Dish vs. Cable

[MnGirl]

If you are thinking of getting Dish, I must tell you, with the storm season coming you may not get to watch TV.
The storm sometimes is in Atlanta, and will interfere with your reception. Your safe with cable because it's buried.

[handieman]

If you are thinking of getting Dish, I must tell you, with the storm season coming you may not get to watch TV.
The storm sometimes is in Atlanta, and will interfere with your reception. Your safe with cable because it's buried.


I'm confused with your statement. Satellite TV is by nature all digital (not necessarily HD digital) and is received by a small dish which requires approval to place on your home in TV. By nature digital signals are flawless and not subject to snow or ghosting like analog signals. Analog signals are prevalent on cable TV although you can get the digital package which costs extra and gives you many HD channels.
If your a perfectionist when it comes to TV watching then go satellite. Yes the dish is subject to wind load as all antennas would be and also subject to signal loss during intense rainfalls. I do mean intense, normal rain is not a problem. A dish must have a clear view of the southern and southwestern sky. Anything in the path of the minute signal coming from 23,000 miles in space is unacceptable.
Hope this helps
Handie :joke:

[MnGirl]

Who told you that? In Minnesota we had problems all the time. Not only with snow storms, but snow collecting on the dish.
My neighbor has dish and he had problems all summer long last year because of storms. Not only ours, but weather as far away as Atlanta.
I stayed with cable because of all the problems I had in Minnesota.
You have a dish?

[Halle]

We have had DISH network for the last six years in Alaska. We have very strong winds and needless to say a lot of snow. I believe we may have lost service three times over the six years. We also lived in Florida for eleven years and had cable. We lost service too many times to remember. We now have DISH in our Villages home. We may still lose service due to the weather but I don't think it will be anymore than if we had cable.

[redwitch]

I know that in California, I had cable, my neighbor had DISH. She loved her DISH. When we had our storms (rain but only occasionally truly heavy with heavy winds), her DISH would go down a little more frequently than my cable. When it was hot, my cable went down more often. In the course of year, I'd say we were pretty even when it came to losing connections.

I do wonder how the dish itself stands up the hurricane force winds we get in Florida.

[captain1202]

When was the last time it snowed in TV? ??? ::)

[Muncle]

When was the last time it snowed in TV? ??? ::)
\

According to that "Leisureville" book, we get more snow than Buffalo.

[smalldog]

Another View
we have had Dish since a friend was selling it in NY in the mid 90's ...... we have had it in Florida since we have been here about 4 years and the last 1 1/2 in TV .........
yes you will sometimes loose the signal in a heavy storm ( should the Tv be on ??) ......
you won't get The Villages channel on dish ........ and sometimes customer service isn't what it might be( had Comcast for the computer and theirs isn't to good either) .......
no problem with wind on a properly installed antenna but the lord high developer has rules for that also so check if you install .....

[handieman]

Who told you that? In Minnesota we had problems all the time. Not only with snow storms, but snow collecting on the dish.
My neighbor has dish and he had problems all summer long last year because of storms. Not only ours, but weather as far away as Atlanta.
I stayed with cable because of all the problems I had in Minnesota.
You have a dish?

Snow! meaning not frozen water vapor, I'm talking "snow" which is an electronic term for noise levels attached to an analog signal. Remember a "snowy" screen on your TV? That snow was caused by a poor signal to noise ratio which in turn was caused by the distance from your antenna to the TV tower and the quality of your antenna. Satellite signals do NOT exhibit a snowy signal, HOWEVER yes satellite dishes are subject to signal loss because of physical snow ( frozen water vapor) in the bowl of the dish.
Tomorrow when we begin TV reception 101 we will show you snow and "snow"
Jus sayin
Handie :joke:
PS: yes I've had a dish since 1995 and proir to that I installed 10 ft diameter dishes

[xNYer]

One minor advantage with having Comcast is that The Villages.net is free. With dish you are required to pay a $5 per month fee.

[Bubbalarry]

I haver both digital cable and FTA (Free to air) dish. My dish picks up dish network channels.

For what it's worth cable does not go out as often as dish. Because you must align the dish to an exact azimuth facing southwest, and rain clouds that block that beam will interfere with the signal. The deeper the overcast the weaker the signal and so on.

As for cable they use dishes as well to receive the signals but they have monster dishes.

It must be really bad weather for them to lose or get a weaker signal for it to go out.

Now a free to air receiver receives the signals in the air without any fees. They have no card which makes them legal since you aren't stealing signals off a card by Dish Network.

However you can download a bin and install it into the receiver that gets you free PPV's and all the channels for free. Everything including all sports. Currently I have 1 dish with 4 LNBS attached that allows me to receive 4 satellites. 2 from USA & 2 from Canada.

Altogether I get over 1250 Channels. It also gives me my locals channels for my hometown even when I am in TV.

When the bin gets loaded it makes the unit illegal. I use Comcast in my hometown for High speed INTERNET and local sports in HD, that dish can't get.

With me getting that many channels I think you get my point. Plus over 100 are in HD.

WHATS SO HARD TO FIND IN TV IS SOMEONE TO INSTALL THE DISH. I TRIED AND UNLESS YOU SIGN UP FOR A 6 MONTH CONTRACT NOBODY WILL INSTALL ME A DISH.

:bigthumbsup: wav wav

[Sidney Lanier]

All we hear about are nightmares with Comcast, the cable company that provides service to TV. In our home up north, we have cable and are really unhappy with the cable company, but here in the boondocks we have no alternative for Internet access other than cable; DSL is not available here. The people we know who have DirecTV up north are very happy not only with their reception but also with customer service, and they say that outages are VERY rare. For what it's worth....

[nitehawk]

with the FTA is the dish the same size as a regular direct dish? and does it face the same direction as dish or direct?

[F16 1UB]

Dish for us. Interference from Atlanta may be caused from southern migration of lovebugs. ;D Actually sounds as though mn may have dish out of alignment. We've had Dish for 8 years. Heck with comcrap.

F16

[Number 6]

For full disclosure, let me state that I have been a Direct TV customer for a number of years, and intend to continue when we move to TV (hopefully soon). I am also an old C-Band (BUD) customer. Having said that, the small dish signal is not perfect. If you want a “clear as a bell” signal, you should have seen the analog C-Band signal from a 10 foot dish. Anyway, those were the days. The small dishes take the first generation signals off satellite and compress them down and retransmit them. That process does degrade the picture on anything over a 12” TV set. We also have the issue of “rain fade”. It seems just before a thunderstorm, we lose the signal due to interference between the satellite and the dish. It doesn’t last long and should not be a reason to pass on the small dish.

[handieman]

For full disclosure, let me state that I have been a Direct TV customer for a number of years, and intend to continue when we move to TV (hopefully soon). I am also an old C-Band (BUD) customer. Having said that, the small dish signal is not perfect. If you want a “clear as a bell” signal, you should have seen the analog C-Band signal from a 10 foot dish. Anyway, those were the days. The small dishes take the first generation signals off satellite and compress them down and retransmit them. That process does degrade the picture on anything over a 12” TV set. We also have the issue of “rain fade”. It seems just before a thunderstorm, we lose the signal due to interference between the satellite and the dish. It doesn’t last long and should not be a reason to pass on the small dish.

Free Playboy channel and HBO were great back in those days huh
I installed the ole C-band Beasts
Handie :joke:

[Russ_Boston]

Hate to sound like a Comcast supporter but I don't think I've ever (OK maybe once or twice) lost my cable signal in the past 10 years here in MA. I do cable, internet and phone through Comcast with no complaints about service. Price? That's another issue but reliability is more important for me since I work from home quite a bit and relable, speedy internet is essential.

I hope TV Comcast works as reliably.

[zcaveman]

Hate to sound like a Comcast supporter but I don't think I've ever (OK maybe once or twice) lost my cable signal in the past 10 years here in MA. I do cable, internet and phone through Comcast with no complaints about service. Price? That's another issue but reliability is more important for me since I work from home quite a bit and relable, speedy internet is essential.

I hope TV Comcast works as reliably.


AS far as I am concerned there is no problem with Comcast cable and internet in TV. I have lost the internet for a couple of hours a couple of times but then I can see the truck next to the equipment box. I lost cable back in 2004 for two hours during one of the three hurricanes that came through the area.

Your biggest problem with Comcast is when you lose the closed caption on one of the 100 or so stations and you have to convince them that it is the station and not you. The on-line and call-in techs are very limited in the thought processes. But then so are most of the other on line and call-in services that I have used. I will admit - at least they do speak English.