Do I need a New Satellite Dish

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

I have a 20 year old twin LBN satellite dish, and have just upgraded to a 4K TV. Do I need to change my satellite dish to the latest?

wongataa

If your Sky reception has not degraded then no. Sky don't broadcast in 4K though. There are no 4K TV broadcasts in the UK. The only way to get 4K content is over the internet at the moment.

almillar

SD, HD and 4K are all just ones and zeros when they arrive at the dish (or aerial, or through Cable), so no, as long as you have good signal, you will continue to do so.
You realise that your 4K TV isn't much good until you have 4K content on it?

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

yes understand that no 4K content yet, just our dish is so old now and on our new tv Samsung UE55JU7000 which has Freesat the picture breaks up

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

Should add, used to have sky years ago, cancelled and purchased a Humax Foxsat HDR 4 years ago, so have used the dish for freesat not sky.
Picture quality ok with the Humax but with the New TV the picture breaks up, so have disconnected and gone back to the Humax box.
So was just wondering if the dish needed replacing.

jbainbridge

After 20 years you probably would see an improvement in replacing the dish and cables.

almillar

the picture breaks up

The vital missing information!
Dish maybe could do with being replaced, LNB could be slightly misaligned, or your wiring from dish to TV mightn't be right, or could be old.
Can I check how you're connected?
Should be 2 cables (or shotgun cable, 2 together) from dish into Humax box. Then a short cable from LNB out on Humax, into TV. OR maybe you've got 3 lines from the dish, going straight into the 2 inputs on the Humax, and 1 on the TV.
Either setup is fine. First one WILL mess around with your TV picture if you're recording 2 things on the Humax. If this is the only time the breakup happens, a dish won't help.
Check the signal both on the box and the TV, and check that all cabling is secure etc. If the Humax is getting a good picture the dish can't be THAT bad.

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

almillar
We have twin cable coming into the house from the dish, connected to either the humax or tv. Have used the Humax for years as old TV had freeview only. Signal on Humax is 100% Strength 80% quality. Change from Humax to TV and it is approx (as all channels give a different reading) 80% Strength 30% quality.
So not sure why the difference in signal strength and quality would be so different between the 2 devices. Was also unsure about the picture quality on the Humax, case being what you get used to, used for so long
that just got used to the picture, so one reason for trying it on the new TV. Only difference I can see is I believe could be wrong that Humax is Astra, TV Eutelsat, did find at first one channel that looked better on tv than humax but lost other channels so retuned and cannot get the channel back with the good reception now. So gone back to the Humax box for viewing, a pain to keep changing the cables over. Did consider getting a splitter so I could connect both devices to the dish but was advised against this.

almillar

OK a basic question that I should have asked - What Humax box are we talking about? I've got a Foxsat HDR. If you've got an HD box, and you've connected it to your TV via HDMI cable, you should have an excellent picture on HD channels.
If you have a similar box to me, you should have 2 LNB in, which you connect the 2 dish cables to (which I think you've got), THEN there should be an output, which you can connect to your TV. You should definitly do this intstead of constantly swapping. F-Connectors are a hassle to connect once, never mind all that faffing! You can't split sat cable, you were correctly advised.
Get some decent coax cable and 2 F-Connectors - so that you can have a cable like the white one here
http://www.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!/accs/WF65_cable.htm#twiston
(that site is sat cure . co.uk don't know why it's blocked!)
If you're not confident with making cables get that pre made one. That site has plenty of advice for making the connections. Fit it CAREFULLY, ONCE, and see what the signal is like

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

Same as you a Foxsat HDR. Would you say a new Humax HD version would produce a better picture than the Foxsat HDR?

almillar

Nope. They'll both receive the same 1080i picture, and they'll both send it down an HDMI cable. The TV can play around with the picture, but often lots of the features are gimmicks which can actually make the picture worse.
The improvement you would get from a newer Humax Freesat box would just be better software, with nicer looking menus and bigger hard drive. You've currently got 320GB or 500GB I guess. Or if you get a freetime box, that's Freesat plus integrated catch up (iPlayer etc), in the same way as YouView is Freeview with integrated catch up.