What do you want to spend? What do you want it to do?
I would get:
Drake 1824
Orbitron SST-10
ADL Feed
CAL AMP C/KU LNB's
AJAK H/H Mount.
This is the best setup you can buy.
I would buy it from
Global Communications 608 546 2523
P.O.B. 747
Spring Green WI 53588
In fact I did that very thing after doing over a year of research. I talked
to engineers, users, TV station people.
I wanted the best picture, Most flexible receiver, full stereo sound on
EVERYTHING. I wanted international reception, KU news feeds, EVERYTHING.
This system delivers.
Global has the best price in the country if you are buying mail order. If
buying locally, don't let the dealer substitute something like GI or UNIDEN.
They usually do that to make more money.
Insist on the Drake.
--
/ Gary Bourgois, WB8EOH, The Birdwatcher: Marquette Michigan USA \
([-o Radio Omega T2/21 5.8 - FRIDAY NIGHT LIVE Weekly 10PM Eastern o-])
\ Now a snazzy new DOMAIN address! fl...@lopez.marquette.MI.US /
birdw...@genie.geis.com FAX: (906) 228-7477 BBS: (906) 228-4399
good luck!
John
Many thanks in advance.
Paul
I really appreciate your postings and all the info and help you provide.
However, I *do* have to say that my experience with my GI 550i IRD has
been just as good as your Drake experience - OK my unit has only been
up for one year, but it is also on 24hours and has only been off on the
three or four times we have had a power cut.
I know you have a personal dislike for GI, and I knew that before I bought
my system. I was faced with what I could obtain locally and with local
service, so that limited me. I also had to go on *all* the info I received
from members of the group and from my own personal observations. Drake was
not an option for me, Uniden video on any unit I tested *sucked* and the
other choices did not match the GI units.
I will include a few of your comments and add my views....
>Here is my *OPINION*:
>The Drake has the features I personally wanted. It has beautiful
>sharp video that cuts like a knife. On my MITSUBISHI, I can see individual
>whisps of hair, or the little freckles on NELIX.
To confirm, this is my *OPINION*:
This applies to my GI550i seen on a 20 year old Sony Trinitron!
>The Drake has 200 favorite channels (100 audio and 100 video) and it lets you
>put a NAME on channels, which is handy. I like the interface a lot. There
>is minimal fooling around to do things. I like the KU Seek, very handy for
>scanning for new KU channels. I like the ability to assign ANY name to any
>of the 99 satellites I can have in Memory. Panamsat-1 is P1 on my drake,
>Orion 1 is O1, Intelsat 601 is I-1.
The GI550i favorite channels is (from memory) 150 which can be assigned to
either video or audio - I haven't run out. You can name channels and if
stored as favorite audio it can have different name than the same channel
with video (or several different audios for one channel).
Likewise, you can can a satellite any name you wish with the GI550i.
>The Drake has SKIP tuning, which saves wear on your polarotor.
The GI550i also has this important feature.
>The Drake has THREE audio Bandwidths which have been selected very very
>well.
The GI550i only has two, but I have never found any audio that one or
other of the choices does not give clear audio.
>I get no sparklies to speak of. NETV on S3/02 is quite viewable, but not
>perfect. However, on other receivers I could not watch it.
NETV on S3/02 has only very minimal sparklies - you have to look very
closely to see them. (I'm up in Saskatchewan, Canada).
>I won't buy anything made by GI just on principle. I also think their
>interface looks junky.
As I mentioned at the beginning of my post, we all know this now Gary! ;)
I think it only fair to make sure that you ALWAYS make note of that fact!
Best wishes from the frozen north,
--
Terry Maton - University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada
INTERNET: Terry...@usask.ca
WWW: http://www.usask.ca/~maton/
Well I have never been to Columbus, so the book is probably right. Most
people I talk to can't get ANIK KU, except for Canadians and northerners like
me. However I am very far INTO the ANIK footprint. It comes in gangbusters.
> Don't worry about these messages going out to the whole
>group. These messages have
>swayed me to go TVRO (I had DBS but am selling it when I move).
AWRITE!
> In terms of VCRS subscription stuff, The dealer can keep
>that crap. Why PAY for empty-v (MTV) when I can get
>MuchMusic and Musique Plus on Anik? Why pay for CNN and CNNI
>when I can watch the feeds
>directly and the BBC nightly news. The only thing I am
>wondering about is movie channels.
Presently there is FXM, MOVIEPLUS and MOVIEMAX all uninterrupted movie
channels. I don't have time to watch movies. The Canadian ones will
eventually go DIGITAL, and I don't know about FXM.
> Isn't there a Latin American HBO that is ITC? Is this
>scrambled now? See.... No reason
There used to be a movie channel on one of the Mexican Birds. I don't know
if that is there any more. It ran the movies in English with Spanish
Subtitles. This was a couple years ago. It may be gone now.
>to subscribe to anything! Maybe if I went the scrounger's
>guide (I like this) way, which I am
>also considering, then I will have a little money to burn for
>crap programming like MTV.
I don't have a descrambler. I never run out of stuff to watch and listen to.
I am weird, though.
However, check the WILD FEEDS LIST and the Different Strokes List and the
stuff that RobertK posts for the Canadian channels. It is all great stuff.
I live just west of Columbus and get Anik E2 Ku with excellent signal and
Anik E1 Ku with light sparklies.
Andy Lyons
ar...@cbmsg.att.com