Sattelite Dish Recommendations???

Do you like TV? Is it something you plan to watch daily and for more than an hour or 2 per day? Did you want to watch TV even if it's raining? If you said yes to any of these then $300 is not going to do it! Unfortunately, the answer is the Winegard Trav'ler and you are going to need to spend upward of $2000. It's worth it, however!

Holy moly! I assumed the 300 dollar 9nes were sufficient

Bill.Satellite wrote:
Do you like TV? Is it something you plan to watch daily and for more than an hour or 2 per day? Did you want to watch TV even if it's raining? If you said yes to any of these then $300 is not going to do it! Unfortunately, the answer is the Winegard Trav'ler and you are going to need to spend upward of $2000. It's worth it, however!

and along those lines...do you want HD or will standard def do? do you have more than one TV and if so do you want to be able to watch different programs on each set simultaneously? do you want/need a DVR?

unless you're going to park your RV in one spot permanently IMO DISH IS the better choice as they are much easier to deal with when you move to a new location and want to get the local channels for that area.

do you want an an automatc antenna...push a button and it fnds and locks onto the satellites or a manual one you have to set up? roof top? ground mounted?

DISH has 3-satelllites with programming spread across all three. some antennas can lock onto all 3 at once while others can lock onto just one at a time. with those antennas if you change to a channel that's on a different sat the dish has to seek and lock onto that bird and that does slow things down a bit. the Winegard Trav'ler locks onto all 3 birds simultaneously. RF Mogul also makes compatible dish antennas for both DISH and DirecTV.

fugure out what you want before making a purchase. good luck.

With a Pathway X2 and rudimentary eyeballing of the tree lines or using the DishPointer Pro app one can do a lot for $500. I get it done in Canada and heavily forested areas in the US. Sure, in a monsoon you may lose signal for a few. Had a Tailgater for two years and unless you are tailgating in an open parking lot, it is nothing more than an electronic doorstop. The Pathway X2 has served me well for 5 years without issue.

What are your needs
Highly mobile ?
Or staying in one place?

I have the Tailgater 3and the 211Z receiver. Had it a little over a year. Just use it when out with the camper. I have the basic Dish for RV package. Meets our needs just fine.

We use a portable tripod mounted dish for our Dish Hopper receiver that has 3 tuners plus an OTA adapter so we can record 4 channels at once if we want to. It typically takes me 15 minutes or less to set the dish up at each stop. We also have an interchangeable pair of Dish triple LNB's that let us use either the three western arc satellites or the three eastern arc satellites, making it much easier to find an aiming hole through trees or other obstructions. The total cost for our RV setup was about $350. Note that none of the automatic dome style antennas like the Tailgater, etc., can be used with any of the current Dish Hopper DVR multi-tuner receivers, only the single tuner Wally receiver.

Thanks for your help on this. I will be moving so it will not be in a fixed location. I am not looking to mount it on my roof. Being able to watch different channels on multiple TVs would be nice, but not if it is going to cost $2k. I am looking to get whatever is the best setup for $500 or less.

Maqtt

bowler1 wrote:
Thanks for your help on this. I will be moving so it will not be in a fixed location. I am not looking to mount it on my roof. Being able to watch different channels on multiple TVs would be nice, but not if it is going to cost $2k. I am looking to get whatever is the best setup for $500 or less.

Maqtt

As others have said, it depends upon how you are going to use it. We had a roof mounted in-motion Standard definition dome that we loved for many years. We also used a standard 18 inch sat dish on a leash when we were parked in trees. We used only the manual sat dish for about 2 years when the dome went bad. When we got tired of always having to set up the manual dish every time we moved, we upgraded to the Winegard Traveler which has worked great for us.

Just remember there are worse things than spending $2K to watch TV. One that comes to mind is spending $500 to watch TV and not being happy with it and THEN spending $2K to get what you really want.

bowler1 wrote:
Thanks for your help on this. I will be moving so it will not be in a fixed location. I am not looking to mount it on my roof. Being able to watch different channels on multiple TVs would be nice, but not if it is going to cost $2k. I am looking to get whatever is the best setup for $500 or less.

Maqtt

got it. well then a couple of suggestions.

1. decide what your specific setup and configuration will be.
2. read and search the forums.
3. as you walk thru campgrounds and rv parks stop and talk with others with portable dish setups. see what they’re using.
4. talk with a pro shop like Solid Signals for advice.

god luck.