, and structure of the dish. TVRO systems were originally marketed in the late 1970s. On October 18, 1979, the FCC began allowing people to have home satellite earth stations without a federal government license. The dishes were nearly in diameter, were remote controlled, and could only pick up HBO signals from one of two satellites. Originally, the dishes used for satellite TV reception were 12 to 16 feet in diameter and made of solid
fiberglass with an embedded metal coating, with later models being 4 to 10 feet and made of
wire mesh and solid
steel or
aluminum. The dishes worked by receiving a low-power C-Band (3.7–4.2 GHz)
frequency-modulated analog signal directly from the original distribution satellite – the same signal received by
cable television headends. Because analog channels took up an entire
transponder on the satellite, and each satellite had a fixed number of transponders, dishes were usually equipped with a modified
polar mount and
actuator to sweep the dish across the horizon to receive channels from multiple satellites. Switching between horizontal and vertical polarization was accomplished by a small electric
servo motor that moved a probe inside the
feedhorn throat at the command of the receiver (commonly called a "polarotor" setup). Higher-end receivers did this transparently, switching polarization and moving the dish automatically as the user changed channels. By Spring of 1984, 18 C-Band satellites were in use for United States domestic communications, owned by five different companies. The retail price for satellite receivers soon dropped, with some dishes costing as little as $2,000 by mid-1984. Once a user paid for a dish, it was possible to receive even premium movie channels, raw feeds of news broadcasts or television stations from other areas. People in areas without local broadcast stations, and people in areas without cable television, could obtain good-quality reception with no monthly fees. • Reception of unencrypted satellite signals by a consumer • Reception of encrypted satellite signals by a consumer, when they have received authorization to legally decrypt it This created a framework for the wide deployment of encryption on analog satellite signals. It further created a framework (and implicit mandate to provide) subscription services to TVRO consumers to allow legal decryption of those signals. HBO and Cinemax became the first two services to announce intent to encrypt their satellite feeds late in 1984. Others were strongly considering doing so as well. HBO and Cinemax began encrypting their west coast feeds services with
VideoCipher II 12 hours a day early in 1985, then did the same with their east coast feeds by August. The two networks began scrambling full time on January 15, 1986, which in many contemporary news reports was called "S-Day". This met with much protest from owners of big-dish systems, most of which had no other option at the time for receiving such channels. As required by the Cable Communications Policy act of 1984, HBO allowed dish owners to subscribe directly to their service, although at a price ($12.95 per month) higher than what cable subscribers were paying. This sentiment, and a collapse in the sales of TVRO equipment in early 1986, led to the
April 1986 attack on HBO's transponder on
Galaxy 1. Dish sales went down from 600,000 in 1985 to 350,000 in 1986, but pay television services were seeing dishes as something positive since some people would never have cable service, and the industry was starting to recover as a result. Through 1986, other channels that began full time encryption included
Showtime and
The Movie Channel on May 27, and
CNN and
CNN Headline News on July 1. Scrambling would also lead to the development of
pay-per-view, Channels scrambled (encrypted) with VideoCipher and VideoCipher II could be defeated, and there was a
black market for illegal descramblers. By the end of 1987, 16 channels had employed encryption with another 7 planned in the first half of 1988. Packages that offered reduced rates for channels in bulk had begun to appear. At this time, the vast majority of analog satellite TV transponders still were not encrypted. The growth of dishes receiving Ku band signals in North America was limited by the
Challenger disaster, since 75 satellites were to be launched prior to the suspension of the
Space Shuttle program. Only seven Ku band satellites were in use. In addition to encryption,
DBS services such as
PrimeStar had been reducing the popularity for TVRO systems since the early 1990s. Signals from DBS satellites (operating in the more recent Ku band) are higher in both frequency and power (due to improvements in the
solar panels and
energy efficiency of modern satellites) and therefore require much smaller dishes than C-band, and the
digital signals now used require far less
signal strength at the receiver, resulting in a lower
cost of entry. Each satellite also can carry up to 32 transponders in the Ku band, but only 24 in the C band, and several
digital subchannels can be
multiplexed (MCPC) or carried separately (
SCPC) on a single transponder. General advances, such as
HEMT, in
noise reduction at microwave frequencies have also had an effect. However, a consequence of the higher frequency used for DBS services is
rain fade where viewers lose signal during a heavy downpour. C-band's immunity to rain fade is one of the major reasons the system is still used as the preferred method for television broadcasters to distribute their signal.
Popularity TVRO systems were most popular in
rural areas, beyond the
broadcast range of most local
television stations. The
mountainous
terrain of
West Virginia, for example, makes reception of
over-the-air television
broadcasts (especially in the higher
UHF frequencies) very difficult. From the late 1970s to the early 1990s DBS systems were not available, and cable television systems of the time only carried a few channels, resulting in a boom in sales of systems in the area, which led to the systems being termed the "West Virginia state flower". The term was regional, known mostly to those living in West Virginia and surrounding areas. Another reason was the large sizes of the dishes. The first satellite systems consisted of "BUDs" twelve to sixteen feet in diameter. They became much more popular in the mid-1980s when dish sizes decreased to about six to ten feet, but have always been a source of much consternation (even local
zoning disputes) due to their perception as an eyesore.
Neighborhoods with
restrictive covenants usually still prohibit this size of dish, except where such restrictions are illegal. Support for systems dried up when strong
encryption was introduced around 1994. Many long-disconnected dishes still occupy their original spots. == TVRO on ships ==