Dish TV. Can I just move our house receiver to the RV?

sorry wrong string..

Dutch_12078 wrote:

Which portable manually aimed dish you can use depends on which receiver you have. Dish and DTV multi-satellite, multi-LNB dishes are not interchangeable. As far as I know, all of the Dish and DTV receivers have a signal strength display of some sort for use in aiming, but I prefer using a separate meter right at the dish for that. My setup time for is usually less than 15 minutes, including setting up, anchoring, and leveling the tripod. But then I have had lots of practice, since we move around a lot. Heavily treed sites can be a challenge to find a usable "hole", but so far we've never had a site where I couldn't get a signal from one of the two Dish satellite arcs. There are a number of helpful dish aiming videos on YouTube.

Its just to much effort and cost to justify two weeks of use. I'll stick to rented and saved DVD movies etc.

Thanks for your vast knowledge on the subject Dutch..
This is looking more and more complicated with each post..
I think I'll check out what the other campers are doing when
I get back out there. That's usually a pretty good way of learning
what really works and what is available per your needs..

rerod wrote:

I can understand why full timers would buy a trav'ler or carryout. But for us working folks.. That's expensive for one or two weeks a year.

I'm not much for learning curves when I finally leave on my vacation. I read about a guy who through his dish into his neighbors camp spot after 2 hours of fiddling..
If there was a good write up on how to do this on the cheap, I would..

If I buy DISH or DirectTV for my home, is a 1000.5 dish and digital signal meter and the DishPointer Pro Android app for aiming the only additional hardware I need? Which system has aiming software built into the receiver?

Thanks!

Which portable manually aimed dish you can use depends on which receiver you have. Dish and DTV multi-satellite, multi-LNB dishes are not interchangeable. As far as I know, all of the Dish and DTV receivers have a signal strength display of some sort for use in aiming, but I prefer using a separate meter right at the dish for that. My setup time for is usually less than 15 minutes, including setting up, anchoring, and leveling the tripod. But then I have had lots of practice, since we move around a lot. Heavily treed sites can be a challenge to find a usable "hole", but so far we've never had a site where I couldn't get a signal from one of the two Dish satellite arcs. There are a number of helpful dish aiming videos on YouTube.

DesertMax wrote:
Well that explains why I had such a hard time getting lock when I myself tried the ladder trick. I'm going back to full timing in the fall and may just get the roof mounted spinning widget antenna!
These days I like to keep things as simple as can be and what you just explained sounds like a real pain in the behind..

Whether you can use a "spinning widget" roof mount dome or not depends on which receiver you want to use with which dome. The Dish Hopper series receivers for instance, will not work with any of the domes, only the roof mounted Trav'ler or a stand alone tripod mounted dual or triple LNB dish.

DesertMax wrote:
I'm going back to full timing in the fall and may just get the roof mounted spinning widget antenna!
These days I like to keep things as simple as can be and what you just explained sounds like a real pain in the behind..

I can understand why full timers would buy a trav'ler or carryout. But for us working folks.. That's expensive for one or two weeks a year.

I'm not much for learning curves when I finally leave on my vacation. I read about a guy who through his dish into his neighbors camp spot after 2 hours of fiddling..
If there was a good write up on how to do this on the cheap, I would..

If I buy DISH or DirectTV for my home, is a 1000.5 dish and digital signal meter and the DishPointer Pro Android app for aiming the only additional hardware I need? Which system has aiming software built into the receiver?

Thanks!

Well that explains why I had such a hard time getting lock when I myself tried the ladder trick. I'm going back to full timing in the fall and may just get the roof mounted spinning widget antenna!
These days I like to keep things as simple as can be and what you just explained sounds like a real pain in the behind..

DesertMax wrote:
Ah ok thanks for clearing that up. I never watch without my DTV DVR so if I grab a tripod, my current receiver and the dish and some coax I should be good to go then.. Cool! I once saw a TC with a dish mounted on the rear ladder with U-Bolts. I guess that would work as long as you park it correctly within reason...

Aiming a dish isn't quite that simple. If it's a single LNB dish, there's three settings to consider, once you determine the dish has a clear view of the desired satellite(s). 1. The mounting post, whether a tripod or ladder mount, must be very level. 2. The elevation must be accurately set for the location. 3. The azimuth (direction) must also be accurately set, usually by using a signal meter, either an independent one or one found in the receiver settings. For a multi-satellite, multi-LNB dish, there's an added step of setting the correct skew to align each LNB with its corresponding satellite. Once a signal is found, then the elevation can usually be "tweaked" a bit until the strongest signal level is found. With practice, it's not that difficult to do, but there is a learning curve.

Ah ok thanks for clearing that up. I never watch without my DTV DVR so if I grab a tripod, my current receiver and the dish and some coax I should be good to go then.. Cool! I once saw a TC with a dish mounted on the rear ladder with U-Bolts. I guess that would work as long as you park it correctly within reason...

The only reason for letting DTV or Dish know your current service location is so you can receive the local stations for that area. Other than that, neither the service provider nor the dish care where you are, nor can they detect where you are. Point the dish at the correct satellite(s) and you're watching TV.