I have a Dish Network dish at my house left by the previous owners. I got a ViewSat receiver and scanned for available channels, but the only unencrypted signals I get are a repeating Dish Network commercial calling me a "satellite pirate" and pay-per-view listings.
The problem with using a Dish Network dish is three-fold:
1. Dish uses circular polarization, not linear (with their basic setup)
2. Dish operates in the DBS portion of the Ku band which is higher in frequency than most of the unencrypted stuff
3. The 18" or 20" dish is just too small as it not only isn't capable of pulling in a sufficient signal on most of the satellites, but also its beamwidth isn't narrow enough to prevent two adjacent satellites from being received at the same time and interfering with each other (2 degree separation versus 9 degree separation)
Don't they scramble those signals?
The uplink truck news feeds usually aren't. They're typically DVB 4:2:0 in the clear. There's also some analogue unscrambled feeds. The good sporting events are now on C band HD which is a little more difficult but not impossible. There's people out there who can pick up any unencrypted feed out there, whether it be DVB 4:2:0 or 4:2:2, DVB-S2, 8PSK, HD, etc. That's going to run you a little more than the $100 FTA receiver and someone's old Directway or Primestar dish. C-band dishes are still out there to be had. A good idea would be to put an ad in your local classifieds or Craigslist saying "Satellite Dish Removal Service -- will remove 12' dish and under for $20" and you'll likely get a few calls with people paying you to take their dish home.
Post some of these numbers
There's a bunch of numbers on FTA. There's a couple live call in shows, and this Farsi speaking carpet salesperson who screams all day pinning the VU meter, and these uplink trucks. Here's two that I just captured:
AMC 5 (79W) 12177 MHz H 20500 vpid 0101 apid 0102
"New for 2009! NYN's Mobile Uplink Vehicle. You are watching Channel One. Call us to rent now! NYN East 518.443.5333 NYN Uplink 518.453.9521
www.nyn.suny.edu"
Galaxy 28 (89W) 11955 MHz V 19532 vpid 0408 apid 0356
"ABC News Acquisition Center xx:xx:xx LIVE CHANNEL 2 24/7 Phone: 212.456.1700 Galaxy 28/K13 Channel 2 Data Rate: 27.0 Symbol Rate: 19.532 FEC 3/4"
I'll post more later. Right now is an odd time for live news feeds -- slow news day, late at night. It's great to watch the news people rehearsing. Some are really mean to their crew. Some just B.S. about whatever. Sometimes you hear them give personal info like cell phone numbers. Once I saw ABC reporter Gloria Riviera doing a live remote from Florida somewhere reporting on a hurricane and she talked about boozing it up and all these hot guys...
