rebooting

[sandycole1607]

My husband and I just bought a used directv system and we found out that it had been hit before. We rebooted it and it worked for a little while but since the hurricane came through, it has not worked. We attempted to reboot and nothing has worked. Still says "searching for satellite signal, please wait." Any suggestions???

[megados]

It's possible the wind has moved your dish, or possibly damaged the cable. I'd try looking at those first. :)

[sandycole1607]

Originally posted by megados
It's possible the wind has moved your dish, or possibly damaged the cable. I'd try looking at those first. :)


We've tried both of those things and they are both fine. We moved the dish and it still will not register anything.

[jjsmoke]

The most freq. problem that causes your system to loose its signal is when your LNB (the tip at the end of the arm of the dish) gets hit by lightning. First try to switch satt.entry points located where your signal strength is. If that does not work try replacing your LNB.
Those problems and your dish being moved are the only signal problems I know of.

Or the hurricane could still be causing interferance still.

Hope everything works out, If not just call dss for service.

[tumor]

Searching for satellite signal is a problem unrelated to the programming on the card.

Some 3Ms will show this message on certain channels briefly before the video comes in, but I think this is different.

Hurricane? Your dish moved or the LNB went bad.

[eeprom7777]

Originally posted by sandycole1607
... We moved the dish and it still will not register anything. How do you know that the dish is aimed correctly now?

[megados]

OK let's assume the dish is in the correct position. The next test(s) you want to make are using a voltmeter, check the voltage at the sat-in connector on the back of the receiver. from the center to ground, you should be getting ~13 - 18 VDC. If there's no voltage present, or it's remaining high, (19 - 22 VDC) then the problem's in the receiver. If it's normal, (varying between 13- 18 VDC) then you want to check it at the dish. you should get this same reading at the end of the Co-ax that's ordinarilly connected to the LNB. again, from the center pin to the outer sheath, you should get the 13-18 VDC. If not the probelm is in the cable, and if it is, and the dish is in fact aimed correctly, then the problem is likely the LNB itself.

Hope this helps :)

[eeprom7777]

Nice! (I hope they make it back for that..)

While your here...

I was just checking one like this and the sat in measured 13.0, thought it was low but seemed to recall them exact figures (13-18vdc) or maybe it seemed that most I had checked were always closer to 18.0. At any rate it's in the ird. Is there some power regulator or something in that circuit thats a common deal, or this being low or borderline might indicate some common deal that you know of? (Its an ebox)? I'd appreciate any tip's ya might know of :)

[megados]

To start off, yes all the receivers have a regulator that is used to supply the voltage to the LNB. It's variation is how it switches polarity. I forget which, but it's like 13V for odd transponders, and 18 for even, or vice-versa. If you have the receiver on, and go up and down the channels, it should switch back and forth between voltages. Then you'd know if the regulator is working. Different receivers use different regulator components, so it's not a case of one-size-fits-all; they all perform more or less the same function though: that of controlling the voltage to the LNB.

There's also one possibility that I had forgotten to mention also, and that's if the regulator is working, cable and LNB are good, but the IF chip in the receiver quits. That can cause the searching for signal thing too, even with a good setup. It's not common, but it does happen on occasion.

[eeprom7777]

Thanks bud! I appreciate the tips, I'll check it out a little closer.