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Star Choice now called Shaw Direct, arrived lakeside via satellite Anik F1 in I believe early 2001 and I immediately gave up Dish. What I know about Dish is therefore is a little outdated. But Dish provides programming on three satellites  each spaced far enough apart that one needed to point a different satellite dish at each of the three satellites in the sky. However most of the programming was on one of the 3 satellites flying overhead. So most lakeside customers only had one satellite dish pointing at the satellite carrying the most channels.

I had all three satellites it was OK but I couldn't get my home town stations from Seattle or Vancouver, so when Shaw Direct (then called Star Choice) arrived, I immediately switched. What am I going to do when Shaw stops using the two old satellites that can be picked up lakeside, I don't know. Maybe stream, maybe Dish, maybe DirecTV. I hope someone with more current information will update my information on Dish.

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Satellite is dinosaur technology in terms of TV and I am a total tech geek (not). I went to a streaming service provided by the late Brit, Derick and it works very well with a little tweaking now and then, and no outage in the rainy season. You need very good internet speed and I am lucky to now have ILox, with fairly constant 80 - 90 download. I have 2 huge Dish TV dishes on top of my house if anyone wants to make me an offer! 

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2 hours ago, johanson said:

Gringohombre, I am interested. How large are the satellite dishes and are they only C band capable or will they also work with the higher frequency Ku signals?

These were installed by an Ajijic company (well regarded...cannot remember the name) 12+ years ago using an address in Brooklyn NY to create the "legal" Dish TV account. Worked well for many years (except in the rainy season) and the rate for basic TV slowly increased to US$80 a month until ditching for the streaming app service about 6 - 8 months ago. One is maybe 10' diameter and the other maybe 4' (was told this one was for HD reception). Have no idea about the technical questions you are asking. 

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On 7/16/2020 at 12:51 PM, sm1mex said:

We lost more and more channels on Shaw. We changed to Dish and we love it. 
A Shaw provider said within 2 years most all Shaw channels will be gone. Canadian Gov. does not want Shaw outside of Canada. 

That will be a sad day if most all Shaw channels go. It is the best for me. It depends on what you like to watch. I don't watch movies.

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The condo I live in up here in Seattle offers internet speeds of up 1000 megabits or one gigabit. So streaming is easy. They also offer DirecTV via satellite. Trouble is that DirecTV doesn't come in that well lakeside. 

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5 hours ago, johanson said:

Do you still have the Dish network LNBs? That would make a big difference

 

5 hours ago, johanson said:

Do you still have the Dish network LNBs? That would make a big difference

Yes...and all works very well as I was getting good reception before I switched.

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Mitch:  Dish offers 3 packages.  Lower, medium and high.  We have the medium package which is about 240 channels.  the higher package had things we were not interested in.  We have better picture on our semi smart tv and we do not lose the signal all the time like we did on Shaw if a cloud came over.

Each package has it's cost, with the higher package being more expensive.  Our medium package costs more than the plan we had with Shaw but much worth it.  We can record multiple shows at one time, where Shaw we could only record 2 at a time.  We get NBC, ABC, CBC, FOX, CNN, HLN and more educational channels like Discovery and Animal Planet, etc.  Also we get the old timers like Jackie Gleason Honeymooners, Happy Days, Andy Griffith, Golden Girls, and many others.  We had Ajijic Systems Mike Merryman change out our service.

We have 2 receivers, which we pay extra for the 2nd receiver.  We are not Canadians so Dish has all the U.S. programs.  We are extremely satisfied with Dish.

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Hey sm1mex, often when using Shaw one uses a dish that is not large enough for cloudy days. My dish is more than 4 feet in diameter and I almost never loose my Shaw signal. And yes Dish network is great, but in my case I want my home town stations from the greater Seattle-Vancouver area to include stations  from smaller cities close by. . With Shaw one can get 5 stations from Seattle and many from the Lower mainland (Vancouver, Victoria Etc)  And  Dish doesn't provide any of those stations

So it all depends upon where you live and which system provides you the stations you wish.

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So Gringohombre, you have two satellite dishes that were used to pick up Dish  Network. That means they are the modern Ku type. Before we can talk dollars, I need to know the diameter or size of each satellite dish. I'm looking forward to hearing from you..

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Prior to recently leaving Mexico for S Carolina, we had Dish US. We used CP Electronics in Guadalajara. I had Americas top 250 service plus HBO (HBO and Dish have been in contract disputes for months) and Sirius Radio for about $110/mo. My network channels were out of NY area. I had the 2.4 meter dish pointed SW to Sat 119 and also a smaller dish pointed SE at whatever Sat Dish Mex uses. This was so when rain interrupted the signal on 119, it would automatically switch to Dish Mexico. Service was good and many channels were Hi Def. We also had a DVR receiver and could record stuff. CP has a good website if you want to check it out. 

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You are correct, sm1mex. The new satellite you mention above is better focused on Canada,, and it was suggested that because of a better focus, the signals reach about as far south as San Francisco, But certainly not all the way south to the US Mexican boarder nor even further south to lakeside.

The newer satellite is called Anik G-1 has been in place since 2013. The two older Satellites that reach lakeside are Anil F-1R was launched  in late 2005 and has an average expected life of 15 years, and the other older satellite which is called Anik F-2 was launched in the summer of 2004 and has already stayed active 1 year longer than its average expected life of 15 years

Sadly lakeside, we can only receive the signals from the two older satellites and once they die off, which should happen very soon, we will no longer be able to watch the Shaw Direct programming in Mexico. And that is sad. Without Shaw, we will only have Dish Network or DirecTV via satellite. How much time do we have left on Shaw Direct in Mexico? Maybe a day or maybe a year or three, no one really knows

Are there other alternatives? Yes, if you have a good internet connecting with reasonable speed, you can always start streaming TV via the internet. But that will take a little time for you to learn how. Just maybe you should start leaning now

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On ‎7‎/‎16‎/‎2020 at 8:22 PM, gringohombre said:

These were installed by an Ajijic company (well regarded...cannot remember the name) 12+ years ago using an address in Brooklyn NY to create the "legal" Dish TV account. Worked well for many years (except in the rainy season) and the rate for basic TV slowly increased to US$80 a month until ditching for the streaming app service about 6 - 8 months ago. One is maybe 10' diameter and the other maybe 4' (was told this one was for HD reception). Have no idea about the technical questions you are asking. 

Great, it sounds like one is  2.4 meters in diameter and the other a 1.2 meters in diameter Ku band satellite dish . What is the dollar amount we are talking about here, for each?

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On ‎7‎/‎16‎/‎2020 at 4:36 PM, artsnob said:

I have Directvgo, most channels are in English, CNN, pbs tv English classic. Etc

Hey Artsnob, I presume DirecTVgo is via the internet. Am I correct?

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On 7/17/2020 at 9:29 PM, johanson said:

So Gringohombre, you have two satellite dishes that were used to pick up Dish  Network. That means they are the modern Ku type. Before we can talk dollars, I need to know the diameter or size of each satellite dish. I'm looking forward to hearing from you..

Here are photos. At my age I am not going up on the roof to measure, but one is between 10' -12' and the other between 4' - 6'. They were installed by the Mike Merriman group. They have all the fittings and cables. You can PM me with your offer. Gracias

#1.jpg

#2.jpg

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Thanks for the pictures. I'm pretty sure you are wrong about the diameters . I am guessing that the larger one is 2.4 meters and the second one 1.6 meters in diameter. So what are we talking about dollar-wise here?

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2 hours ago, johanson said:

Thanks for the pictures. I'm pretty sure you are wrong about the diameters . I am guessing that the larger one is 2.4 meters and the second one 1.6 meters in diameter. So what are we talking about dollar-wise here?

Please send me a PM offer.

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