Satellite dish or dome
hi ,I am after information about the different typse of sat ,dish ,I spend a lot of time in france,
witch is the best system ,domed type or dish type ,
is the dome type more aerodynamic,
i want a system with automatic skew ,
also any advice on TV sets to go with them ,I only need a small one say 19 inch ,thanks ,and sorry if this has been answered before but I could not find the thread ,
pops
Comments
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Pops
It depends on how far south you go in France. Whilst a Dome has many advantages in terms of usability in bad weather I doubt that it would be big enough to get a signal more than halfway down through France. A clam style dish of 85cms, especially with autoshew
should work right down to the South of France. Most clam style dishes fold fairly flat against the roof of the motorhome so I don't think it would affect the aerodynamics any more than a Dome.As for TV's, as I have one, my starting point would be an Avtex with a built in Free to Air satellite receiver. Some people think they are too expensive but if you are going to spend £2000+ of a roof mounted dish that seems a bit of a hollow claim!!!
David
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We tour a lot in France and Spain and so far have used an 85cm free standing dish which will give you UK programmes down to the borders of France/Spain.
We are now having an 85cm Oyster full autoskew dish fitted to the roof of the M/H. OH wants to cut down on the setting up and carting it around, we can often just do an overnight stop so setting up can be a faff with free standing, although it is good if
yu are on a site with a lot of trees.As to which TV, purely a personal choice really. We have had a cheapo from Tesco (now in spare bedroom) which worked/works very well, but didn't have 12v capability. So we now have a Cello tv, same as the Avtex but much less price. The Cello has built in
12v/240v, freeview, freesat, Irish freeview, DVD player and a USB port with which you can record and play back programmes.If you read the thread below about Avtex it might help,
Sorry can't do links. just copy and past.
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Oyster fold down IMO, I've had a Caro for many years, you end up with a bigger dish and lower profile, but to be fair you pay a premium for it.
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Can't help you with the question about roof mounted systems, I'm a free standing advocate! But as far as TVs are concerned I'd go for the Avtex . We're had two over the years, only updated to latest model when it came in the package with the van. They are
robust although had some issues with the DVD in the first but this format is all but redundant these days. Sticks or pegs seem to have superseded these. Also , in the first one we had an issue with a faulty remote, never sorted that, was sent back to Avtex
but they denied it ever arriving for repair, can you get the codes these days to program a universal replacement? The latest one, no issues at all!0 -
Hi
Both my TV and Sat are Avtex, the TV was brought from John Lewis because they were the only one's giving three year warranty. The Avtex Snipe Sat was brought from Brownhhills when they were doing one of their 20% off weekends, perfomance wise both are excellent
and have got TV at the aire in Gruissan on the south coast of France after that any further south forget it. The TV is quite expensive compared to others but the Sat is one of the cheapest around compared to others.0 -
Just FYI on recording with an Oyster system as soon as you turn the TV off or on standby the dish retracts , at least with the TV that comes with the dish, may be different with a tv of your own. similarly as soon as you turn the TV on the dish pops up
and tunes into the satellite .0 -
Michael, surely this wouldn't be the case if using (say) a Sky+HD box for recording with an Oyster...often i want the box to be recording but dont want the TV on till later.
if the dish were to drop when turning off the TV, the signal to the Sky box would be lost....
for those with Sky+HD or simlar twin-tuner recording boxes, i suggest they do some reading before diving in for an Oyster.
i thought i read somewhere that one of the feeds from the twin LNB was used to control the Oyster controller and this made recording two channels (or watching one and recording another) 'difficult'......not possible?
i dont have an Oyster so Im not 100% sure of this, but theres plenty of reading out there....
we have a Teleco Smart Flatsat 85cm Twin LNB and this works just like our home system with the Sky+HD box.
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We are having an Oyster dish fitted in a few weeks time so this does concern me a little. We have a Cello tv with inbuilt freesat, we do record programmes at the moment using our free standing dish. If our system was to drop the dish everytime we switch
the tv off or on standby that would be an issue for us. Will be talking to our dealer about this.0 -
We are having an Oyster dish fitted in a few weeks time so this does concern me a little. We have a Cello tv with inbuilt freesat, we do record programmes at the moment using our free standing dish. If our system was to drop the dish everytime we switch
the tv off or on standby that would be an issue for us. Will be talking to our dealer about this.Write your comments here...Ours has the built in Avtex/Oyster TV so its all intergrated, yours will just have the control box that would control the dish so I think it would be OK as your TV would not be controlling anything. The Avtex/Oyster TV that comes
with the system has different software to the normal Avtex TV's and an interface to change countries etc.I would ask when you go to make sure but my gut feeling is it will be fine and a geat system it is too. If we were asked what extras we wanted on the next MH Oyster would be one of the first thing onthe list over an awning we have not used yet (probably
cos we have not been abroad) but we use the TV always in this country.0 -
Living as we do in the UK, the windiest part of Europe, it's a dome for me as it's wind, rain, etc., proof unlike a dish which has to be taken down in high winds / rain.
Yes you loose sat signal a wee bit further north, but unless you're taking your holiday in that small (say 80k) band it really doesn't matter.
As they say, there's b* all to watch anyway most of the time!
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I have had both an Oyster and a Camos. The Camos was easy to remove and swap over when I changed vans, it was also an autoskew and to be honest I never really appreciated much benefit and from what I now read autoskew is not really that effective in smaller dishes. One other issue which effected the camos was rain. Heavy rain would completely shut the signal off, this was not an isolated fault as it happened in both the domes I owned and my friend suffers with the same issue.
The Oyster in the current vanis the 85cm twin LNB. I use a Sky+ Box and have no issues as highlighted by BoleroBoy, perhaps I am just lucky. My dish remains up when the TV is on or off but auto retracts when the handbrake is released
Which do I prefer, both have issues. The Oyster will get me a wider coverage in Europe. However, is effected by wind, but never had a real issue where I have had to stop viewing. However, we did have disturbed viewing with the Camos due to the rain issue more frequently. Based on that I would go for the Oyster.
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