satelliteman

MOVING

2009-12-16T19:10:00.000-08:00

MOVING MY BLOG... Now I'm going to have only one blog instead of the many that I have had up til now... The new location is http://jeffthomann.wordpress.com/

http://www.era.com/property/index.jsp?property=ERA2774027

2009-09-11T06:07:00.001-07:00

Fantastic house for sale!
http://www.era.com/property/index.jsp?property=ERA2774027

Uninstalling ATI All In Wonder 9000 Pro...

2008-07-20T08:03:00.001-07:00

http://www.driverheaven.net/windows-xp-2k-radeon-display-drivers/1893-guide-uninstalling-ati-drivers-winxp.html

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33606840

Also under ATI/Technologies/Support is sometimes an unstall utility that sometimes work, but it's about a 50/50 chance if it'll show up, or work...

Please pray for Jon.

2008-06-27T12:24:00.001-07:00

My cousin Jon Thomann has been in the hospital the last week. He fell down a flight of concrete stairs and did some major damage to his head that required brain surgery. He has not fully become consious yet, but there are indications that he is becoming more active. This has been a trying time and has been hard on all of us.

Please pray for his recovery. If you would like to know more about his current situation, his girlfriend, parents and brother are keeping us all updated with this website/blog:

http://caringbridge.org/visit/jonthomann

If you would like to help out financially, there has been a new Support Fund recently set up. You may send checks to the

Jon Thomann and Family Support Fund
P.O. Box 1262
Columbia MO 65205-1262

For more information on the fund and its purpose, you may contact Cathi Harris at 573-220-6582.

Trick to All In Wonder 9000 Pro.

2008-01-05T13:28:00.000-08:00

I admit it. I don't post here too often. I mainly use this place to post some super useful (at least to me) links and stuff since that sort of thing can be buried deep in search engines and dissappear eventually.

If you ever get your hands on an All-In-Wonder 9000 Pro or similar type ATI video card, you can put yourself in to major dll hell if you are not careful because ATI's latest drivers unfortunately are not what you should use. DO NOT DOWNLOAD THE LATEST DRIVERS - or at least if you have a computer set up like mine. I find the latest drivers actually cause tv lipsync to be way off. Various rumors around the internet claim that ATI blames Microsoft for something in WMDs or something, but honestly, it's just crappy updates from ATI that the haven't ever fixed and don't plan on ever fixing... So if you do ever accidentally install the updates for 9000 pro all-in-wonder, you need to go find your cd, and get read to reinstall it all... but first you have the major headache of uninstalling all the crap you just installed with the latest update. This is a multistep process. Here's where I found the steps originally:
http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33606840

Just for simplicity, and archiving's sake, I'm copying what that says here:
[blockquote]
Guide to Uninstall ATI Drivers Completely!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Alright...here is my way of deleting and installing ATI drivers running Windows XP (Win200 should be the same too).

1. Go into the Control Panel and under the ADD/REMOVE SOFTWARE icon uninstall the ATI MultiMedia software and/or the ATI DVD software.

2. Uninstall the ATI drivers also found in the Add/Remove section. Once removed, it will prompt you to reboot....do so.

3. When returning to windows, the NEW HARDWARE FOUND wizard will come up and will tell you that it has found a new VGA card and will prompt you for drivers. Hit CANCEL!

4. Now, go to START - SEARCH - FOR FILES OR FOLDERS and do a search for all files and folders using the filename ati*.*
This search will normally give you 3 to 4 files found in your c:/windows directory and subdirectories (including the Windows/System directory). Select these files and erase them. Now go to your Recycle Bin and Empty your bin.

5. Next...time to go to your Registry. Go to START -- RUN -- regedit

Here go to key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE -- SYSTEM -- ControlSet001 -- Control -- Video . Here there should be 4 entries. 3 of them are default Windows XP entries and the 4th one is put in by the ATI drivers. Expand each one by one until you see ATI entries. Once found, erase the entire key.

Now repeat the same step above for the ControlSet002 key and the CurrentControlSet Key. Normally, whenever you erase a key in the ControlSet001, XP automatically deletes it in the CurrentControlSet section too. So if the ATI key is not found in the CurrentControlSet section, don't worry about it.
Once all keys are deleted, proceed to the next step.

6. While still in the registry, go to the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE -- SOFTWARE section. Here you should find an ATI Technologies key. Select it and delete it. In that same section, look for an Installed Options key. Expand it and there you should find another ATI Technologies key. Select it and erase it.

7. Still in the registry, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER -- Software and there you should find another ATI technologies key. Select it and erase it. Once all this is done, close the registry. the registry is now clean.

8. Close all windows and reboot.

9. When in windows after the reboot the NEW HARDWARE FOUND WIZARD will pop up again. Cancel that. Now find the new ATI drivers that you have downloaded and extracted and run the SETUP file. Once complete, reboot and you are done. You may want to reinstall your ATI MMC software and DVD software if you use them. DONE!

For all those who do not like going into the registry and rather have an easy to use program to do it for you, you can grab a nifty tool called "RegCleaner" here and it will do it for you without getting your hands dirty in the registry. Follow steps 1 through 4 as stated above, then run RegCleaner to do the rest. Once completed, follow steps 8 and 9 and you are DONE!

If there are errors in this guide or there are things to add or change let me know and I will alter the guide.

Hope this guide helps everyone!
[/blockquote]

Good luck.

I love my all-in-wonder and the drivers and software out of the cd work's fine and dandy. It's just annoying that ATI screwed the world over by releasing crappy update drivers and never fixed the problem. If I had a better computer (mine's only 1.5 ghz with 512 mb ram) the new drivers might, possibly work better, but I highly doubt it since they just made buggy software and never took the time to fix it.

Now that the world is going to atsc this old analog tv card can probably be gotten pretty cheaply on ebay and other places. All you need is one of those funky digital to analog tv converter things put in front of it and you should be good to go. I would get a real atsc tv card, and am working on getting one eventually, but keep getting outbid on ebay. Good luck with your TV viewing and recording on your computer!

Please Stay Tuned...

2007-08-18T05:56:00.000-07:00

I haven't had a lot of time lately to dedicate to this blog, but do plan on adding a lot more useful and information posts... I think I'm going to try to add a lot of really useful links to various online forums and discuss some of the technical issues of getting a free-to-air satellite system set up, do-it-yourself style... Hopefully this will lead to some useful items that someone down the road might actually find helpful.

PLEASE DO check out the links list at the bottom of this page.

8193 trick

2007-06-30T04:19:00.000-07:00

My Pansat 3500 sd has a problem... for some reason I can't make it go between audio and radio when I hit the satellite audio/radio button. In reading some forums and discussion groups on satellite fta reception... I discovered that 8193 is a great video pid that you can scan in for transponders that are solely for satellite radio, and aren't suppossed to really have a video pid. What this does is it fools the fta receiver in to thinking there's something on the video side when there isn't really... and thereby causes it to load the radio channel with no video in to your video channel list instead of your audio channel list... which means you can flip to a radio station on your receiver without having to hit that audio/radio button on your remote, and it just shows up as a normal tv station in the list! For people like me who have broken receivers that have problems going between audio and radio lists this is awesome. This is also a neat trick for any lazy fta reciever owners who have fine working recievers but don't want to have to constantly hit that audio/radio button to jump between audio and radio satellite reception! I'm posting this here because this is a little known secret that a lot of folks who might be first time receiver owners (like me) probably don't know about...

It's possible to get carried away...

2006-12-14T20:25:00.000-08:00

When setting up all of this fta stuff, it's highly possible to go overboard and get carried away with all the options, equipment, and add ons you can put in to your system's setup. I'm getting close to getting to that point.

Prior to now my computer was only pulling in signals from a satellite receiver's tv out, which meant that it could only see whatever channel that the satellite receiver was on, just like a tv or vcr. After this weekend, it'll be able to see all the unencrypted channels on the satellite just like the fta satellite receiver, and what's more, be able to record stuff, just like a tivo or high powered dvd recorder! Better yet, it's better than a tivo or dvd recorder because it records directly to a hard drive that's got 132 gigs on it. Recording in VCD Quality, that gives me over 8 solid days of recording potential (that's 24 hour days!). On top of that, the way that this is being hooked up, via an extra Linear Port on an Invacom Quad LNB, the stuff that the computer does has no effect on what's being watched on the living room tv and vice versa (well, there is a little of an affect in that the living room controls the motor on the dish, and that means the pc can only see whichever satellite the motor is letting the dish look at at that givin point in time, but for the most part, that's ok since most of the time I'll have the dish setting on G10R at 123 Degrees West)

At the moment, I've got a pc that will, after this weekend, be able to pull in satellite signals directly from a lnb on a motorized dish. That dish currently feeds a fta satellite receiver in the living room. The computer pulls in over the air (normal antenna) signals via an all-in-wonder video card at the moment. The computer can send video and audio signals to the tv as well as pick up tv stations. The all-in-wonder sends video signals to a vcr that is hooked up as the in port on an a/b switch going in to the main satellite receiver's antenna in port. Unfortunately, I had trouble getting the audio to come out of the all-in-wonder setup properly to get to the vcr so I made due and worked around that problem by using stereo extension cords coming out of the computer's sound card.

Those extension cords (about (3) 20-foot cords - cheap buys at Radio Shack - and yes, you can make them go outside just like coax... just make sure to use lots of electric tape to seal the connectors tight) send audio to a Creative Audigy Soundblaster External card that I use to get dolby digital out of the main satellite receiver. Yes, that external sound card works fine as a stand alone doohicky to pick up dolby digital without needing to be plugged in to a computer's usb hub or ports... Really amazing little gadget. Surprised they don't make them anymore.

Anyways, I keep the extension cords at the Audigy unhooked most of the time unless I want to watch something in the main tv at the living room that the computer's looking at... then I have to flip the a/b switch, which turns off the normal atenna in going to the main living room and also plug in the stereo extension cords to audigy's line in... Also need to turn off satellite receiver to keep there from being two sounds from two channels going over the speakers coming off the audigy. This setup allows me to not only see tv on the computer, but watch and hear stuff that's playing on the computer in the living room... Really nice now that nbc and some others are putting tv shows on the air in case you missed them. The other night my wife and I enjoyed watching Heroes this way off of NBC's website. We'd missed it the night before and hadn't recorded it on vcr. This is technology that's very awesome!

Anyways, more to post and clarify what all I'm talking about in future posts, but now it's getting late, and I'm getting tired, so off to bed I go, to dream of the tv watching possibilities...

Now I'm a DVB World User

2006-12-14T20:12:00.000-08:00

Just got DVB World USB box today! My wife got it for me for Christmas, among other things. I'm going to wire to the lnb this weekend.

Been doing fta a few months now.

2006-10-26T19:14:00.000-07:00

Howdy. My name's Jeff. I've been doing Free-to-air satellite reception for a few months now. It's a really cool hobby, where you use over the counter equipment (well, mostly - probably won't find some of the stuff in a local hardware store, but should be able to find it online at ebay and other places if you don't have a local store that sells the stuff ) to receive free, unencrypted satellite signals so you can watch free tv! It's amazing what's all up there in the sky, in the little manmade satellites, ready for anyone to pick up with the right equipment. I've had my fair share of frustrations with this hobby, but I really love it, and it's really not that complicated either. If I can get it up and going, I know almost anyone can....

It is a little complicated at first, but it's a blast once you figure out what's what, where to find good info, and when you start tons of amazing free tv channels!

It's a bit of a misnomer that it's really free... you do have to pay for the equipment to receive the channels, but once you have that, it's free, just like picking up your local channels with some bunny ears on top of your tv is! That's right, there's lots and lots of free tv channels that you can get without having to pay for any sort of monthly subscription to Dish Network, Direct Tv, a Cable Company, or anyone else!!!

You WON'T get all the channels that you get with those subscriptions, but will get lots of tv channels nevertheless, and overall, the entire amount of channels you can pick up free is really right about equal to the number of channels a cheap cable package would get you, give or take a few movie channels and some other stuff. I plan to use this blog to give you some of the ins and outs of fta, and all the fun that you can have with it.

By the way, if you ever visit http://www.satelliteguys.us, I post there with the username mastermesh. That's the BEST online forum site to find out about the legal free-to-air satellite hobby here in the United States. Lots of other forums exist online that claim to be talking about free-to-air, but some of those sites are talking about hacking... which is using bastardized free-to-air equipment that's been all hacked up with junk software and/or hardware to receive encrypted signals as unencrypted signals. HACKING is ILLEGAL!!!

Don't do it... It can get you in to some MAJOR TROUBLE! I don't plan to discuss hacking here, and would advise you to never think about trying to hack as it's big time bad and lots of companies and local, state, and federal agencies are cracking down on it more and more. It can land you jail time, and/or a lot of fines to pay to fcc and others, and legal fees to various companies like Echostar, and others... DON'T HACK SATELLITE EQUIPMENT!!!

Instead, get in to the free-to-air hobby to enjoy free, unencrypted tv! It's fun, it's legal, and it's a blast!

More posts will come in a couple of days. Stay tuned.