Review of GEOSATpro 90cm dish and GEOSATpro SL2 bullet LNBF.

[hwm]

This is a test and review of the GEOSATpro 90cm dish from SatelliteAV.

The dish arrived via Fedex very well packaged in a heavy cardboard box with custom fitted cardboard inserts. Sturdy, and all recyclable materials.

The instructions are detailed and complete, taking up both sides of a standard sheet of paper. They were written by someone fluent in the English language, and knowledgable about the product and FTA satellite TV reception.

A J-pole mount with two support arms and a clamp-on collar are included. The support arms must be used with the J-pole mount to avoid disappointment. This is a large and somewhat heavy dish. The J-pole base bracket by itself will not hold it rigidly in alignment for long term service.

The mount may be assembled in three different configurations giving elevation from 0- 20, 20- 57, and 50- 90 degrees elevation. The 20- 57 degree configuration is what I used. The elevation degree scale read about 1 degree off the calculated true elevation for me.

All parts are sturdy and well finished, with smooth edges and a dark charcoal grey/black color. The fasteners are plated to resist corrosion, and are all SAE sizes. The entire dish can be assembled with a 7/16 wrench and a #2 Phillips screwdriver.

The effective aperture of the dish itself measures 91cm tall and 81cm wide. It incorporates a unique rolled edge that gives it incredible stiffness.

A circular bubble level insert is included to help level/plumb the mounting pole. It is very helpful and spot-on accurate when checked against a small magnetic machinist's level placed on the mount pole.

You can read the detailed technical specs and get the latest price at the SatelliteAV website.

I like this dish a lot, and recommend it highly.

The GEOSAT SL2 bullet Ku LNBF has a smaller built-in scalar than most other Ku LNBFs. This allows for mounting side by side down to 4 degree spacing between satellites. Performance does not suffer very much from the smaller scalar, and the signal level was way more than enough on all transponders tested with the 90cm dish.

Comparing it to the current best performer that I have, the JSC321s, I got the following Signal Quality readings:

Receiver Coolsat 6000 with latest true FTA firmware installed. Six feet of RG-6. No switches.
Dish: GEOSATpro 90cm
Satellite: G19 @ 97w
Weather: Light clouds.
Temperature 55 degrees F.

11836V Geosat - 73 JSC321 - 75
11873H Geosat - 72 JSC321 - 75
12152H Geosat - 72 JSC321 - 75
12113V Geosat - 70 JSC321 - 72

Results totaled and averaged:
Geosat - 71.75 JSC321 - 74.25

The GEOSATpro is a high quality LNBF with good signal quality output. It is very useful if you need to use multiple LNBFs on one dish to get closely spaced satellites. SatelliteAV sells a neat 4-degree twin LNBF mount specifically for it and their 90cm dish.

However, the JSC321 does beat it by a few signal quality points when tested.

It would be interesting to see how the GEOSAT bullet LNBF would do with a standard size scalar.

I was unable to post this to the review section. Moderators please move it there if desired.

 

[brentb636]

Nice review.. My Geosat Pro 90 arrived today, FEDEX, in excellent shape. It's mostly assembled, but sadly the pole mount won't fit the 2" pole that I sunk for it, so I will have to search about for an appropriate place to put it. I am most impressed by the obvious quality and heavy weight construction of this dish, and it's components. Compared with the 1.2M Fortec offset dish, it is built like a tank ! Pics will follow tomorrow, when I (hopefully) rig a temporary setup for the dish at my shed.

 

[SatelliteAV]

sadly the pole mount won't fit the 2" pole that I sunk for it

Drop a 1 5/8" OD pipe inside the 2" pole and weld or drill and place a few opposing bolts through the two poles.

 

[brentb636]

Good idea... I'm thinking that if I get a smaller pole, I'll put part of it in the 2" pipe, and part of it in bucket of concrete, for temporary playing in various locations.

 

[KE4EST]

Great Review, I may have to try one of those one day.

 

[Corrado]

Mine arrived Thursday in a snow storm and another big storm this weekend with massive power outages here put my project plans on hold until next weekend.

It's my first GEOSATpro dish and I'm also impressed with the high quality.

 

[honkj]

I got the GEOSATpro dish 90 in from fedex, i got it out of the box and it was a little warped, if you lie it face down on a flat floor, it wobbled..(it should not do that right? wobbled cattycorner). I stood it up and man-handled it a little and got the warp out of it as best i can.

anyone else see this? so while i like the price a lot, i think they should add a couple ribs to keep that from happening. I've not gotten a chance to install it yet.

 

[primestar31]

I got the GEOSATpro dish 90 in from fedex, i got it out of the box and it was a little warped, if you lie it face down on a flat floor, it wobbled..(it should not do that right? wobbled cattycorner). I stood it up and man-handled it a little and got the warp out of it as best i can.

anyone else see this? so while i like the price a lot, i think they should add a couple ribs to keep that from happening. I've not gotten a chance to install it yet.

Pick up the dish pan in your hands, (just the pan, do NOT mount any of the fittings to it yet!) and hold it in front of you with the dish face, facing you. Have one hand on each side edge towards the middle. THRUST the dish sharply away from you, (like throwing a beach ball) and then sharply PULL it back. You might have to do this several times, but if done right, the dish will POP back into it's natural shape.

That is the proper way to do it, NOT "man-handling" it!

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Yup Brain taught me that trick when I visited his California headquarters.

It really works!

 

[hwm]

"I got the GEOSATpro dish 90 in from fedex, i got it out of the box and it was a little warped, if you lie it face down on a flat floor, it wobbled..(it should not do that right? wobbled cattycorner). I stood it up and man-handled it a little and got the warp out of it as best i can."



I tested my dish when it arrived on the perfectly flat surface of my table saw. It was fine. This is a very stiff dish, much better than my WSI dish, or even my Winegards.

A floor is seldom perfectly flat enough for this kind of precise measurment. Mine sure aren't.

Please try stretching two strings across the face of your suspect dish at right angles to each other. They should barely touch -- no gap.

 

[honkj]

Pick up the dish pan in your hands, (just the pan, do NOT mount any of the fittings to it yet!) and hold it in front of you with the dish face, facing you. Have one hand on each side edge towards the middle. THRUST the dish sharply away from you, (like throwing a beach ball) and then sharply PULL it back. You might have to do this several times, but if done right, the dish will POP back into it's natural shape.

That is the proper way to do it, NOT "man-handling" it!

hi thanks for that, i just got my Geosatpro microHD in, found the manual on line, and it gave your same directions... so i'll try that.. i'll see if the strings touch, to see if i got it first...

I've got a quick question, but this looks like a review thread, so i'll try to find proper thread to ask a LNBF skew question, but not looking like i am finding one... i'll try some close thread.

honk j

 

[KE4EST]

Great Review, I may have to try one of those one day.

Well the day has come....And was very impressed with the packing and the DISH, very well built. I got me a new SL1PLL LNBF to test to, well testing is in progress now.

 

[honkj]

ok, my "man handling a little" the "90" from before appears to have accomplished the same thing, it just needed to be flexed a little and it goes back into place, i put the strings across and they touched correctly. so anyone getting a GeoSatPro 90 out of the box, eye ball it from the edge, if it is warped do the proceedure that "primestar31" described. it should flex back into place.