Again I moved the dish to what might be a better place. The signal strength meter now alternates between nothing at all, and around 70% (which is quite strong). Sometimes, even, a lock is established, but it isn't good enough (or long enough) to have yet read the time from the satellite, never mind the channel list!
Theory? I'm wondering if the position of the sun is having some effect on the trees that the dish 'sees' through; though to be honest because of the dryness the willow trees aren't exactly covered in leaves.
This is, sadly, the awful thing about digital. Up until recently the reception was pretty good in the evening and at night (it tended to drop out around lunchtime for the non-BBC channels), but now... so little.
Why is this awful? It is because digital error corrects. The signal could have been getting worse and worse over this past week, and on September 1st it got so bad that the Digibox has given up. I wouldn't see this. What I'd see is a transition from a nice clear movie to my favourite message - No satellite signal is being received...
So... <sigh> I guess we're back to this $#!+ again!
The Digibox is 'dead' again (I know I shouldn't call it 'dead', but...). Inside, the signal strength is about a third. Outside, directly connected to the dish, the strength is full bar. Pointed to Sky/BBC and pointed to the older birds at 19.2°E shows me the exact same thing - a good signal strength (the picture is PERFECT in analogue!) but the box refuses to lock. No signal quality whatsoever.
I have used the correct symbol rate and FEC settings to no avail. For the hell of it, I worked through all of the FECs on both supported symbol rates.
Nada, nothing, zip, rien.
I tried a direct access to three or four channels on 28.2°E, and I tried directly accessing every one of my shorter list of 19.2°E channels twice.
Does this look familiar? Are you having a spot of déja vu? Because I sure am!
Try clicking here to read September 2004. Now, can somebody explain what's going on!?!?!?