Pathway X2 Owners

By now, I would consider myself a bit of a grizzled veteran on the gamut of satellite TV options. Until recently, we were exclusively DirecTv. Dome, stationary, tripod, SWM...I've used them all. I even experimented with my own portable Trav'ler attached to a rolling sawbuck for portable HD but it was just way too big and bulky to be practical. This prompted us to add Dish last year and with that came our intro to the X2. As far as signal acquisition, it's takes about the same amount of time for X2 vs the old SD Carryout to lock in. I do find that Dish is much more succeptible to weather related signal loss vs DirecTv regardless of the type of dish used. I also can't get a Dish signal with the X2 at our hunting camp due to surrounding trees in a southerly direction and the low angle to the horizon even if I put it on the roof. Meanwhile, our DTV SWM pulls in a signal just fine mounted on a 5' pole. Even though I own some very expensive meters (DTV AIM and Sat Buddy) which allow me to set up any dish I choose very quickly, I prefer the ease and convenience of the domes. We are now running two X2's on the TT so the DW doesn't have to watch my sports channels and she can have full freedom of channel choice on "her" tv in the bedroom. We keep the DirecTv account solely for hunting camp now. The X2 is definitely the cream of the crop for portable automatic HD signal.

We had a Tailgater that died. Stone cold dead. So rather than futz around we got the newest mostest bestest, an X2. And it was.

Fast forward a few years and not using it one summer. It turned out to be a bit balky. After chunking out the mud daubers tubes in the bottom it worked again. The sequence was to dig out the mud, hose out the area with tuner cleaner and then hose it out with silicon spray. That worked; it doesn't make grinding sounds any more.

A couple of months ago we got quite a few "no signal" error messages while the satelites were quite clearly right there with no trees in the way. I cleaned up the connections and made sure they were tight but still the errors occured. So I used a different coax and those errors completely disappeared. The offending coax appeared to be fine but wasn't. That's happened a couple of times over the years.

It's a nice durable unit. All it needs is a self-defense system against dogs. A nice little tazer maybe.

The X2 is the only portable antenna with a full sized 18" reflector inside. This is the same size as the older single LNB antenna first put out by Dish and DirecTV. The multiple satellite setups required larger dishes but since the X2 simply switches between satellites you can get full signal from the 1 satellite it is pointed toward at that time.

In the antenna world, at those frequencies, without extremely expensive electonics, bigger is always better when it comes to antennae and/or reflector. The X2 is the largest of the portables as far as I know.

I have the X2 and it has performed flawlessly. I can also attest to it physical strength after a Ram 2500 drove over it while he was backing his trailer in, took a licking and continues ticking. Slightly dented, but works fine.

Haven't really been out in storms with it, but I have no fear it will perform as well as any if not better, INHO.

Paul

johnhicks wrote:
I routinely see 40-50. Of course rain wipes it out. For us getting each arc often means TV vs No TV and an unhappy DW.

I've found that occasionally a cable may look ok but replacing it will clear up signal loss problems.

This what I'm looking for to make my decision, my Tailgater has never had that kind of signals, the Playmaker really impressed me but it doesn't have the eastern arc.

Denny

I routinely see 40-50. Of course rain wipes it out. For us getting each arc often means TV vs No TV and an unhappy DW.

I've found that occasionally a cable may look ok but replacing it will clear up signal loss problems.

Do you have a way to check the voltage at the tailgater low voltage can cause weak signal.

Second Chance wrote:
48 locked on to 129 transponder 23 (CNN HD) right now. Keep in mind that the portable antennas require high-quality quad-shield coax since they are transmitting programming signal as well as control voltage and signal(s) on the same coax. We had issues until I upgraded all the coax.

Rob

I checked that transponder and got 25 but it is cloudy today, will have to wait a couple of days for clear skies down here in Texas. I checked the trailer coax the other day by connecting directly to the reciever and got tne same signal strength.

What I'm really looking for is something that will bring in the weaker transponders, I played with a new Dish Playmaker by Winegard and was impressed by the signal strength over the Tailgater. But I like the bigger dish and the eastern arc discussion abilitythat the X2 has.

Denny

The above post is not correct. The domes (all the domes) work just fine with standard RG6 coax. "Maybe" if you were trying to run 100 or more feet of coax a quad shield coax would be helpful.

48 locked on to 129 transponder 23 (CNN HD) right now. Keep in mind that the portable antennas require high-quality quad-shield coax since they are transmitting programming signal as well as control voltage and signal(s) on the same coax. We had issues until I upgraded all the coax.

Rob