From the Risks forum, a submission on sun outages in satellite TV systems. When the receiving antenna, the satellite, and the sun all line up, the satellite signal is swamped by the sun. It's obvious that this would be a problem once you think about it, but this is the first time I've seen consumer level consequences from it. You'd think that cable systems would make a big deal out of this (up to 8 minute outages twice a year), since obviously cable doesn't have the same issues. As Rand has pointed out many times here and elsewhere, the key to reduced launch costs is markets. Right now satellite TV is doing quite well in competition with cable, but this is a definite competitive disadvantage, which is bad news. The good news is that it's also a money making opportunity for whoever can figure out how to fix it.

Other items (also here) in the same digest talk about electronic voting machines. We're entering what is certain to be a nasty campaign, and if things proceed on their current course the results of the election will be tainted by serious problems with electronic voting systems. The last thing America needs in the current global climate is still further internal polarization. Fortunately some smart and dedicated people are working to mitigate the problems, and you can help.

While I don't wish to minimize the importance of this...the title indicates a problem orders of magnitude worse. :)

But wouldn't cable companies have the same problem? After all, they get most of their programming off of satellites as well. Granted, they may receive from more than one satellite, but wouldn't they likely lose at least some of their programming for the same eight-minute span?

John Berntson
"Granted, they may receive from more than one satellite,"

I think that's the key. I've not heard of this problem before, but given the problem, the professional satellite operators will know in advance when it _will_ be a problem and route around the damage.

Cable companies do have this problem. At least here in the Seattle suburbs, it happened with some channels last eclipse season. The times are different for every location, but for the next few weeks you'll notice that certain channels (usually owned by the same parent company-- Turner, Disney, Viacom, or whatever they are called these days) all start to break up and fade out at once. Channels on a different satellite are just fine until it's their turn.

For those of us with day jobs, and things to do on our weekend/days off, this is surely a non-starter.
Jeez, you want to whine about satellite outages, much more prevalent due to weather; rain, hail, snow etc.
Mike

Mike - you have a point, but for those who are heavy TV users outages (whatever the cause) are a big enough deal to make them switch to cable. I'm a fan of satellite TV because it involves launching things. The content is 99.44% crap, but the consumers don't care, and neither do I as long as they create demand for space based business.

This problem has been around forever, and will plague cable companies just as well as satellite TV. After all, where does a cable company get the feeds to distribute out over coax? Satellite feeds. :)

Oddly enough, C-Band offered some relief from the phenomenon because of its relative ineffeciency. With only 24 transponders per satellite, your channels would be spread across a swath of sky (and you could actually track the outage across the satellites) and some would always be active. Didn't help you any if you actually wanted to watch one particular station, however.

Cable should have a limited ability to use this inefficiency to get around the outage, since some feeds (mostly national networks) are carried on multiple C/Ku satellites, and they could swap between them effortlessly (as long as they have enough dishes to point at all of them at once). But still, there aren't enough transponders out there (that I know of) to provide backup support for all cable channels, so there should still be an impact.

Lemme see here, 8 minutes, twice per year. That's what, 16 minutes? Out of 525,000 plus minutes per year? That's an uptime rate of 99.9996%. So, what the hell is the problem? Your electricity supply to your home (unless you have a whole-house UPS) has a much poorer uptime rate.

Find something impressive to whine about.

Dave G-
If you're going to post things like "Find something impressive to whine about," it behooves you to know what the hell you're talking about. Read the piece I linked to (which you obviously didn't, since you used incorrect numbers). While you're at it, read the blog post you're commenting on. Hint: it's not about loss of access to TV, it's about competitive advantage. Neither I nor any of the commenters gives a crap about losing a few minutes of TV.

Finally, note that you're reading a tech/science oriented blog. You're going to run into technical and scientific posts here from time to time, and not all of them will be on matters of earth-shaking importance. In other words, get a grip.

Okay, Andy, let's continue this conversation, since you took exception to my exception.

First, I DID read the links, but used your figures, since the blurb you linked to was anything but definitive. Regardless, my point, which is STILL valid (and unchallenged by you), is that I completely disagree with your "competitive disadvantage" argument. All services have outages, and most are just minor nuisances. This includes satellite sun outages, which have been "consumer level" for 30+ years. Hell, the CATV industry TARGET reliability allows for 53 minutes of outage per year (see Bellcore TA-NWT-00909, Issue 2, Generic Requirements for FITL Systems Availability and Reliability Requirements, December 1993, p. 13-1, Bell Communications Research).

And by the way, if you post to a blog, and ASK for feedback, don't get cranky if you get it. I come to this blog FOR the technical info. In my opinion, this topic is not as insightful as I would expect. Thus, my original post. But, since I am a civilized soul, and willing to let bygones by bygones, I'll offer a mea culpa, just to get on with it.

I am surprised that no one has mentioned the difference in size, comparing the cable companies 26' to 36' dish as opposed to the 18" dish most consumers have.

I had satellite TV for a while and loved it, except during heavy rains and snow. I only remember losing my cable once or twice in over 20 years, so size of the recieving unit must matter!!