If you have a C-Band receiver that still functions and have a C/Ku feedhorn there is a tremendous hobby you can start enjoying for about $50. This hobby is known as DVB or Digital Video Broadcasting. This is NOT for the plug and chug crowd. You have to know how to tune a dish and program satellites into a C-Band receiver extremely well. If you get a "modern" DVB receiver you can have it do the searching for you but it is, in my opinion, a bit harder to start out that way.
The DVB satellite feeds are many times FREE. You can get lots of distant smaller networks, a dozen former UPN/WB (I believe now it is CW), and many very low end cable stations. You won't be getting HBO or Skin er Cinemax. You will get PBS, Fox, and dozens upon dozens of Europe, Asian, Arabic, and similar stations. (Be ready to receive the word of God as well.) The big ones are Galaxy 10R and Intelsat T5. See these listings:
http://www.lyngsat.com/ia5.html
http://www.lyngsat.com/g10r.html
Anywhere you see the F symbol this is a KNOWN free channel. (A little secret: With a BLIND SCAN receiver there are MANY more free channels but I can't talk about those.) Hundreds of radio stations, network feeds, and even some things you wouldn't want your kids finding.
I will warn you now; this is NOT for the faint of heart. Unless you know how to tune and peak your own dish and how to program the C-Band analog receiver this is NOT a hobby for you. I put together and aligned my own analog systems. This was a piece of cake compared to getting my first digital signal to come in. With DVB you must juggle a number of things at once:
Peaking the dish on the center of the bird East to West
Peaking the dish up and down and its tracking
Peaking the skew just perfect
Adjusting the ANALOG receiver to a Horizontal or Vertical channel to change the polarizer.
Now that you have all of that programmed you can start working on the DVB receiver.
Set the receiver up to know the proper LNB frequency for the LO (on C-Band LNBs this is usually 5150MHz and on common Ku it is 10750MHz).
Set the Channel of the transponder you want to receive to the FREQUENCY of the transponder (see the links above)
Set the SR (symbol rate) and FEC (Forward Error Correction). Set the SID and VPID (if needed). Now you must scan the transponder and let the receiver load the channel list. You may have to tweak the skew and dish E W position while scanning. When I first set up my analog dish I had a picture the very first time I turned it on. (Usually you don't get this lucky but I did. And I can still remember the picture I saw.) With the digital it took me several tries over a few evenings before I got a lock and download a channel list.
I wish you luck if you decide to go this route. If you consider satellite a hobby as I do, you will likely have more fun with digital than you did with analog. If you want to sit back and watch TV, I suggest Dish or DirecTV.
BTW the shimmering satellite you describe sounds like an Iridium flare. See this:
http://www.satobs.org/iridpix.htmlNo trees were harmed in the creation of this message. But billions of electrons, photons, and electromagnetic waves were terribly inconvenienced!
