# Please Help Me Understand!!



## Frank*r (Jul 24, 2007)

Hello,

I really need help! I'm new to this forum and to FTA technology. I just dropped my digital cable service thru Comcast for many reason but mainly because its too damn expensive. So I've been researching satellite and stumbled onto Free to air receivers.

I guess I'm looking for someone who is willing to give me a quick crash course on this subject and how to get started/set up.

What channels will I actually receive for free (any premium or PPV's)?

What's the best receiver on the market (I own a HD TV)?

My home is currently wired for HD Direct TV; (from previous owners) can I re-use this equipment?

What other equipment do I need?

What is upgrading your receiver, does this give you more channels, can all receivers be upgraded?

I live in the northeast right outside of Philadelphia, can I receiver free channels here?

Do channels come and go, how frequently?

Thank You,
Frank
[email protected][/email]


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## FTA Michael (Jul 21, 2002)

:welcome_s Welcome to DBSTalk! Lots of questions, so I'll try to take them in order.

The channel list is at www.FTAList.com, which is also a good place to start to learn more about FTA in general. Premium or PPV channels are rarely available; there aren't any as I type.

What's the best receiver? Who makes the best car? What's the best TV? There are many models, most of which do about the same thing, and each manufacturer believes that his is the best. HD FTA is still in its infancy.

Your house wiring is likely to use RG6 cables. If so, you should be able to use it for communicating between your FTA receiver and your dish(es).

To get FTA, you need a FTA receiver, a FTA LNBF, a 30- to 36-inch dish, and a clear view of the southern sky. A motor is nice, but not required. If the previous owner had DirecTV, that's a good sign for line of sight.

The legal use of "upgrading" is using the receiver manufacturer's updates to fix bugs or add new features. It doesn't really give you any new channels. Pirates sometimes call their attempts to overwrite a FTA receiver's firmware "updating". Piracy is illegal, immoral, and bad karma.

From Philadelphia, you should be able to see everything on FTAList, plus you might be able to see some of the programming that's available from the satellites over the Atlantic Ocean. The best list for Atlantic programming is from Global Communications: http://www.global-cm.net/MPEGlistATL.html.

Channels definitely come and go. Pulling a number out of my hat, I'd say that about 20-30% of the permanent-looking channels that are available on a given date are gone within a year. (I'm not including "wild feeds", which are used only to beam an event or news report back to a station.) Yet the total number of channels available keeps growing.

You didn't ask specifically, but FTA makes a poor substitute for pay TV. If you want to tighten your belt and spend $0/month on TV, that's great! A good OTA antenna and a FTA system will provide all the major networks and lots of interesting extras. If you're hooked on ESPN or HBO, you need pay TV. Check into basic cable or a bottom-tier Dish Network package. Good luck!


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