A La Carte satellite TV system under $250 or so?

[OhioGuy]

I've been thinking about setting up some sort of satellite dish system to
supplement the FTA broadcast channels we get. We don't watch a whole lot of
TV - most of what we watch comes from the local library on DVD.

However, at times I would like to watch something. I could either go for
a lot of variety, or else something like the Sci-Fi Channel. My wife loves
game shows, so the Game Show Network would be great.

I don't want to subscribe to cable, DirecTV, or anything where I have to
essentially subsidize a load of channels I would never watch.

What I DO want is the capability of getting a bunch of free channels, as
well as subscribing to several (and by that I mean perhaps 2-4 channels like
Discovery Channel, Game Show Channel, Sci-Fi Channel, etc.) a la carte.

For a while I was looking at getting a big dish, because I heard you could
do a la cart. Then I heard that most of that was switching over to 4DTV,
but that was expensive. Now I hear that 4DTV is on the verge of becoming
outdated, and something called DVB S2 (or something like that) has become a
de-fact standard.

Frankly, I'm very confused by all of the changes. I would like to be able
to get an inexpensive system, under $250, set it up and subscribe to a few
subscription channels. No, not a "tier" of channels, where I get to pay for
crap like the golf channel. (apologies to those who get their jollies by
trying to use a stick to knock a ball in a hole)

Can anyone suggest something like this? I'd be open to using one of those
PC cards, and a small dish or something, if it has stable drivers and
software, but I think I'd really prefer some sort of set top box. Big Kudos
if the system can get game show network, TBS, Cartoon Network, Sci-Fi, or
others a la carte for ~ $9 a year per channel like I saw with a KU band
system a few years back.

Thanks!

[George Grapman]

Almost everything is scrambled so without subscribing to Dish or
Direct you will not get much.

[Crooze]

On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:05:51 -0400, "OhioGuy" <no...@none.net> wrote:

> What I DO want is the capability of getting a bunch of free channels, as
>well as subscribing to several (and by that I mean perhaps 2-4 channels like
>Discovery Channel, Game Show Channel, Sci-Fi Channel, etc.) a la carte.

The free-to-air channels you're hoping to receive are available via an
MPEG-2 set-up.

See the information at
http://skyvision.com/store/mpeg_store.html

[BigDog1]

Not gonna happen.

Either pry open your wallet and subscribe to a cable or satellite
service, or learn to live with what you can get over the air.