New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

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randomium
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Joined: Wed Apr 29, 2020 6:56 pm

New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by randomium »

Hello everyone...I used to enjoy playing C-band satellite back in the early 90's. I didn't have the money to flat out buy a system so I had to trade and buy things bit by bit. I had a lot of fun trying to figure out how to get things working! Fast forward to now and I'm a semi-retired IT guy who has a rekindled spark of interest in the current FTA movement. So...what is the current "best" GTmedia reciever to play around with? I love gadgets and tinkering so combo units are fine with me.

Thanks!

STRETCH
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Location: West Midlands UK

Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by STRETCH »

Welcome to the forum, were in the world is your location, do you wish to receive channels from the (C band)or the (KU band).
Depends on what you want to do, and were you are located , decode channels via softcam, you could use a V8 NOVA ORANGE, other members will say use a another model.
Have a look around the forum, this may help in the way you wish to go.

Den

randomium
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Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by randomium »

Thank you... I'm located in North Carolina. I would probably start with C-band and then expand into Ku later as I get a grasp of things. Main difficulty I'm going to have is getting a good look at the satellite arc. We have a lot of trees to our South and West.

STRETCH
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Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by STRETCH »

In that case go to (dish pointer), put in your location and a satellite that you know that you can receive, put the cross to were you would put your dish,
the info given is, skew of lnb/angle of dish/any obstruction etc.
This will give you some info to be going on with, other members in your neck of the woods will be along with more info etc.

Den

snowwalker
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Joined: Sat Apr 04, 2020 12:53 am

Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by snowwalker »

I have been in the C-Band hobby for quite a while and have tried various brands of FTA receivers. I find that the cheaper ones tend to have flaky software so fewer problems with better quality receivers. I have used the GTMedia Golden, Nova Orange and Nova Blue, so for North America, the Nova Blue seems to work best. The problem I have with these receivers is that my HD tv is an old plasma, so the auto detect of PAL and NTSC formats doesn't work, so I have to manually change it. The default is PAL which means I have to connect to a video (RCA) input to make the change. Not much of a problem really, since it only happens whenever I do a firmware upgrade.

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Feralkiwi
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Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by Feralkiwi »

snowwalker wrote:
Wed May 06, 2020 6:47 pm
I have been in the C-Band hobby for quite a while and have tried various brands of FTA receivers. I find that the cheaper ones tend to have flaky software so fewer problems with better quality receivers. I have used the GTMedia Golden, Nova Orange and Nova Blue, so for North America, the Nova Blue seems to work best. The problem I have with these receivers is that my HD tv is an old plasma, so the auto detect of PAL and NTSC formats doesn't work, so I have to manually change it. The default is PAL which means I have to connect to a video (RCA) input to make the change. Not much of a problem really, since it only happens whenever I do a firmware upgrade.
There is a setting in the menu to set the video output of the box to PAL, NTSC or AUTO. If you select the one that your TV uses, then you will have no more issues, as the STB will do the conversions.
I use this to stop the TV from changing from PAL to NTSC, which blacks out the feed for a moment when you change from one channel type to another on the STB.

Owen
Dishes; 3x3m, 2.4m and 4.1m, 10+ ku, 2 movers, USARLS. V8 Combo, Pro, V8 Golden, Nova V8Pro2, GTC, Super.V7HDs, Combo and V7s V7Plus Finder, Finder-Meter V8X / UHD V7Pro GT/XCombo. Sats 100.5E to 177W. I'm a Sat hobbyist who helps out.

randomium
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Joined: Wed Apr 29, 2020 6:56 pm

Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by randomium »

Thanks for the info. GTmedia currently offers several models of the Nova...what is the main difference between Orange, blue, etc.?

Thanks!

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Feralkiwi
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Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by Feralkiwi »

The Nova Blue / Orange, Blue has AV plugs, the red white and yellow and the Orange has a Scart plug that you can add an adapter back to AV plugs.

There is the new unit, the V8X that is now for sale and is still in testing. It has a Scart connection.

Owen
Dishes; 3x3m, 2.4m and 4.1m, 10+ ku, 2 movers, USARLS. V8 Combo, Pro, V8 Golden, Nova V8Pro2, GTC, Super.V7HDs, Combo and V7s V7Plus Finder, Finder-Meter V8X / UHD V7Pro GT/XCombo. Sats 100.5E to 177W. I'm a Sat hobbyist who helps out.

randomium
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Joined: Wed Apr 29, 2020 6:56 pm

Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by randomium »

Thank you everyone...I ended up ordering a V8 Blue. I'm looking forward to seeing what it can do!

etlam34
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Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by etlam34 »

Do you already have a dish? I have a freesat v7hd and it’s been performing great ever since i bought it 3 years ago. I also have a linkbox 9000i but prefer the v7 for true fta.

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cpr43
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Re: New member...wanting to get into the FTA hobby

Post by cpr43 »

etlam34 wrote:
Tue May 12, 2020 2:30 am
Do you already have a dish? I have a freesat v7hd and it’s been performing great ever since i bought it 3 years ago. I also have a xxxxxxxxx but prefer the v7 for true fta.

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