# So why does DIsh have Western Arc and Eastern Arc of Satellites??



## NCwolfpack00 (Jul 27, 2013)

So if the entire USA has always been able to access the 110,119, and 129 why did Dish have satellites at 61, 72 and 77?? Why does the Eastern US need its own satellites?? Whats the difference? isnt this a huge cost to Dish compared to other DBS providers?? I was just curious about the arcs


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## juan ellitinez (Jan 31, 2003)

More bandwidth for more local markets

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk


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## KyL416 (Nov 11, 2005)

There's also a good chunk of the country with line of sight issues for 119 and especially 129.

Prior to the Eastern Arc becoming a thing, it was the norm for HD installs in many Eastern markets to have two dishes on the roof, one dish pointed at 110 and 119 and another dish pointed at 61 instead of 129.


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## JosephB (Nov 14, 2005)

Back in the day DirecTV/USSB got the "prime" DBS slot, 101. It is the best slot allocated to the US for CONUS signals. It's not too low in either the east or the west

Echostar ended up with 119/110 and 61.5. 110/119 are viewable from the east, but are not as great as 101. 61.5 has never been viable for the west coast. For a long time national channels, larger market locals, and all west coast locals would come from 110/119, and smaller east coast markets would come from 61.5. This gave them theoretically more bandwidth, but, the downside was that anyone in a 61.5 market needed two dishes, where DirecTV could serve them with one dish (at least initially, DirecTV did have a handful of two-dish markets for a little while)

Dish needed more bandwidth and put together a plan to use some slots from Canada and Mexico, and these slots lined up with their existing satellites. Given the fact that these wing spots had poor coverage for portions of the country, it made sense to duplicate the national channels and then put certain markets on certain dishes. This was also aided by the fact that the Eastern Arc is MPEG4 only which means they can squeeze way more channels in a given amount of bandwidth vs. the "old" satellites


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Technically: 61.5, 101, 110 and 119 were eastern satellite locations. 148, 157, 166 and 175 were western satellite locations. The FCC initially allotted the same number of transponders to the eastern and western locations for each applicant who was awarded satellite space. Only Echostar ever built their "western" allotments (at 148). The rest of the companies either sold their allotments to Echostar or DIRECTV or forfeited their allotments. (Three other companies launched satellite services on DBS. USSB on DIRECTV satellites, Dominion (SkyAngel) on Echostar satellites and Cablevision (Voom) on their own satellite.)

The availability of Canadian slots (72.7 and 129) and a Mexican slot (77) changed the landscape. It allowed DISH to abandon 148 and cover most of the country on one dish (similar to DIRECTV's 101-110-119 but with more transponders). As noted above, the need for additional spotbeams for locals and the availability of 61.5, 72.7 and 77 made a second arc possible. Single dish installations with some cities available on both arcs.

DISH experimented with BSS satellites at 105 and 121 to expand their bandwidth and ended up moving channels to DBS satellites. Those satellites are still available and are used for business feeds. DISH's use of BSS at 118 continues for international channels.


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## scooper (Apr 22, 2002)

I'll give you a good reason for Eastern Arc - 

I can't see 129 (but 119/110 are fine) due to too many too tall trees too close.
OTOH - Eastern Arc works great for me. Since Raleigh is a dual HD market (HD locals available from both Eastern and Western arcs), it is not a problem for both of us. 72.7 ( for most of the HD) and 77 (mostly SD, maybe some local channels still on it) should also be visible for most of the west ( but maybe not AK and HI). Dish used to have licenses for 148, 157, and 166, but they are not very desireable for ANYBODY.

129 has problems if you get too far NE of Pennsylvania, and I've already stated my problems with it.


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## NYDutch (Dec 28, 2013)

As a near full time RV'er, I can attest to the fact that having both arcs available has been the difference between getting a signal or not in many heavily treed locations we've visited. In the park we just left in southern GA for instance, the western arc was completely blocked at our site, but I was able to hit 72.7 and 77 through a small gap in the trees with the EA LNB installed on our 1K4 dish. We were in the Jacksonville, FL market, so the same locals were on both 61.5 and 77 and we had the full channel lineup, albeit some in SD only. The site we were on previous to that in SC, I installed the WA LNB, since it had the better view. The ocean side site we're on today in FL is wide open, so either arc would work well for us and I kept the EA LNB in place. When we move again next week? Who knows...


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## tampa8 (Mar 30, 2002)

NCwolfpack00 said:


> So if the entire USA has always been able to access the 110,119, and 129 why did Dish have satellites at 61, 72 and 77?? Why does the Eastern US need its own satellites?? Whats the difference? isnt this a huge cost to Dish compared to other DBS providers?? I was just curious about the arcs


Your premise is incorrect. 110 and 119 in the SD days were (and are) largely viewable but when HD was added along with the 129 satellite that changed everything. 129 is not easily viewable. As it turns out the Eastern Arc is the one that may be mostly able to be viewed because of the height of the satellites.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

JosephB said:


> 61.5 has never been viable for the west coast.


It was very viable when international channels (and HD later) was on it - I did install a few of dishes around San Jose !


scooper said:


> Dish used to have licenses for 148, 157, and 166, but they are not very desireable for ANYBODY.


It [148w] was desirable for West coast, in California particularly.


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## sabrewulf (Sep 4, 2011)

All I know is when it was only western arc I tried to get Dish and they said it wouldn't work. So it opens the option for Me now.


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