
DUAL Output Universal KU LNBF
FORTEC STAR FSKU-2v
cost: around $40
- no reviews here that I could find.


So have a made any bad choices here? Would be grateful for any suggestions
or recommendations. I'm looking to stay in the $300 range or less to get started. Also in case someone needs to know, im located in Kentucky.


Thanks in advance for any help....

 

[dfergie]

Welcome to SatelliteGuys... One of the FTA staff or some of the very knowledgeable users/members will be along shortly to help you, again welcome to the site.

 

[goaliebob99]

For the lnbf I would go with the inavcom as its .03 DB.... Its currently the best LNB on the market and if you look on ebay you can get a decent price for it... You might also want to concider a blind scan recver like the Fortec Star life time ultra. It will help you find feeds that arent normally visable... also you might want to concider a motor after you bag a few sats and have them pointed right.. that will allow you to see the whole arch providing you have clear Line of sight to the whole arch. Welcome to satguys. dont be afraid to ask as were here to help!

 

[Mr Tony]

bob
Invacom is .3

.03 would haul ass if there was one

most LNB's are .5, .4 or .3

 

[aneuryzm]

thanks for the suggestions, will definatly look into a receiver that supports blind scanning & the lnbf with a lower noise figure.

 

[CharredPC]

Oooh, I SO want a .03dB lnb!

 

[sksatellite]

Oooh, I SO want a .03dB lnb!

Damn, if anyone can get a noise that low or almost no noise lnbf, who wanna to buy a blind scan receiver, this lnbf does it all with the basic setting DVB box.
.

 

[123tim]

Is it "Legal" to point someone (Aneuryzm) in the direction of a Seller on this forum? I really think that I got a really good deal on my system that is coming via FEDEX tomorrow. I never would have been able to make the choice without the help of the people of this forum.

 

[Mr Tony]

Is it "Legal" to point someone (Aneuryzm) in the direction of a Seller on this forum? .

sure you can. People have done it before

 

[123tim]

Thanks Iceberg.

Aneuryzm,

Well Sadoun (Link at top of page) has what I think is a really nice FTA system for around 300 dollars. It has a Fortec classic receiver with disecq, usals, ac3 bitstream output, and blind search. It also has a motor drive. You can upgrade the receiver for 15 dollars to a 36'' Fortec dish. They'll upgrade the motor drive to a STAB system for free. The cable seemed a lot cheaper than Radio Shack, so I got that too. I also got a power meter (Satellite finder) for 9 dollars.

It did take me about 7 phone calls to get the system shipped. I don't think that was a normal occurence though...The people all seemed courtious and helpful for the most part.

The system that I'm getting is the M-1 motorized classic blind search set:
http://www.sadoun.com/Sat/Order/Satellite-systems/Motorized-Systems.htm

Don't take my word for it though. Do some research.

I didn't know anything when I started looking for a receiver. The people on this forum have been a tremendous help and got me to where I am now. You can click on my username to trace all of the questions that I've asked, and see the answers that got me to where I am.

Good luck!

 

[Robbert]

123tim,

I recently also had an order placed with Sadoun on a Monday and my dish (ordered a 90cm dish, some cable and some misc. accessories), still hadn't shipped on Friday. Called 3 times that week. First they said it would ship the next day (Tuesday call), then on Thursday they said it would definitely ship that same day. Then on Friday when it still hadn't shipped, I called to cancel. Ended up buying the dish from dishexperts.net. Shipped out same day I ordered it, and arrived in good shape.

I bought my first system from Sadoun as well. They were quick to ship and I had everything in fairly quickly. However, the packaging for the dish was a little sub-par (have a small dent in the side of the dish, but doesn't appear to affect the signal).

They have always been courteous, also during my last dealings with them. But I see no reason why something that was ordered on a Monday (and is in stock, I checked), still hadn't shipped out on Friday... That is just bad!

 

[123tim]

Robert,

Thank you for the link to dishexperts. They seem to have pretty good prices.

Well, I got my system on time. (The seventh time ) I must say that I am really pleased with everything but the delay in shipping.
It wasn't really the delay, as much as the fact that Sadoun's sales staff each day said that the package would be shipped, when in fact, shipping had run out of 36" dishes.

They were though, (with one exception) very courteous and helpful. Like you, I thought that the packaging was a little sub-par, but it seemed to make it through ok. Everything was packaged individually in pretty strong boxes, so they might making out ok with that system.

On the positive side, the price was great, everything was as promised, and all of the product seems to be very high quality. I am used to buying all of my electronic components and hardware from Radio Shack, but the cable that I bought from Sandoun was half of Radio Shack's price and twice the quality!

Another thing that impressed me was the fact that the owner of the company (I think) answered one of my questions on this forum as I was deciding what to buy. He did this without trying to push his product. Also, a question that I emailed the company came back with an answer within 6 hours. That doesn't happen very often these days.

The Sandoun website also seems to have a good bit of FTA information (and Fortec setup instructions which the Fortec manual seems to be lacking).

All in all, I am pleased with Sandoun's. The delivery would have been well worth the wait if I had known why I was waiting. I would buy from them again, and would rate them a 9.9 on a scale of one to ten, minus one point for the "confusion" with the shipping.