Snowy Picture

[mjgsat]

I've had a Dish 500 with a 3900 receiver for many years now and just recently the picture has started to come in snowy at times. The signal strength is always close to 125 for both satellites (110 & 119) but the picture would show different degrees of snow throughout the course of an evening - from very snowy to a little to none at all and then back again. I've replaced the cables all the way to the Dish cable that comes into the house and still encounter these problems. I was just wondering if the switch (SW21) or the LNBs could cause such a problem? Should I try to replace the cables all the way to the LNBs?

 

[KE4EST]

If you are getting snow it is not your dish etc. Try changing the 5-6 ft cable from your receiver to tv, if that don't do it, it may be the tv.

 

[mjgsat]

I did replace the cable from the receiver to the TV and also tried it on another TV and still have the same problems. The only cables left to replace are the ones outside on the switch and the LNBs.

 

[KE4EST]

Have you hooked up another tv in same location just to see if the same problem exits?....I would try that.

 

[mjgsat]

I did that too. I took the TV out of bedroom and swapped it with the one in the living room that is hooked up to the satellite receiver. Same problem....

 

[Foxbat]

I'm assuming you're seeing the snowy picture on all channels. If you bring up the Program Guide, is the Guide snowy as well, or just the small picture in the Guide? If the EPG is snowy, that would point to an issue with the RF modulator in the 3900. To eliminate the RF modulator in the 3900, can you use an A/V hookup (three RCA cables: Red, White, and Yellow) to hook up your 3900 receiver to the TV?

If the snowy channels are limited to your Locals via Dish, it could be a problem with Dish's terrestrial receivers that pick up your local TV stations and send them to Dish. What is your TV Market Area?

With satellite, if the signal from the dish to the receiver is bad you don't get snow; you'll either get nothing (satellite loss-of-signal error message) or you might see some "blocky" images from time-to-time, but not snow.

 

[dfergie]

Moved to Dishnet forum Welcome to SatelliteGuys!

 

[Van]

Receivers can cause a snowy picture if they start going bad, I know of two diferent customers and with receivers both legacy and dishpro that have produced snowy pictures. One receiver was found to be heat damaged from sitting in a small enclosed cabinet with a hand towel between the top of it and the vcr that sat ontop of it. The other customers receiver had been subjected to multiple brown outs and black outs over a 3 year period and was damaged as it wasnt on any kind of electrical protection.

 

[retiredTech]

If Your TV has Audio/Video inputs, use the A/V out of the receiver to the A/V in of the TV. In this way you won't be using your TVs tuner or the receiver RF modulator.

 

[seamike]

I also had snow show up in the picture after years of good reception, finally traced the problem to water getting inside the cable on the outside cable of the house to the dish , once water gets up the cable and starts causing snow you have to replace the outside cable and make sure the conections are sealed properly, the people that had orginally installed my dish and cable never did seal it properly and that caused the problems with the snowy picture I started getting 4 or 5 years later. Hope that helps

Michael

 

[Van]

All his cables were replaced already, water in the lines wont cause snow but will cause pixeling and eventual signal loss and potential damage to the receiver if it travels up the line to the receiver.

 

[mjgsat]

I just switched to the A/V cables and I can see a big difference in the picture quality. I will monitor this to make sure it continues.

Does this mean that my RF out from the receiver is bad? If so, is it worth replacing?

 

[retiredTech]

I perfer A/V over RF for quality. Audio/S-Video is even better, if your TV has an S-Video input. IF not A/V is much better than RF.

 

[jrallen]

I move a 3900 box from one location to another sometimes when I travel. The dish where I take the box is in a fixed location. This last weekend when I hooked up the box I had a snowy picture. I tried a new cable from the dish to the receiver and also a new cable from the receiver to the tv. Neither helped the problem. The signal strength is running around 95. To see if it could be the tv I hooked up an outside tv antenna to the tv and the picture was crystal clear. I brought the receiver home and hooked it up to the dish we use at our house and the picture was clear. Could the problem be in the dish itself at the second location?