HDTV Forum

I ive in NYC (queens) and just had my Direct TV receiver installed on a Panasonic 42" plasma. Unfortunately due to the fact that i live in a two family condo i am not allowed to put my dish on the roof and Direct TV informed me that the HD TV Dish is too heavy to put on the side of the complex. The tech then informed me that the standard dish will pick up the HD signal sufficiently and works just as well as there 5 LNB Multi-satellite dish antenna.


A. Is this true?
B. Is anyone else experiencing the same issue?

My sister has HD with Time warner on a 37" sony wega plasma and it seems she is getting a better picture.

A - The existing 3LNB dish is good for all current HD content, minus the new MPEG4 local broadcasts. Since you live in NY, this doesn't matter as the existing East Coast HD feeds are from NYC. You don't need MPEG4 right now.

B - Don't think so.

For your last comment...
"Seems she is getting a better picture" can be very subjective and there are a ton of influences in this arena.

But... DirecTV is in HDLite mode right now, so it's possible that the 1080i stations do not look as nice as on her HD CableTV. The 720P stations "should" look the same.

When you say "HD Lite" mode , what exactly does that mean?

Thanks for the info. Seems like im going to have to figure something out before january 07'. Too bad there isnt some type of QOS (Quality of service) for cable like there is on data networks.

Can't do QoS until everything on Cable goes to IP.

Currently video and IP traffic is multiplexed onto the line together. When TV service eventually goes all IP, the muxing can stop and the traffic switched at layer 3. Then QoS can be applied, but you are years away from that!

You also need to keep in mind that D* farms out some (or all) of it's installation work, so you're at the merices of a third party and quality control is out the window. I've run into several lazy or incompetant jobbers down through the years. One company said I wouldn't get a picture because my tree line was too high, yet another came out and said the other guy just didn't want to go up on my high roof.

Thanks for the reply. That is exactly why i posted this question on this board.