alright, so no "need" to change my setup. So here's what is likely a tougher question. Any likelihood that a 1k.4 dish would provide a more stable reception, with less rain issues???
for some history, my initial dish install was a 500 dish (don't recall what it was called exactly) for 110/119, with a 501/301 in about 1999/2000 timeframe. I was nervous, but found the signal to be super. i recall some really nasty storms, including a really bad Nor'easter that blew thru in like 2001 and i think I lost signal for 10 minutes over the few days it was going thru.
Around 2004 (whenever that dern 921 came out) I upgraded to HD, added a 61.5 single dish. Immediately and ever since, I have gotten noticeably worse rain fade issues. It's to the point now, that I've considering switching to FIOS or other options to eliminate the rain issues. In the past year, I've had multiple recordings get jacked up due to rain caused signal loss. And these aren't nasty, trees bending blow hard storms, these are little drizzlers (granted, in my area, all rain storms cover the entire sky, so it's hard to tell what's going on up top) with light rain and a little wind. Most aren't even T-storms.
I've had Dish peeps out a couple times, and my dish's always seem to be aimed correctly. My signal strengths are usually well over 100 on a clear day, but I do recall the last time I had Dish out, they asked me to check when it was a rainy day, and I had gone from a 120'ish signal to a sub 80 on a day with a light rain. I've always felt something had to have changed when I was upgraded to HD. I don't have paperwork to know, but I'd swear the tech did replace my LNB unit at that time, which has made me wonder if the newer LNB's are not as good as the old ones, or something else changed that makes them more susceptible to rain? or perhaps i've had bad luck with the techs that came out to 'align' and verify my dishes??
I've read too many recent posts with people stating how well their units are performing in the rain, so I'm really curious as to what might be messing me up. I even thought some tress might have gotten in the way, so I had them topped a year or so ago to remove branches near the path of the dish, made no difference that I can tell. Then again, it's not like I loose signal on windy days, only rainy ones (or snowy ones).
Any thoughts??
Thanks
