Subscription Radio Channels with FTA RX?

[mbarnes]

THIS IS NOT HACK TALK! Please don't delete.
I presently don't have any fta stuff up, but I need some fast answers.

On AMC3 C band on TP 17 at 4043 are a variety of Christian radio feeds. (http://www.lyngsat.com/amc3.html) Some of these are subscription channels. The three that I am involved with are SMA, SMB, and SMC from the Salem Music Network. Stations who subscribe to those feeds are using Wegener Unity 4000 receivers which are permissioned to receive those channels.

What I want to know is, with a normal FTA receiver, can you receive these channels? We are trying to determine if the lockout is a function of the command string in the DVB carrier, or some type of descrambling code that is provided to the receiver. The manufacturer of our control software and the receivers is unable to tell us how this works.

If any of you have the time (and have C-band), would you mind swinging over to AMC3 at 87 degrees and look at transponder 17 to see if you can get these channels?

Thanks so much for your help.

 

[turbosat]

Michael> I scanned AMC3 for you, I came up with a ton of radio channels on that transponder, it lists 30. I never saw that many radio channels on one transp before, the screen where it usually will say
"Encrypted=Nagra" or something similar is not showing anything, so I have to say its
not scrambled. There's alot of religious stuff on some of those channels, some have nothing on them right now. Comes out as 4043 Horiz 7140SR, 1/2FEC, APid 102, V8192.
Nobody is doing any station ID so I cant say where they are, some have spanish language on right or left , in stereo I get both english and sp on a few.. Dont listen to much radio so Im not real swift with sat radio.. Hope this helps

 

[Mr Tony]

Mike Kohl posted them on his site (www.global-cm.net). He would only post them if they were FTA

H-4043 1107 1/2 07.140 Religious Radio Feeds: Channels below confirmed Previous numbers listed
8191 0261 Audio: Info Radio Net Audio 11
8191 0700 Audio: Audio 03
8191 1000 Audio: Audio 05
8191 1276 Audio: Moody Bible Radio 1 Audio 13
8191 1286 Audio: Audio 04
8191 1553 Audio: Focus On The Family Radio Network 1 Audio 07
8191 1746 Audio: Moody Bible Radio 2 Audio 14
8191 2592 Audio: Salem Radio Network 4 Audio 18
8191 2593 Audio: Audio 19
8191 3719 Audio: Salem Radio Network B
8191 4019 Audio: Ambassador 2 Audio 02
8191 4368 Audio: Focus On The Family Radio Network 3 Audio 09
8191 4617 Audio: Audio 10
8191 4737 Audio: Audio 15
8191 4972 Audio: Salem Radio Network 2 Audio 16
8191 5029 Audio: Salem Radio Network 3 Audio 17
8191 5069 Audio: Audio 06
8191 5181 Audio: Ambassador 1 Audio 01
8191 5587 Audio: Salem Radio Network C
8191 6139 Audio: Focus On The Family Radio Network 2
8191 6189 Audio: Audio 08
8191 7249 Audio: Salem Radio Network A Audio 20
8191 8000 Audio: (Left channel) Audio 12

turbo...dont know if you can match the PIDS up to verify

 

[techno935]

No sweat Mbarnes. We have a Unity 4000 receiver at work for our religious station as well. There is a site DEDICATED to DVB radio for most of the Christian broadcasts.

http://www.crtech.org/ and also check out http://www.dvb-radio.net/


There, you will find lots of useful info on ANYTHING and EVERYTHING involving these broadcasts. I don't believe any of those channels should be scrambled either.

 

[DiscoLoveGrapes]

Some of them might be scrambled from what I remember. I work for one of the guys up on that TP as well (Skylight) and I know that we've scrambled one of our secondary feeds in the past - although I'm pretty sure our primary is not.

If it helps, I know we've controlled individual station's access from our end in the past. IIRC, some of those unauthorized receivers will go silent after 10 minutes (but I think authorizing for those with a U4K is a simple formality). If you need some help, check out those sites techno mentioned - and if you're with a station broadcasting up there you might be able to get on their CRTech listserv and ask questions (our techs are brilliant) ....but don't quote me on that.

 

[turbosat]

What a wealth of information, that should answer all the OP's questions! This forum
has the widest range of experienced people I've seen.
oh yeah, ice>my ultra gives the figure 8192 for anything it doesnt immed see, as in
ac-3 channels sometimes, and for any radio channel is always V8192 lol. I learned something with that test though-30 radio channels on one freq, pretty cool.

 

[mattb]

Ive worked with Christian radio before in the past,

I think the reason Michael is asking is if you use a Unity receiver and try to tune into those channels SMA SMB and SMC they will go slient after a few mins if your not authorized to receive the programming, skylight does the same thing now (they always have with skylight 1 but do with skylight 2 now.) the stations unity receiver has to be authorized to receive the programming from those channels.

I unfortually dont have a Cband dish or FTA receiver to test this.

The 3 channels that he is asking about have 3 different formats of Christian music on them.

 

[techno935]

That would suck if a station decided "hey, lets take Skylight" without knowing the authorization process. Flip on Skylight, go home, driving and hearing your station go dead.

 

[mattb]

That would suck if a station decided "hey, lets take Skylight" without knowing the authorization process. Flip on Skylight, go home, driving and hearing your station go dead.

When a station wants to carry a networks programming they have to sign an agreement usually so a station would not willingly be cut off from skylight's programming or salem's or anyone elses for that matter if they had a legit contract to use it... if a station had an agreement with say skylight they would not have their receiver blanked after 10 mins, same with the stations that carry salem's todays' Christian music -- their recvs are authorized for it so they can "flip the bird on" and leave... and rest assured the programming will be there.

 

[mbarnes]

Thanks everyone for your answers. It has been very helpful. While I'm pretty good with most of the DVB stuff, the permissioning was a bit of a grey area. Even the manufacturer was unable to answer the question that you guys handled quickly.
BTW, for those who mentioned CRTech, thanks for the plug. I am one of the co-founders of the CRTech list. If you look at the archives or past messages, sort them by author and look for Michael. That would be me.
Regarding the comments about a lot of religious programming. That particular DVB feed on TP17/4043 has some 35 or so channels for the Christian Radio consortium or CRC. Hence the whole thing is Christian programming. Other than possibly the Moody channel you will not hear any station IDs as these are feed channels. Local radio stations take the programs and air them on their own schedule. Almost everything there is free to use. There are a few of the feeds which require registration with the provider to get your receiver authorized for it. Some channels, like Salem A, Salem B, and Salem C are subscription channels, which you actually have to pay for to use.
The thing that I was unable to find out was how the permissioning took place. For example, if you do not have a subscription for Dish Network and you use an FTA receiver, you will not see their programming. My question being similar, if you do not have a subscription to Salem A and you try to listen to it with an FTA receiver, would you hear anything or would it be blocked? From the answers, it appears that you can hear it just fine. That would mean that the Compel control commands only tell a Unity 4000 (FWIW, I was the one who coined the term U4K) receiver whether it can or cannot listen to a specific channel. Otherwise, the channel is not scrambled and should be receivable by any non-U4K (or other Compel controlled) receiver.
With eleven channels, I happen to be the biggest user in the CRC group. I also have two full time and one part time channel on the ABC Starguide system on AMC1.

Even us 'experts' need some help now and again.

Thanks again everybody.

 

[mattb]

Michael,

One would think that the CRC channels could be uplink/ encoded in a way that you could block them from FTA. I would think the Unity 4000 (u4k) could handle it. Fox used to use the U4k with video capabilties at one point for FSN programming to some cable providers so I would suspect it has the ability to do some form of encryption unless the u4k's for the CRC have that portion left out of firmware.

You would think the folks at the microspace uplink would have an idea.

 

[mbarnes]

Michael,

One would think that the CRC channels could be uplink/ encoded in a way that you could block them from FTA. I would think the Unity 4000 (u4k) could handle it. Fox used to use the U4k with video capabilties at one point for FSN programming to some cable providers so I would suspect it has the ability to do some form of encryption unless the u4k's for the CRC have that portion left out of firmware.

You would think the folks at the microspace uplink would have an idea.

It's actually quite amazing what is known and what is assumed. This is normally an extremely busy field, and you often only get detail on what you need to. Otherwise, you have a box with an input and an output and it works. Internal encoding and other tricks are not important knowledge to keep things going. What management wants to know is, "Can we get the signal to our users?" and "Can we limit some signals to only subscribed users?". The sales people will say, "Yes, you can authorize or de-authorize our receivers as needed." Nobody even thinks of some one with an FTA receiver listening in. A lot depends on the program content. The CRC is in a unique position compared to most broadcasters or content distributors. The majority of the content is free anyhow. The goal, after all, is to spread the Gospel to every one and get the widest possible dissemination. So, actually, to meet that objective, we, the CRC, for the most part don't really care if you can pick these up. In fact most of our program providers are happy for the increased audience. Of course the vendor tells management that this is an exclusive system and only works with their equipment. Management typically takes that at face value and assumes that means no one without a properly authorized receiver can get the subscription channels. But it still leaves a few unknowns, hence my original questions.

We got some former Fox receivers. IIRC, they either had an option module or an external box to deal with the scrambled video.