FEATURE Intermodulation
The stronger, the better
– it that always true?
Probably all our readers are aware that in order to have a reli-
able satellite reception, we need to have strong enough signal
at the receiver input. Generally, the stronger the signal, the
better its quality. Always?
The quality of signal is related to the so-
called signal-to-noise ratio S/N. For digital
signals, we more often use the carrier-to-
noise ratio C/N but its meaning is practically
the same. Every satellite signal except for
the useful data has some amount of noise.
We would like to have as much useful signal
and as little noise as possible. Probably you
know that to improve the signal to noise
ratio you may:
• increase the size of your dish
• replace your current LNB with a better
one of lower noise figure.
However, there is yet another trick that
may sometimes be used. It is relatively easy
to try and we will not have to spend a fortune
on that.
Those of our respected readers who have
some experience with the amateur radio
12 TELE-satellite International — www.TELE-satellite.com
have probably already guessed what I aiming
at. This is about reducing the sensitivity of a
receiver. Ham radio receivers and transceiv-
ers quite often have buttons to either switch
off their front-end RF amplifier or switch
on the input signal attenuator. Sometimes,
both functions are available. We are speak-
ing here about reducing the input amplifier
sensitivity by 10-20 dB.
How that can be? When a number of
strong signals are present at the receiver
input, they interfere with one another and
produce extra noise. This phenomenon is
called intermodulation. Some receivers are
more immune to intermodulation, the others
are less immune. There are no electronic cir-
cuits that are absolutely protected against
this. Moreover, the more sensitive we make
the receiver, the less protective against
intermodulation it becomes. Now, if among
the strong signals, there is a weak one, its
quality is decreased by the noise generated
by its stronger companions. What we can
do? Optimally, we would like to attenuate the
“strong bullies” and preserve the strength of
the “weak guy”. Unfortunately, this is very
difficult to do. What we can do very easily, is
to attenuate all signals by a few decibels in
hope that this will reduce the intermodula-
tion but not make the weak signal too weak
for reception.
Does it work that way in satellite recep-
tion too? That’s what we wanted to test for
you. We added a manually adjustable 20 dB
attenuator at the receiver input. We aimed
the dish to Hotbird satellite which has a lot
of strong transponders (when received in
Europe). After traveling among transpond-
ers, we found the weakest one. In our case,
it was 12303 V, SR=27500, FEC ¾. The
table and the chart present the readings of
our receiver strength and quality indicators
taken when we were turning the knob of the
attenuator. We used approximately ¾ of its
full range, what means 0-15 dB.
As you can see, the signal quality actually
improved when we added some attenuation.
Even at -15 dB, the signal was still better
than when fed directly. This confirms that
the satellite TV receivers are also not free of
the intermodulation problem.
However, we must emphasize here that it
was the ONLY signal on Hotbird that behaved
in this way. All others (which had initial qual-
ity reading >60%) were simply maintaining
its initial quality reading and were getting
worse for bigger attenuation setting.
So, adding an attenuator at the receiver
input is not a universal solution. However, if
you are (or want to be) a DX-er, you should
have an attenuator in your drawer. If you
want to pick a weak signal surrounded by
the strong ones and its quality is not good
enough to produce a stable video, before
climbing to the roof to re-align your dish,
insert an adjustable attenuator before your
receiver input (LNB-IN). Turn its knob and
observe the quality reading - you may be
surprised!