11-12/2014
axing
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TELE-audiovision International — The World‘s Leading Digital TV Industry Publication
— 1 -12/2014
—
TEST REPORT
One Cable LNB
MAXING MX-OCS12
Perfect for using with existing tv cabling
What Is a One Cable LNB?
The universal LNB for Ku-
Band has become something
so standard that many of us
think that nothing else is of-
fered on the market. That
is not true. There are oth-
er products available. And
one of such non-standard
LNB for Ku-Band is the MX-
OCS12 of Maxing. The man-
ufacturer calls it “one cable
LNB” and this needs some
explanation.
The MX-OCS12 converts
two specific sub bands of the
lower part of the Ku-Band
to the L-Band. These sub
bands are: 10.7~11.2 GHz
at vertical polarization and
11.45~11.7 GHz at horizon-
tal polarization. Because its
local oscillator works at the
typical frequency of 9.75
GHz, the two sub bands are
shifted into the following
frequency ranges in L-Band:
0.95~1.45 GHz and 1.7~1.95
GHz. Now, the trick is that
you can connect more than
one satellite receiver to the
output: if only one of the
receivers supplies the MX-
OCS12 LNB with d.c. volt-
age (in the range of 11.5~19
volts) all the other receiv-
ers in the chain may have
their LNB power switched
off. Now the question is:how
many receivers can then
be connected to that one
LNB? Well, this depends on
the sockets you will use.
The sockets have splitters
that may differ in insertion
and tap losses. With typical
sockets, you should be able
to connect 8~10 receivers to
the output of the MX-OCS12
LNB and all of them wil be
able to tune into the above
mentioned two sub bands.
From the outset the MX-
that the MX-OCS12 LNB per-
formed very well in its ver-
tical sub band (10.7~11.2
GHz). It generated stronger
signals than the reference
LNB without compromis-
ing signal quality. MER was
practically identical with the
reference LNB. Moreover,
it was able to work even at
11.279 GHz so the vertical
sub band was slightly wider
than promised.
Output signal for the hori-
zontal sub band was a little
bit weaker than our refer-
ence. Also signal quality was
somewhat poorer. MER was
by 0.5~1.5 dB lower than
our reference. However,
MER=12 dB still guarantees
very solid reception even in
terrible weather conditions.
So, if the MX-OCS12 LNB is
used for a similarly strong
satellite as HOTBIRD then its
slightly weaker performance
in horizontal sub band will be
unnoticeable.
The MX-OCS12 LNB by
Maxing is a unique solution
to some special situations,
mainly when only the tran-
sponders on the two sub
bands, which the MX-OCS12
LNB supports, need to be
received. In such a case
the MX-OCS12 LNB allows
for a very simple chain in-
stallation, as normally used
in regular terrestrial tv dis-
OCS12 LNB looks as a typical
product for Ku-Band. Quality
of workmanship is excellent
but as we have noted before,
Maxing uses lables printed
on paper. Whilst this would
not concern us much with
any regular LNB in this case
with such a special LNB it
might be good to be able to
read the specifications also
after the LNB is exposed
to the outdoor world being
mounted on a dish.
Of course, the type of lable
on a LNB is not at all criti-
cal. What really counts is the
product performance. For
our TELE-audiovision test
we selected the HOTBIRD on
13° East as our source of sig-
nal and a modern universal
LNB as our reference LNB.
Our measurements revealed
