Where Cable Comes From, Part 1: Satellite Dishes

Jun 24 2010

Where Cable Comes From, Part 1: Satellite Dishes

The blinking, crashing wonder that is cable television in the 21st century does not spend its entire life cycle on a wire. It’s actually blasted down from space by giant satellites high above the earth. Enormous satellite dishes suck the signals off the satellite and shoot them into head ends, which process the signals and clean up the images into the sharp, crisp cable-quality picture that everybody loves.

I took these photos of the satellite dishes at our head end in Manhattan a few weeks ago. There they go, silently pumping daytime television into homes across Brooklyn, Staten Island, Manhattan, and Queens.

You can click on the pictures to enlarge them …

In the coming weeks I’ll be sharing a series of posts that elaborates how cable actually gets into your home — how it travels through the sky, into the plant and out into the world. Stay tuned.

Categories: Content Delivery, Cool Stuff

2 Comments »

2 Responses to “Where Cable Comes From, Part 1: Satellite Dishes”

Jason
Jun 24, 2010
at 7:23 pm

What are head ends?
Kristian Jackson
Oct 19, 2011
at 5:08 pm

Head ends are like central distribution points for the cable company. They are similar to central offices for the phone company. Lots of data and video equipment all used to serve an area of customers.