DSTV Questions - Technical

[gboy]

i have 2 questions that have come up.

1. How much is the satelight Rental Every month that Dstv uses.

2. If it gets knocked out buy something would we be affected, and for how long, is there a back up that they can move in.

just some interesting facts for the next Braai.

 

[Leno]

very hard to tell what their rental is, they must get some sort of volume discount etc when buying whole transponders

i've seen 1mbit on satellite go for about $2000/month

They supposed to run a channel at 2mbit (Mpeg?) but the quality of some of the channels (pixelation) leaves me to wonder about that

Guesstimate on the above, 134 (seen on bouquet scan) or so video channels (no idea how much audio takes) * 2mbit * $2000/mbit = $536 000 pm

Their channel feeds probably come in via C Band, and from a few diff satellite's so no idea on those, to be safe add another $536 000 ?

im on local only now or i would have given you the url for a year or 2 back where one of the big us satellites died.. they sorted that out pretty quickly with another sat but i dont think there is that much spare capacity on other sats that have transponders pointed our way

 

[TheREV]

In a pinch, they could use Panamsat 4.
AFAIK, currently they use 10 with 7 as a backup.

There's also an Intelsat floating around with spare capacity.

 

[adsl3g]

In a pinch, they could use Panamsat 4.
AFAIK, currently they use 10 with 7 as a backup.

There's also an Intelsat floating around with spare capacity.

Hmmm... AFAIK, Panamsat 4 was relocated so your dish would have to be re-aligned. My guess is that the satellites are monitored on earth and if they see that it is drifting off course - like what happend to PAS 4 - they would launch a replacement. Unless a piece of space junk knocks it out of the sky, I think they do have their bases covered. If the latter happens, they will have a problem - I do not know what the capacity of PAS 7 is but I don't think it could handle the additional load from PAS 10.
The backhauls are via C-Band - Myself and a group of other people went to MIH for a tour a few years back and the whole setup was quite impressive. Actually makes me wonder how the h$ll they manage to have adverts at 2 times the sound of the program.... its just bad monitoring on their part.
I know that the cost of a transponder - this was also a few years ago - ran at US$ 350 000 per month. A single transponder can manage a few channels depending on the bitrate used - so the cost per month is quite high.

 

[gboy]

wow, thanks it must be quite a mission, to run a station like that.

interesting to hear that the PAS 4 drifted, was it distroyed or did they just leve it up ther.

 

[Ricard]

Hmmm... AFAIK, Panamsat 4 was relocated so your dish would have to be re-aligned. My guess is that the satellites are monitored on earth and if they see that it is drifting off course - like what happend to PAS 4 - they would launch a replacement. Unless a piece of space junk knocks it out of the sky, I think they do have their bases covered. If the latter happens, they will have a problem - I do not know what the capacity of PAS 7 is but I don't think it could handle the additional load from PAS 10.
The backhauls are via C-Band - Myself and a group of other people went to MIH for a tour a few years back and the whole setup was quite impressive. Actually makes me wonder how the h$ll they manage to have adverts at 2 times the sound of the program.... its just bad monitoring on their part.
I know that the cost of a transponder - this was also a few years ago - ran at US$ 350 000 per month. A single transponder can manage a few channels depending on the bitrate used - so the cost per month is quite high.

Pas4 was moved, it didnt drift. Many ISP's using PAS4 now.. even e-TV is on the bird
http://www.lyngsat.com/intel4.html (Panamsat was bought by Intelsat - so PAS7/10 are now Intelsat 7/10)

The PAS 4 Indian Ocean Region satellite experienced the failure of its primary SCP (Space Control Processor) in November 1998, though it continues to provide normal service on its backup SCP . PanAmSat plans to launch PAS 10 in May to serve as the replacement for PAS 4 at 68.5°E.