Wow, did I mess up!

[MellowYBird]

I've been wanting to try DishFAMILY, so I turned my DISH at 110/119 realized I had a DISHPro Dual LNBF so I had to buy a DISHPro Twin LNBF. Added DishFAMILY programming via internet. Started receiving channels almost instantly. Canceled Sky Angel for now. This was Tuesday or Wednesday the 16th or 17th. Everything was going great, until this morning the 21st. I go to see what's on and I only have NASA and Angel One. (The two free channels, right?) I call DISH and logged on my account my balance of $17 is past due, plus I owe a $25 reactivation fee. I assumed I was going to be billed by mail.
After I tried DishFAMILY for awhile, I was considering another small DISH to receive Sky Angel with DishFAMILY before this morning, but now I'm going to be spending too much with all my reactivating to have anything! Now that I've screwed up, kinda miss Sky Angel, have 1 DISH antenna, 1 single receiver 2 LBNF's (one a dual one a twin) and NO service is there any other free channels I can receive? I don't know if I want to reactivate for DishFAMILY or Sky Angel. So for now I'm stuck with NASA and Angel One.

~MYB~

 

[adventistkid]

adventistkid

I've been wanting to try DishFAMILY, so I turned my DISH at 110/119 realized I had a DISHPro Dual LNBF so I had to buy a DISHPro Twin LNBF. Added DishFAMILY programming via internet. Started receiving channels almost instantly. Canceled Sky Angel for now. This was Tuesday or Wednesday the 16th or 17th. Everything was going great, until this morning the 21st. I go to see what's on and I only have NASA and Angel One. (The two free channels, right?) I call DISH and logged on my account my balance of $17 is past due, plus I owe a $25 reactivation fee. I assumed I was going to be billed by mail.
After I tried DishFAMILY for awhile, I was considering another small DISH to receive Sky Angel with DishFAMILY before this morning, but now I'm going to be spending too much with all my reactivating to have anything! Now that I've screwed up, kinda miss Sky Angel, have 1 DISH antenna, 1 single receiver 2 LBNF's (one a dual one a twin) and NO service is there any other free channels I can receive? I don't know if I want to reactivate for DishFAMILY or Sky Angel. So for now I'm stuck with NASA and Angel One.

~MYB~

hi mellowbird
this is adventistkid i to had dishnetwork and sky angel,did not like it ,i went toFREE TO AIR SATELLTE
SYTEM.those channels are free,what kind of prgramming do you like,pleasecheck out free to air
forum at satellite guys

 

[MellowYBird]

I went ahead and paid the $42 so I could try DishFAMILY a little longer. Good news, looks like I've got a credit of the $25 reactivate fee. So I'm at least back to where I started. (I got an email reply saying it looked like my account was disconnected by Sky Angel but I don't think that was the problem.)
I do miss a lot of the Sky Angel shows and Christian movies. I mostly do not like GTN anymore and I already have HLMK, HMC, FNC and HGTV blocked. Mostly because of content and content of commercials. I thought Sky Angel was Christian based and do not find some of the material to have Christian morals or values.
I'm noticing with DishFAMILY the content of programs have been okay so far. But some of the commercials are VERY disturbing. I want to be able to walk out of the room and not come back hearing about men's "private" parts problems and sizes, or women's personnel hygiene "solutions", or drugs for diseases that are only spread through sexual contact with multiple partners etc...
My only solution seems to be to go back to NO TV at all. I just want programming that is not immoral or indecent and no profanity or nudity.

 

[andrews777]

I can't see how you would like DishFamily if you don't like those SkyAngel channels.

Fox may have some commercials like you mention, but I don't recall seeing them on HGTV.

Brad

 

[MellowYBird]

That's just it. I don't think I'm going to like DishFAMILY either. I more or less expected this type of content from a secular company, but not Sky Angel. I just thought I'd give it a try since Sky Angel was changing so fast.
I must say if it wasn't for some of GTN new programming I would love Sky Angel. I hate to block the whole channel because of a couple shows. I wish the TV rating would show up in the program guide so I could just use the content block.
Is there a way to use the TV content rating without a V-Chip equipped TV?

~MYB~

 

[Mr Tony]

the receiver should have parental controls that allows you to edit the type of program

 

[MellowYBird]

My receiver lets me block by rating, but it only works if the rating is in the program guide, info, description.

Say a program comes on and has the TV rating PG-L, V, SC in the corner (which is great, most do have this), my settings don't do any good unless that rating was in the program guide- info, description.

Do you know what I mean?

~MYB~

 

[ShaneLinder]

Sounds like an FTA system with a dual LNBF to pick up IA5 and AMC4 would work well for you.

 

[kb7oeb]

You might also look into the signals you can pick up for free from digital over the air broadcasts. Digital TBN usually has 5 channels and pax has a 24/7 kids channel and you can usually pick up an extra PBS feed.

 

[RevJimbo]

I went ahead and paid the $42 so I could try DishFAMILY a little longer. Good news, looks like I've got a credit of the $25 reactivate fee. So I'm at least back to where I started. (I got an email reply saying it looked like my account was disconnected by Sky Angel but I don't think that was the problem.)
I do miss a lot of the Sky Angel shows and Christian movies. I mostly do not like GTN anymore and I already have HLMK, HMC, FNC and HGTV blocked. Mostly because of content and content of commercials. I thought Sky Angel was Christian based and do not find some of the material to have Christian morals or values.
I'm noticing with DishFAMILY the content of programs have been okay so far. But some of the commercials are VERY disturbing. I want to be able to walk out of the room and not come back hearing about men's "private" parts problems and sizes, or women's personnel hygiene "solutions", or drugs for diseases that are only spread through sexual contact with multiple partners etc...
My only solution seems to be to go back to NO TV at all. I just want programming that is not immoral or indecent and no profanity or nudity.

Let me see if I understand, MellowYBird: You object to most of Sky Angel, because of "content and content of commercials". Ok. I can live with that. But I can't understand why you would then try DISH Family! It has Fox News, Hallmark, and HMC (things you found offensive on Sky Angel), as well as TV Land and Nick at Nite!

You say you thought Sky Angel was Christian based. Let me tell you: it IS Christian based. Almost every morning, I listen to the most annointed Christian radio station I have ever heard - KSBJ - on Sky Angel. I often watch really good preachers on the Liberty Channel. I watch Way of the Master, which teaches me how to win souls. I watch Every Young Man's Battle, which teaches me how to resist sexual temptation. My 8 year old neice and I watch Superbook every weekday morning, which is teaching her the Bible. I could go on and on.

My point is, give this some more thought. If you want to have only Christian programs, then the way to do it is to have only a DVD/VCR player with a monitor (not a TV), and then rent / buy only those movies / shows which meet your standards. But if you don't want to be that radical, then I think Sky Angel is an excellent choice for TV / Radio in the home.

 

[lumpkin666]

To add to RevJimbo's post, if you are finding that the commercials have too much offensive content, maybe try purchasing/using a ReplayTV DVR (with commerical skip). Let it record all the programming that you want to watch, then just play it back with Commerical Skip enabled, and it will skip right past the commercials automatically.

 

[tiara builder]

something else to consider what I been using for the past few years is called the tv guardian which reads the closed caption of the content of programs being viewed ,and then just mutes the volume in the inappropriate areas .the timing of it is pretty close and it lets you know on screen when there is no closed caption.

 

[MellowYBird]

RevJimbo,
No I do not object to most of Sky Angel programming, just some of it. I just thought being a Christian satellite there wouldn't be anything at all immoral, offensive, indecent, etc...
I know it has a lot of good ministry, religion and teachings, but I thought the other programs and commercials would be more sophisticated and biblical, not so "worldly" and secular.
As for DishFAMILY, I had no idea what it would be like, just that everything was mostly G rated. I have the same channels blocked with DishFAMILY that I have blocked with Sky Angel and a couple more (TVLand, Nickelodeon, and a few more).
It's just frustrating trying to find an all around solution.
We had no TV at all for quite a few years and only watched tapes or DVD's but that gets old and there's only so many videos that are appropriate and trying to figure out which ones were and weren't was time consuming.

lumpkin666,
Does ReplayTV really skip commercials automatically? I've looked at it online, but never tried it. Can you purchase a ReplayTV DVR at a store or just online?
We tried TiVo for a very short time but had to skip commercials manually. Same as if you use a VCR and play back the tape.

tiara builder,
I have heard of TVGuardian our VCR and DVD player are both equipped with it, but I really haven't had to use it because we don't watch movies with profanity. But I guess that would help too.

Thanks for all the info.

~MYB~

 

[RevJimbo]

RevJimbo,
No I do not object to most of Sky Angel programming, just some of it. I just thought being a Christian satellite there wouldn't be anything at all immoral, offensive, indecent, etc...
I know it has a lot of good ministry, religion and teachings, but I thought the other programs and commercials would be more sophisticated and biblical, not so "worldly" and secular.
As for DishFAMILY, I had no idea what it would be like, just that everything was mostly G rated. I have the same channels blocked with DishFAMILY that I have blocked with Sky Angel and a couple more (TVLand, Nickelodeon, and a few more).
It's just frustrating trying to find an all around solution.
We had no TV at all for quite a few years and only watched tapes or DVD's but that gets old and there's only so many videos that are appropriate and trying to figure out which ones were and weren't was time consuming.

MellowYBird: Here are some places you can go for good Christian and patriotic movies:

https://www.visionvideo.com -- This is where many of the great movies / biographies shown on Faith TV come from.

http://www.wallbuilders.com -- They have lots of great stuff which shows the history of America from a Christian perspective - i.e., it doesn't leave out the Christian stuff.

http://www.christiancinema.com/dvdrental/default.php?isrc=retail_nav -- I've never used these people's services, so I can't say for sure, but it looks like you could rent some good stuff from them.

http://www.pluggedinonline.com/ -- A GREAT place to see what's in a movie, before letting your kids see it. Sponsored by Focus on the Family.

Good luck!

 

[lumpkin666]

MellowYBird - Sorry, I lost track of this thread. There are several models of ReplayTV, but the 5040 and 5080 models can be set to automatically skip commercials without pressing a button. There are other models that can do this, but these are the most popular.

There are still some in stores, but your best chance of picking one up these days is to watch eBay and buy one there since the ReplayTV company has stopped selling them through their outlet.