DBS (Digital Broadcast Satellite)

DBS is television service that allow households to receive television programming directly from satellites on 18" inch to 3’ diameter fixed position satellite dishes. Composite analog video from standard cable services are converted to component digital, then MPEG compressed for transmission. This allows several programs to be broadcast from a single satellite transponder thereby allowing up a large number of channels to be received with a dish pointed at one orbital position in the sky. Programming on the various services includes most major cable services, sports, Pay Per View (PPV) movies, audio services, and specialized "niche" programming aimed at smaller audiences. These are often referred to as Direct To Home (DTH) services but the term Direct Broadcast Satellite (DBS) is more commonly used. HDTV programming is now available on some DBS services.