DBSTalk Forum banner

Rain fade all day long...what a drag.

3K views 40 replies 26 participants last post by  russdog 
#1 ·
Rain fade since 8:30 am here in mid-Michigan. Other than a few breaks I haven't been able to watch more than 3 hours aggregate of any HD programming today.

I've been a D* customer for 11 months and this is the worst I have ever seen. Is anyone else in the area south of Lansing MI experiencing this misery?

Also, this is the first steady rain I've experienced in this home. Is it possible that my dish was not aligned properly from the outset?

I guess this is one instance where I am glad I don't get HD locals through D* because the OTA HD is all I have had all day.
 
#27 ·
heisman said:
Been without sat service for most of 3 days now with all the rain. Thank god I pay Comcast for basic service so I could watch that great game my boys played last night in LA. :crying_sa
I think you need to get your dish realigned. Honestly. Been getting pounded with rain from Ike all afternoon and my HD channels are in and out but my SD are strong as ever.
 
#28 ·
russdog said:
How great were the signal strengths at installation time?

Here's why I ask: I live where tropical storms and hurricanes are a normal feature of life. When my original installation happened, dense wet cloud cover would cause me to lose signal for extended periods. I then redid the installation myself (required getting the top part of the mast exactly plumb, which the installer failed to do) and the problem disappeared. Since then, I might lose signal for 20 minutes at a time, maybe 4 times per year. With my recent upgrade with Slimline-5, the installer took proper care and got me signal strength ranging from 96 to 100, depending on the sat (he was kinda surprised about the 100 ;-)

So FWIW, based on my own experience, I would think that if you don't have at least mid-90's signal strength on a clear day, then you're asking for wet-cloud signal loss. Of course, maybe you have that already and the recent cloud cover in your area is a freak thing.
Signal strengths were all very high at time of install. I will check them again on the next clear day.
 
#29 ·
Most rain in Chicago since records started being kept, 1871 I think. My neighborhood is at 9" plus right now.

I had rainfade nearly all day yesterday but NOT on the locals. I assume since these come in on spotbeams that they just had enough signal to come in OK for the most part.

Bottom line, this was the worst I've ever seen in 10+ years of having DirecTV. It did suck, but I don't expect to see anything like this again... ever.
 
#31 ·
GTLYON said:
I gotta tell you, I am just very glad I bought an am21. Here in Grand Rapids my HD locals kept fading in and out, but with my am21 I didn't miss a single snap of the Lions arse-whipping by the Packers.
God, the Lions need help.:nono2:
Greg
Kitna experienced some major rain fade that last 5 minutes... :eek2: :eek2: :eek2:
 
#32 ·
smithrh said:
Most rain in Chicago since records started being kept, 1871 I think. My neighborhood is at 9" plus right now.

I had rainfade nearly all day yesterday but NOT on the locals. I assume since these come in on spotbeams that they just had enough signal to come in OK for the most part.
in my chicago burb, i literally have 6-8 inches of standing water in my yard (fortunately not in my basement like many of my neighbors!) and I only had one 5-10 min rain fade event on the CONUS HD maybe around 1pm saturday, otherwise it held up like a champ! SD locals were gone about a minute.
 
#33 ·
Redlinetire said:
Since that's a made up statistic, I'd say it's 'worth' nothing. :lol:

But we have had a ton of steady rain here too, been watching mostly OTA today.
Well, any statistics probably won't compare the cable in your area with satellite in your area, anyway.

What is your experience, and those of your neighbors?

Around here, cable goes out 3-4 times a year for a couple of days at a time. It would take a lot of rain fade to equal that.
 
#35 ·
Very little rain fade. Chicago had almost 7 inches on sat., but they didn't add friday or sunday. It rained friday heavy to moderate here starting before 5 am. and it rained most of sunday. I would say maybe 10-11 inches for 3 days total. Not the worst rain I've seen here. I did checksignals one time and they were bad, mostly inthe 50 to 60 range. I don't know how I was getting anything! Will check today when I get home.
 
#37 ·
During the remnants of Ike on Sunday morning, I had zeroes across the board on the 99/103 sats. The 101 was in the 70's, so we just turned off hide HD duplicates. It did the same thing with the remnants of Gustav. My dish usually has 99 and 103 around 80 and the 101 around 95 on a clear day.
 
#38 ·
putty469 said:
During the remnants of Ike on Sunday morning, I had zeroes across the board on the 99/103 sats. The 101 was in the 70's, so we just turned off hide HD duplicates. It did the same thing with the remnants of Gustav. My dish usually has 99 and 103 around 80 and the 101 around 95 on a clear day.
The fact that you're getting 95 on some sats but only 80 on others sounds suspect to me. I had a similar issue when the original installer did not install the mast properly. It was a mast-installation issue, not a dish-aiming issue. Unless the top part of the mast is exactly plumb, it is impossible to aim the dish properly. Once I re-did it, the signal strength from all the sats was within 5 of each other.

Before I fixed it, I had rain-fade issues fairly frequently. Once I fixed it, they became both very rare (just a couple times per year under very dense and wet clouds) and very brief (maybe 20-30 minutes each).

I recently had a Slimline-5 installed, and this time the installer was great. When I told him of my concerns about getting the mast right, he told me that he was required to get signal strength no lower than mid-90's on *all* sats as part of dish installation. Mine are all between 96 and 100. (I live on the Gulf Coast, and maybe being so far south means I get stronger signals in general, I don't know anything about that.) The installer verified that 95% of the issue is installing the mounting mast properly.
 
#39 ·
paulman182 said:
Well, any statistics probably won't compare the cable in your area with satellite in your area, anyway.

What is your experience, and those of your neighbors?

Around here, cable goes out 3-4 times a year for a couple of days at a time. It would take a lot of rain fade to equal that.
I was just pointing out that I don't believe the statistic that was repeated.

3 to 5% downtime for cable (over a year) would be 11 to 18 days.
1% for satellite would be 3 or 4 days.

I wouldn't doubt that cable is less reliable (as your experience shows) but I think for the majority of people that's not their experience (for either cable or satellite). I rarely hear people say "I got satellite because cable was going down all the time". People switch for quality, selection, price, Sunday Ticket, etc but not reliability in my experience.

But for me, in my area, cable has been pretty reliable. In my last stint with cable(two years) I never lost signal as far as I know. But the DVR did stop working for two days due to some software glitch on their end. Not that you could really tell with the crappy Moto box they offered. :lol:
 
#40 ·
Rain Fade after a recent installation = check the mast bolts. Ifd you see skid marks on the side of the base the mast has moved......put it back where it was when it was tuned. Tighten without breaking the bolts

Sometimes that is all it is.

Next...look for water in the fittings...just shake the wiring with someone watching the screen.

Joe
 
#41 ·
Redlinetire said:
I was just pointing out that I don't believe the statistic that was repeated.

3 to 5% downtime for cable (over a year) would be 11 to 18 days.
1% for satellite would be 3 or 4 days.

I wouldn't doubt that cable is less reliable (as your experience shows) but I think for the majority of people that's not their experience (for either cable or satellite). I rarely hear people say "I got satellite because cable was going down all the time". People switch for quality, selection, price, Sunday Ticket, etc but not reliability in my experience.

But for me, in my area, cable has been pretty reliable. In my last stint with cable(two years) I never lost signal as far as I know. But the DVR did stop working for two days due to some software glitch on their end. Not that you could really tell with the crappy Moto box they offered. :lol:
I don't know what the accurate stats might be.
But I do know that rain fade does not require dealing with crappy customer service to fix it.
All you have to do is wait for the wet, dense clouds to move on by. No service call required.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top