jimh425 wrote:
How well do the tailgaters work compared to the permanent mounts?
THE only reason I have Dish is because of this thing. I have a permanent Dish w/dvr at home and the Tailgater with another receiver in the TC. The Tailgater is awesome - makes up for a LOT of frustrating calls to Dish Customer no-Service.
Set the Tailgater outside in an area it can see south, turn on the power, tell the receiver which state you're in (not drunk or intoxicated, one of 50 US states), and in about 5 minutes you're watching HD TV. It's completely self-pointing. DirecTV has a similar setup, but last time I checked, it costs 3x as much and is not HD, just SD.
So like I said, if it wasn't for this thing, I'd be on just Comcast cable at the house, no dish at all.
Pro's --
* Very portable
* Very reliable - if it can see to the south, it will find the satellites, even in the rain.
* Whatever channels you're subscribed to at home you get in the TC - with one exception covered in 'cons'.
* It's matching receiver is relatively lower power drain, ~30 watts total, great to know if you run off inverter a lot.
Con's--
* If you travel outside your hometown too far, you lose your locals. You can, however, call dish and get the locals for wherever you are. Good example - I boondock at Coos Bay, Oregon during Hawks pre-season. A local channel in Eugene get the Hawks games. One call and I then get all the locals for Eugene.
* I boondock a lot on inverter, no shore power. Every time you kill the power to it, it has to completely re-do it's start up procedure.
* When your TC is in storage at home, if the receiver is not connected to a dish and powered, it loses it's authorization in just a few weeks. Next time you go to use it, you must call Dish and get it re-authorized. Big problem if you're camping somewhere with no cell service, which I frequently do. I now have a second dish mounted to my shop and it's only purpose is to keep the TC receiver 'alive'.
