How Satellite TV Works

Before you install Satellite TV system, you should have a basic understanding of the satellite TV transmission. We know that conventional TV signals travel through the air from the transmitter to out antenna. In a similar way, they travel on the cable as well.

So why can't these signals travel to us from space too? Well the fact is they can. Predictably, military was the first to use satellites for communications. As the technology came into civilian domain, telephone, radio and TV service providers began to exploit it to increase their reach.

When a satellite is placed into a geo-synchronous orbit, it stays fixed over a spot on the earth at a height of approximately 36,000 km. If we now send a radio signal to this satellite, we can make the satellite receive, amplify and retransmit this signal back to the earth. Since the satellite is so high, its footprint or viewing area can be very large and thus a large region can receive the signals that it sends down.



The satellite TV service provider is not the same company as those that produces the actual programs. It is the job of the service provider to set up the up linking stations to beam the data to the satellite. Before this is done, they compress the data or the satellite TV programs to reduce the bandwidth required and encrypt it so that non-paying users do not get free service.

At the user end, the user buys a satellite TV dish antenna, a receiver and other equipment that is required to convert the compressed and encoded signal back into a form that your TV uses.

The real magic in the satellite TV system occurs because the receiver is in contact with the TV service provider. Most satellite TV receivers have an in-built hard drives (similar to the one in your PC). Based on the model, it can store about 100 hours of video data. Now when you go on a holiday and tell your system to capture all episodes on Discovery Wings, the system swings into action.

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Al Falaq Arsendatama (c) 2005

http://www.satellitetv-choice.com

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