DH & I are considering purchasing a Vu-Qube for the RV and are wondering if any of you have one and if you are pleased with it. Pros and cons, please??? Also what service do you use---Dish or Direct?

Janie

There have been a couple of threads on the forum that included references and links to the Vu Qube. Use the FIND command above.

We purchased a Vu-Qube in Feb. 08.
Installed a few says later, it did not work, so called the folks like there instructions said, after 2 different calls, they decided our Vu-Qube was defective. We are waiting on a replacement to be UPS to us. WE WILL SEE.
Oh yes we have Direct in our home
Very happy with Direct.

One of my concerns would be theft since it is so small.

My Directv at home has been screwed up for two weeks. The audio keeps cutting out. They say they are aware of the problem and will have it fixed in a week. We'll see.

the signal gain of a dish is proportional to the size. The Vu Cube won't have nearly as much gain as the standard size dish since it is so much smaller.

I don't know how much of a problem that will be, but I think there will be some locations where it will be an issue.

Up date on our Vu-Qube
King dome shipped it today, now we will see when it arrives. So far took them a week to ship since our phone call.

I was considering Vu-Qube for a while but decided against for the following reasons.
1. The Vu-Qube antenna is smaller than the 36” satellite dishes we are used to. My 36” dish quickly looses signal in inclement weather. The signal strength on a Vu-Qube be affected even faster.
2. The Vu-Qube points to one satellite at a time. Dishnet mostly has two, 110 and 119 plus they are going to 129 for HD. The last HD DirectTV installation I saw had three LNBs.

quote:

Originally posted by Nyles:
I was considering Vu-Qube for a while but decided against for the following reasons.
1. The Vu-Qube antenna is smaller than the 36” satellite dishes we are used to. My 36” dish quickly looses signal in inclement weather. The signal strength on a Vu-Qube be affected even faster.
2. The Vu-Qube points to one satellite at a time. Dishnet mostly has two, 110 and 119 plus they are going to 129 for HD. The last HD DirectTV installation I saw had three LNBs.

But, how many satellites can you watch at a time?
All this stuff is a trade off...you pay your money...you take your chances.

The dishes keep getting smaller...cause the satellites are getting more powerful on the downlink.

Quote--But, how many satellites can you watch at a time?[/QUOTE]

Usually just one, except for those who can record a program while watching another. The biggest problem is if you channel surf alot (why are you looking at me?!!). Different channels are on different transponders, sometimes on different satellites. We have an automatic rooftop unit that has to toggle between satellites automatically when we select a channel requiring a different sat. That toggling doesn't take long but kinda bugs me so we are now using a tripod mount with a regular residential dish. We use Dish Network so it has 3 LNBs and switches electronically when different satellites are requested. This Spring we will replace the domed rooftop unit with the new Winegard open face auto unit. It utilizes the same residential dish. If you have DirecTV and want hi def, too, you would have a dish with 5 LNBs! Once aimed, the electronic switching between satellites is much preferred over the toggling required with one LNB setups.

See, I have no interest in HDTV...so, that parts kinda moot...but, if you take the cover off you will find that there are two lna's inside all you have to do is run another chunk of coax back and you can play to your hearts content.

quote:

Originally posted by leftyf:
But, how many satellites can you watch at a time?

If you only watch one TV, don't care about recording programs, or don't care about HD programming, then being able to *see* only one satellite at a time isn't a problem.

However, if like us, you want to watch two different programs on two different TVs, and each of the two different programs is on two different satellites, one person is going to be SOL.

But, how many satellites can you watch at a time?[/QUOTE]

Linda Said:

If you only watch one TV, don't care about recording programs, or don't care about HD programming, then being able to *see* only one satellite at a time isn't a problem. However, if like us, you want to watch two different programs on two different TVs, and each of the two different programs is on two different satellites, one person is going to be SOL.[/QUOTE]

Linda is correct of course, and there is more:

The Dish assemblies with more than one LNBF, (low noise block downconverter with feedhorn),
{currently up to 4 with Dish, and up to 5 with Direct}, will have one or more KA band LNBF's as well as the more common, and older KU band LNBF's. Some of the KA band satellite transponders are circularly polarized like the older KU band transponders, but others are linearly polarized; and the 1/4 wave "stub" antenna pickup in the LNBF needs to be on the same plane as the transmitting antenna on the Satellite for best signal strength and minimizing cross polarization interference, This adds another reason for needing a "skew" adjustment. The first reason of course, is to align the LNBF assembly with the apparent slope of the geostationary belt, in the area of your satellites, as seen from your location, with the goal being to obtain approximately identical signal strengths from 2,3,4, or even 5 satellites at the same time.

Also, a new class of satellites are being located with approximately 2 degree spaceing. These FSS satellites use less power than the older DBS satellites with 9 degree spaceing.(in order to avoid mutual interference).
We will have to have dishes with better directional characteristics, snd more gain, (read bigger reflector and/or longer focal distances), and point them more carefully to avoid ajacent satellite interference.

The point of all this is to say that even an 18 inch dish will be marginal for the FSS satellites:{not enough passive gain), and the narrow beam width required to avoid adjacent satellite interference isn't there. The "dome" dishes are smaller than a 18 inch dish as well as having the dew or rain drop on the dome problem. Draw your owm conclusion about smaller dishes.

Bill T

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Bill Turner,

My "flea market" procured dish on a ground tripod does what a $799 VuCube can do and is almost twice the size.

quote:

We purchased a Vu-Qube in Feb. 08.
Installed a few says later, it did not work, so called the folks like there instructions said, after 2 different calls, they decided our Vu-Qube was defective. We are waiting on a replacement to be UPS to us. WE WILL SEE.
Oh yes we have Direct in our home
Very happy with Direct.

quote:

Up date on our Vu-Qube
King dome shipped it today, now we will see when it arrives. So far took them a week to ship since our phone call.

So, have you had a chance to try out the Vu Qube yet? Does it work with two receivers? Any comments about the set-up and reception?

Are you taking the receiver(s) out of your home into the RV? Do you plan to turn off your home DirecTV service when you travel? As you can tell, we are still "researching" adding DirecTV to the home and RV.

VU Qube arrived 16 days after our call. But any way its here.
Took about 10 minutes to install and find the signal. Great pic. We bought a receiver for the MH.
We are on Direct TV, 2 receivers in our home one in MH. We never turn the service off.
You can use on 2 tv's, but you get the same programs . In our home we have a receiver for each TV .