[Crow 492]

Early days "Evolution of FTA" By Dipper..

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I would hope that this downtime would encourage people to invest in a motor and linear LNB and take a look at what's out there. There is satellite television BEYOND 110 and 119. In fact, there is FREE TV beyond Dish and BEV. It actually kinda irks me when people use the terms Dish, BEV, Free TV, and FTA interchangeably. This thread should be named "The Evolution of Free Premium TV via FTA/DVB receivers".

Here's the real story of the "Evolution of FTA":

The Early Days

Home satellite television has been around since the 1970s, when hobbyists discovered they could use a giant 16 to 20-foot parabolic dish hooked up to old military communication equipment and receive channels such as HBO and WTBS for free. In those days, there was no such thing as encryption, so if you could pick it up, you could watch it--- in other words, Free To Air.

In the early 80s, a few electronics manufacturers, including Charlie Ergen's Echostar, built the first home satellite receivers. They were pricey but they allowed you to watch all those channels for free that you previously had to pay the local cable company to see. Soon, cable companies started complaining. They pushed to outlaw satellite dishes, fearing they would be put out of business. But Congress and the Courts decided that any signal that is unencrypted can legally be viewed, even if it is not intended for the viewer. Shortly after, many cable stations began encrypting their signal-- ironically, to prevent cable companies from receiving the signal for free, charging subscribers for it, and then not paying the programming provider. At that time, the stations were not concerned with home satellite viewers.

By the mid-90s, nearly all commonly viewed cable and premium channels were scrambled and encrypted. But without a decoder, it was still possible to receive literally hundreds of channels. These were mostly religious and shopping channels, but there were a few extremely popular channels as well: Newfoundland's NTV (which broadcast US network programming hours before it was seen on the East Coast), Much Music, The Movie Network, and the raw unedited feeds from NFL football games (before they were snatched up and sold as "Sunday Ticket"). And of course, wild feeds and backhauls have always been popular.


Satellite TV goes digital

In the late 90s, there was a push for stations to begin sending their signal digitally. In the US, Digicipher2 was the most commonly used platform for digital transmission. But in the rest of the world, a more generic format called Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) was used instead of Digicipher2. This period also saw the transition from the big dish to the pizza pan. Direct TV used their own proprietary DSS video platform. StarChoice and Bell ExpressVu used the popular Digicipher2 format, although BEV later switched to DVB. Dish Network, launched in 1996, also used DVB format-- the same format used by many international free-to-air channels.

As the DVB format became more popular in North America, programming providers began shutting down their analog transmissions in favor of MPEG-2/DVB digital transmission. Wild feeds and backhauls that were previously seen on analog C-band satellites became available on digital Ku-band satellites.


FTA receivers become an overnight sensation

The fact that most free-to-air television uses the same video format as Dish Network and Bell ExpressVu would ultimately become what would make receiver manufacturers wealthy overnight.

In the early 00s, it was discovered that a Dish Network or Bell ExpressVu card image embedded into a file to be used with a DVB PCI card could enable computer users to watch Dish Network and Bell ExpressVu on their PC. A coder using the alias Al7bar (see thedssguy's post) took this a step further and discovered how to make a Fortecstar Lifetime receiver decode Dish and BEV. Fortec Lifetimes and "Blackbirds" sold for hundreds of dollars at the time and were not particularly popular among Dish/BEV testers who were testing with equipment that could be purchased for far less than that. Still, these "new" FTA receivers were becoming popular among true dedicated hobbyists who were looking for new toys to play with.

But then something happened in March 2004: Direct TV shut down the HU stream and fully implemented the P4 stream. Direct TV free TVers had nowhere to go except to Dish Network. Many of them had been used to easy free TV and were enticed by ads proclaiming "No ECMS, No JTAGs, No hassles". FTA receivers became an overnight sensation with former Dave freeTVers because they offered an easy and effortless "solution".

Of course, Dish Network and Bell ExpressVu are not "FTA" or "Free TV". True FTA channels continued to go on the air, most notably the Equity Broadcasting channels on Galaxy 10R, which is a collection of UPN, WB, and ABC affiliates, as well as RetroJams, Retro Television Network, and several Spanish-language channels. Intelsat Americas 5 has also been a very popular home for foreign programming and even a few English-language channels as well. Wild feeds continue to be abundant, though you do need to know when and where to look. Increasingly, news and family programming are beginning to appear as well


The future of FTA

FTA has a bright future should Dish Network and Bell ExpressVu secure their signal permanently. Analog channels are switching to digital and by 2009, everything will be digital. The DVB format is often preferred over the older, proprietary Digicipher2. So invest in a motor and a linear and scan the skies for FREE TV...