Originally posted by Mittman
My problem is I live in a house with 10 TVs. Back when we were building it we thought about switching to DirecTV, but they said we would need to have 5 dishes in order to be able to watch TV in all 10 locations.

Originally posted by huzefa
lisadoris, I don't think it's legal for your apt manager to ORDER you to take your dish down. As long as its in your 'leased space', it's acceptable to put up a dish.

Originally posted by huzefa
Actually I think they didn't have the newer switches that are present now. Now for example with Dishnetwork, the dish connects to one switch, and that switch has signals going to all of your TV's.

Originally posted by Mittman
But can you watch 10 different channels on each of the 10 TVs, or is it just whatever one channel the dish is tuned into that is shown on all the sets? This situation will probably never come up, but I like to know that I can do it just in case I have company over.

Originally posted by BenCJedi
I have lived in apartments for 6 years, having had a dish for 4 of them and having moved twice. The places I have lived at would not let me attach a dish to anything I didn't own. The satellite home viewer act (SHVA) says you are allowed to own a dish regardless of what your landlord tells you, but it must be on space that you rent. Since technically the balcony is part of my rented living space I am allowed to have a dish there. With the clincher being not attaching it to anything, I bought a 5-gallon bucket at Home Depot, two bags of Quickcrete cement and a 15' water pipe. My dish is attached to the water pipe in my bucket mount and is heavy and stable, but it does not violate the clause by the landlord, so there's not a damn thing they can do about it. To get the cables into the apartment Radio Shack sells flat coax couplers so you can squeeze the cables under a window into the apartment. What's alarming to me is that many of my neighbors are directly mounting the dish to their balconies, even though I was told that wasn't allowed. I am guessing the property owner may allow them now. I stand by my bucket mount.. it allows me to move the dish across the balcony if I need to get a better signal (with trees to contend with, I have had to do this every spring). The wind had never blown hard enough to knock down the dish or move it to disturb signal, so it was a good way to go.

Originally posted by huzefa
If you guys need it, here are a few various mounting options for dishes. I especially like the window mount.

http://skyvision.com/store/d_dbsmount.html

Originally posted by atari2600
whoa thats cool - is it held up with magnets or what?

Originally posted by atari2600
suction cups? hmm...dunno how much i trust that. ive had those hooks that used suction cups for like my hat or something and they didnt hold up!

Originally posted by atari2600
suction cups? hmm...dunno how much i trust that. ive had those hooks that used suction cups for like my hat or something and they didnt hold up!

Originally posted by huzefa
Apparently there's five of them. I think you have to first clean the glass thoroughly and put some sort of adhesion liquid between the suction cup and the windowpane to make it completely adhesive. Still I'm having a hard time seeing it work.

Originally posted by SmackDaddy
Another thing about Digital cable. Not all of your channels may be truly digital. At least that's the case with Time Warner here in Housron. Many channels are your regular analog cable stations just piped in thru your digital cable box. So some channels actually look as bad as regular cable, because that's really what they are. This came from a Time Warner install tech. And after checking out a friends digtial cable, I can see that there are quite a few of these channels (generaly the basic channels).

I've had Dish and am currently with DirecTV. For me it was a no brainer. If I'm paying for digital, I better darn well be getting digital.

Originally posted by mmconhea
Big Satellite Negative: Most people in apartments can't get them installed.

Originally posted by einTier
Most people in apartments don't know the law. There was a law passed in congress back in the late ninties that says that no aparment complex can prohibit you from installing a dish, and if you do not face the correct direction, they have to facilitate your mounting of the dish. The only thing they can require is that the mounting not require any permanent modification of the structure, and when you leave, everything must be put back the way it was. It is illegal for an apartment to keep you from installing a dish or to tell you to take one down (unless they give you another suitable installation point), but that doesn't mean they don't try.

Court Backs Renters in Satellite-Dish Case


By TED HEARN
Multichannel News
7/16/2001

Washington— A federal appeals court here has ruled that property renters have a right to install direct-broadcast satellite dishes in locations under their control, even if such action is prohibited by a lease agreement with the landlord.

The July 6 verdict — handed down by a panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit — was a victory for the Federal Communications Commission, DirecTV Inc. and EchoStar Communications Corp. over real-estate owners who sought to control renters' ability to use their balconies and patios as dish-installation sites.

"The FCC clearly acted in the public interest and within its authority when it extended [dish] rules to apply to renters," said James Ashurst, spokesman for the Satellite Broadcasting & Communications Association, the DBS trade lobby. "We are very pleased with the court's decision to protect current and future satellite subscribers."

In 1996, Congress ordered the FCC to draft rules that would eliminate restrictions on DBS dish installation. The agency moved first against zoning and homeowner restrictions, and then took on landlord-imposed limits on renters.

A group of landlords, including the Building Owners and Managers Association International (BOMA), claimed the FCC did not have the authority to void lease agreements regulating DBS-dish placements. The building owners also said the commission's protections for renters ran afoul of Fifth Amendment prohibition of the taking of private property for public use without just compensation. The court, however, rejected both arguments.

In an opinion written by Circuit Judge Judith W. Rogers, the court said Congress authorized the FCC to ban "restrictions that impair a viewer's ability to receive" DBS programming. Rogers added that the commission did not abuse its authority by including both owners and renters within the scope of the words "restrictions" and "viewer."

"Congress demonstrated no intent to qualify the terms 'viewer' and 'restrictions,' " Rogers wrote. "It did not specify which types of 'viewers' were covered, nor which types of 'restrictions' were permissible.

"Had Congress intended to qualify those terms, it clearly would have done so," Rogers said, adding that the intent of the law was to give the FCC "a very broad mandate."

On the taking-of-property issue, Rogers said the landlords failed to demonstrate that a renter was an "interloper with a government license." Rather, she said, a renter has an agreement to occupy space over which the landlord had yielded control, and the FCC had Congressional authority to alter the terms of the lease agreement.

"Having ceded such possession of the property to a tenant, a landlord thereby submits to the [FCC's] rightful regulation of a term of that occupation," Rogers said.

The FCC's power to void a DBS lease restriction without violating the Fifth Amendment was akin to government regulations that impose rent controls on landlords or require them "to accept tenants [they do] not like," Rogers added.

BOMA and its lawyers were still studying the case and could not comment on further appeals.

Landlords, including BOMA, are gearing up to challenge new FCC rules that extended the scope of the dish rules to include reception devices capable of two-way telecommunications.

Matt Ames, who represented BOMA in the loss to the FCC, said his client might have a better chance in overturning the new rules by relying on Rogers' emphasis that the 1996 law protected "viewers." Consumers of telecommunications service were unlikely to be deemed as viewers in that context, said Ames.

The FCC rules upheld by the court apply to dishes one meter in diameter or smaller and cover individuals who rent single-family homes, manufactured homes or apartments. Protected locations include railings, balconies and terraces, as well as patios, yards, and gardens within the tenant's leasehold.

But the rules do not permit renters to install a dish in common areas or restricted areas, such as party and pool areas or exercise rooms. The FCC also carved out exemptions that allow restrictions on dish placement in historic areas.

In the past, apartment landlords have said they opposed the FCC rules because they wanted to protect the aesthetics of their property, not because they wanted to deny their tenants access to DBS programming.

BOMA said the U.S. has about 30 million apartment dwellers and only 3 percent of apartment units had balconies — the most likely site for a DBS installation. Moreover, anyone with a balcony would need a southwest line-of-sight to pick up a DBS signal, a requirement that further reduces the number of apartment dwellers that would benefit from the agency's rules, BOMA said.

Originally posted by Numanoid
Never heard anything about them having to find you a line-of-sight location...I'm pretty sure that is not true. But you can install the dish on your balcony, patio, or whatever outside are is attributed to your apartment without intereference.

Many apartment managers will tell you you can't because they either don't know the law, or are hoping you will just believe them. If you have line-of-sight and a place to mount it, go for it, no one can stop you.