Satalite vs Antenna TV

I had cable before changing to satellite. Satellite can go out because of rain or snow but no more often than my cable service went down for unknown reasons.

Satellite outages can be a result of antenna size. I have a Winegard Carryout portable satellite antenna and a Winegard Roadtrip installed on our RV. Satellite DirecTV signal is weaker in the northwest. My installed Roadtrip antenna looses a signal when we have a heavy rain in the northwest but my larger Carryout portable antenna can pick up a signal in the rain.

A portable dish similar to a dish mounted on a house picks up a good signal, even in Canada, but a manual antenna can take time to aim at a satellite to find a signal.

RV automatic satellite dishes make locking onto a signal easy.

If you live in the southern part of the US the Winegard Roadtrip will work but if you live north you may want a satellite antenna with a larger dish.

Safe travels. JD

Sorry for the delay in responding, but we had "issues" here. Thanks to all that gave your advice and help. I believe I like the idea of switching to sat (Dish) for the house w/an antenna system, and then getting a 2nd box and portable antenna for the RV, with the ability to turn on/turn off the 2nd box. That sound the best to me.

Thanks again for all of your help and suggestions.

GGeorge

TechWriter wrote:

GGeorge wrote:
My local cable company is always running an ad about cable being better than satalite TV because of the continuous availability of service vs cloud cover and the blockage of the satalite beam to your tv. Is this still a really big problem?

Cable TV can have that same problem as it uses sat dishes too:

Except the large dishes the cable services use are almost immune to rain fade. Back when we had a 12' C-band dish, the only time we lost the signal was when snow build up got deep enough to attenuate the signal. As soon as we remotely flipped the dish over to dump the excess snow, the signal came right back. The big fixed dishes are subject to seasonal solar blackouts though. The cable companies usually post a notice when it's due.

GGeorge wrote:
My local cable company is always running an ad about cable being better than satalite TV because of the continuous availability of service vs cloud cover and the blockage of the satalite beam to your tv. Is this still a really big problem?

Cable TV can have that same problem as it uses sat dishes too:

I have had both. I had cable for 20 years and have had satellite TV for the last 3 years. I have had about 2 outages per year for a short period of time (less than 10 minutes) with the satellite TV. I love being able to use the same satellite subscription at home that I do on the road. I have Dish.

Trick I learned from Bill.Satellite is that if I have rain fade (rare) I can switch to the SD (Standard Definition) channel and almost always get the program.

I've had Dish Network since about 1991. I think I could count the times I've lost signal on my fingers. Maybe a few more but not many. Dish service has been 10 times better than cable.

I have had directv for quite a long time. I used the cube at first and it was before much HD. You do not get the reception from the small portables you get on a roof top. Love my Winnegard automatic. Rarely to I lose signal and then only HD. I take the Genie DVR and one of the drones with me when we travel. DTV is very cooperative. I recommend them. I like TV for recreation including a lot of sports so the investment is worth it to me. We also like to record our programs for obvious reasons.

GGeorge wrote:
My local cable company is always running an ad about cable being better than satalite TV because of the continuous availability of service vs cloud cover and the blockage of the satalite beam to your tv. Is this still a really big problem?

I am considering dumping the cable and moving to direct or dish with a mobile antenna which will be in use all the time while on the road or at home, by changing the antenna feed from RV to house.

Does anyone else do this? Any problems?

Thanks, in advance

GGeorge

If what you are hoping to do is be able to use satellite TV in your RV, the most practical and affordable option is to also have satellite TV in your home. When you travel you simply remove a receiver from the house and install it in the RV. If you keep cable you will have to pay for it for all 12 months (most likely) plus pay for satellite TV when you are in the RV.
Dish or DirecTV is highly subjective and works better or worse depending upon the type of RV antenna you plan to buy and what kind of receiver you want to use. The cheap end of the scale you could likely have a good manual ground mounted antenna for about $200 all the way up to having a Trav'ler installed on the roof for around $2000.

First: Satellite TV is there for nearly all the USA, oh there are a few spots where due to a mountain you won't see the sats. And if you are in a dense enough Forest you can't see the sky.. Well, again it won't work.. But ... Expensive

Cable TV, Many RV parks have it, Many more do not Some charge.

Over the Air: MOST of the us has that, though it may be very limited (one or two stations in some places I park short term)

Where I am now, thanks to the improved Batwing (+ wingman +Sensar Pro) I'm watching TV from about 50 miles out AS I TYPE.. Now I do pick up some shows off cable as well (I have a Rube Goldburg TV system that lets me record day or night, automatically selecting CABLE or OTA via an adapter)

Side note: ANTENNA TV.. Is the name of a sub-tier network,, Good programs (One of the RETRO, Show I'm watching now is ME-TV, also COMET, and THIS, and a couple other tier 2's are my favorite networks,,, and hard to find on sat/cable systems)

Recently we had a bit of weather come through near here.. A small little storm named Matthew,, Perhaps you heard of it.. I am THREE MILES from the mandatory evacuation path.

We lost power
We lost cable
We lost internet (I had to drive 3 miles to the line of demarcation to send E-mails to people who needed to read them)

But the Antenna.. Kept right on working.. No loss of signal,, Batteries and inverters kept the DVR's working (Of course the cable only shows were lost), and the Generator recharged the batteries during the day.

The cheapest I can get Sat TV is around 70/month.. But ... WHY?