Sub - Best DVB-S Card Option in NZ?

[mruane]

Sub,

I need some help selecting a DVB-S card. I notice that DVB-S cards are now becoming available in NZ from local suppliers (see http://www.ascent.co.nz among others). I was looking at the AVerTV DVB-S Hybrid, the AVerTV DVB-S Pro or the Hauppage WinTV Nova S2.

Given your experience with DVB-S cards what would be your advice for a card to be used exclusively with GBPVR. Not all of the above are mentioned in the hardware compatibility list and I cannot see any dual tuner cards available locally. So, one of these three look like it.

If you needed to replace your DVB-S card, what would you go with?

Cheers Mike

[sub]

I was looking at the AVerTV DVB-S Hybrid, the AVerTV DVB-S Pro or the Hauppage WinTV Nova S2.

To be honest, I dont have first hand experience with any of those cards, so I wouldnt know what to recommend. The Hauppauge Nova card is probably the best option given I do diseqc support with Hauppauge cards, which would let you do multiple satellite dishes etc if needed in future.

[JonnyCam]

I just ordered the DVB-S Pro yesterday, as I have cable for my analog now.

I'll let you know how I get on with it. Was a good price, had dropped $28 from about 1 week ago (about $150 now)

I searched the forums before I purchased it, and there was a thread indicating people were using it for NZ freeview channels using their old sky dish.
http://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.php?t=24418
Thanks

[krypton_john]

Hey JonnyCam, areyou going to run Sky Digital and your DVB-S card off the same sky dish? If so, how will you physcally make the connection? Our UHF/VHF signal is pretty poor so I'd like to run both off one dish using a freeview STB running into one PVR500 tuner and Sky into the other.

[JonnyCam]

No, I''ve got Telstra cable for my payTV, but I was reading on a site which came up while googling for a sat card, that you can just chuck an in-line splitter and connect your skybox & freeview to the same sat.

I am unsure if this works, and it may require that you have the dual LNB installed (again, I dont know much about satellites - when I got sky installed, then upgraded the LNB on the dish to a dual one - as the guy said I might want to install MySky in the future....for $600, I dont really think so.)

http://pvr.geek.nz/w/index.php/DVB-S_Setup

Thanks

[mruane]

Thanks guys,

Thats helpful. I have a splitter in my SKY disk feed and it previously fed a standard SKY decoder and a MYSky. I have returned the SKY decoder so I now have a spare cable coming from the splitter that I can make use of.

Provided the card does not generate any power output to the LNB, the MySky will control the polarisation of the dish, so we are stuck with whatever transponder polarisation the MySky is selecting. From what I can see, that should cover TV1 and TV2 but not sure about the rest until SKY change to Horizontal polarisation.

JonnyCam - I will be interested in what experience you have with the DVD-S Pro.

Sub - thanks for your feedback. The diseqc support is worth considering although its not likely I will mount multiple dishes in the future - a good point though. Thanks...

Cheers Mike

[sub]

Its worth noting that there is some discussion (on apsattv mailing list) about signal polarisation of Sky and Freeview on the new Optus D1 satellite. Its possible that Freeview will be horizontal and Sky will be vertical (its currently this way), meaning the same LNB cant be shared for both services, which might mean the need for a dual LNB or extra satellite dish.

Its possible Sky will also switch to horizontal in the near future, which will again make it possible to have the one LNB feeding both Sky and Freeview - but this hasnt been confirmed either way.

The all relates to a configuration mistake made by the manufacturers of the new Optus D1 satellite. Previously all services in New Zealand were vertical.

[mruane]

I have been keeping up with apsattv also. The polarisation issue has created an interesting situation. There really is no commercial reason for SKY to change to Horizontal, in fact there is good reason to stay with vertical - it stops non paying users from utilising the equipment (i.e. the dish).

So lets hope for a good technical reason presenting itself, so that they need to change, otherwise Satellite Freeview in NZ probably is a dead duck. I cannot see many people wanting to purchase a second dish.

Interesting times ahead...

Cheers Mike

[sub]

I have been keeping up with apsattv also. The polarisation issue has created an interesting situation. There really is no commercial reason for SKY to change to Horizontal, in fact there is good reason to stay with vertical - it stops non paying users from utilising the equipment (i.e. the dish).

I'm not expert on this front, but I thought I'd heard that the horizontal NZ only beams are more powerful than the vertical ones which cover NZ + Australia. One of the big things they were hyping was the new Sky satellite would do away with the rain fade problems they suffer from.

So lets hope for a good technical reason presenting itself, so that they need to change, otherwise Satellite Freeview in NZ probably is a dead duck. I cannot see many people wanting to purchase a second dish.

I dont think its a dead duck, but it certainly wont help.

That said, I know there is quite few people that only have Sky because of bad or no reception (like my brother in Wanaka), and would have been quite happy for a subscription free service that gets them the main channels plus a couple of new ones.

[JonnyCam]

So from what I have read here, I will (at this stage) only be able to get the TVNZ feeds (& regional) using my existing Sky dish. Correct?
(are the new channels, 3,C4 etc going to be Vertical?)

When would DVB-T be available? I thought the government were looking more down the sat path?

Or does this not affect me as I am not using my Sky dish for SKy at all?

Thanks