TEST REPORT Satellite Receiver

Pansat 3500S
Conax Embedded Plus
SD Memory Card Slot
Panarex Electronics has been in existence since 1983. They offer a complete line of sat- a optical digital audio output, an S-VHS
ellite equipment including digital MPEG-2 DVB receivers, antennas, LNB’s and LNBF’s, feed- output and even a main power switch. But
horns, positioners, DiSEqC motors and switches. One of their newest receiver models, the there is also a set of quick-clamp connectors
3500S, found its way into our test labs. At first glance it looks no different than many other that can be used to connect this receiver
receivers available on the market today. But once we took a closer look at it, we discovered to a servomotor on your LNB. Even more
that there’s more to it than meets the eye. interesting are the component Y, Pb and
Pr outputs! Last but not least is the UHF
jack that can be used with an optional UHF
remote control.

The box has a rather simple-looking silver-
colored front panel with a small square-
shaped display located in the center. This
display shows either one of the 5000 possible
channels or the current time. The receiver
has a built-in real time clock – a very unique
feature for a satellite receiver. Eight control
buttons are on the right side allowing you
to completely control this receiver from the
front panel even if you should have a prob-
lem with the remote control.
It’s only when the flap on the left side is
opened that we discover the first surprise.
In addition to a SmartCard slot for the
embedded Conax encryption system, there’s
a second, smaller slot just underneath the
Conax slot. This slot can accommodate an
SD memory card – a feature you won’t find
on every receiver.
The rear panel comes with all of the typi-
cal connectors you’d expect to find in a North
American box plus there are a number of
extras that are very interesting. For start-
ers, there’s the IF input with corresponding
looped-through output, a terrestrial antenna
input with modulator output, a switch to
select the modulator output between VHF
Channel 3 or 4, an RS-232 interface for new
software uploads, a set of three RCA jacks
that provide video and stereo audio outputs,
The standard silver-colored remote con-
trol is long and narrow thus making is easy
to grip. It comes with all the functions you’d
expect plus a number of extras including
four colored function buttons. It is a uni-
versal remote control allowing it to be used
with other major brands of electronic equip-
ment such as TV’s, VCR’s, DVD players, etc.
Even though it is narrow, most of the but-
tons are spaced far enough apart for your
thumb.
Everyday Use
When you turn on the 3500S for the first
time, you naturally want to choose a proper

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language so that you can “talk” with this
box. By pressing the “Menu” button on the
remote, the “Main Menu” page appears on
the screen from which you can select from
a number of Sub Menus. Simply go to the
“User Setup” menu where you have your
choice of English, German, French, Portu-
guese, Spanish, Turkish and Arabic. Here
you can also select the desired Aspect ratio
(4:3 or 16:9), TV Type (NTSC, PAL or AUTO),
set the current time, set the transparency of
the OSD and initiate a software transfer.
The next logical step would be setting
up the satellites you want to receive. This
is taken care of in the “Installation” menu.
Accessing the “Installation” menu requires
you to enter a four-digit password. While
having this feature is not a bad idea, there is
unfortunately no obvious way to turn it off.
A password must be entered every time you
access the “Installation” menu.
The list consists of over 80 Ku-band and
C-band satellites from the western hemi-
sphere. Keep in mind that combined C/Ku-
band satellites such as Intelsat Americas 5
or AMC 4 are listed as two separate satel-
lites, one C-band and one Ku-band. The cur-
rent settings for a highlighted satellite are
shown on the right side of the screen. From
here a DiSEqC switch can be set up,
A number of preset local oscillator fre-
quency (LOF) settings are available but if the
LOF you need is not preset, you can easily
enter any LOF value that you need manu-
ally. The receiver supports both the DiSEqC
1.0 and 1.2 protocols as well as the USALS
protocol. This allows you to use the 3500S
in almost any configuration. Signal strength
and quality bar graphs are also displayed
during installation to help optimize antenna
alignment.
By far the most popular type of chan-
nel scan is the Blind Scan. More and more
manufacturers are including this feature in
their receivers. Called “Smart Search” by
Pansat, this feature lets you scan an entire
satellite for digital signals without knowing
ahead of time any of the signal parameters.
Satellite Receiver TEST REPORT
Is the transponder list for a particular satel- The time to switch between channels is
lite obsolete? No problem. Where before a good one second. Thus, channel surfing
you had to enter transponder data manu- is not all that much fun. A push of the Info
ally (and this was only data that you knew button displays PID data for the current
about!), now just let Smart Search do the channel. The Electronic Program Guide can
work for you. It will identify any DVB signals be called up by pushing the “Guide” button.
that are on a satellite, tell you the trans- It displays detailed programming informa-
ponder frequency, symbolrate and auto- tion on the current channel.
matically scan all the transponders that it
found. It’s an incredible time saver! The manufacturer specifies a symbolrate
range of 1-45 Ms/sec. Once all the channels
Unfortunately, other than selecting an have been stored, the “Channel Edit” menu
FTA or ALL scan or selecting between all can be used to organize everything that was
polarities or just one, no other parameters found. Accessing this menu also requires a
could be adjusted. You could not select a password.
low or high symbolrate limitation nor could
you scan a specific frequency range. Also, So, what’s this extra slot on the front
when the box was looking for channels on panel all about? It’s designed to accept an
the transponders that it found, it would SD memory card and gives this receiver a
occasionally get stuck on some transpond- number of extra capabilities. For example,
ers for quite some time requiring in some MP3 files stored on the memory card can be
cases minutes for the channels to be identi- played back through the receiver. Even new
fied. receiver software can be uploaded into the
receiver via the SD memory card. The SD
But let’s get back to the standard channel card slot can be accessed directly through
scan. The time to complete a full scan of the Main Menu. The data on the SD card
Intelsat Americas 5 was about two minutes is then shown on the screen in a format
and thirty seconds during which a total of that closely resembles the old MS DOS file
182 TV channels and 98 radio channels were system.
found. Simply press the OK button to display
a complete list of the channels stored in the The optional UHF remote control system
receiver. Press the OK button a second time consists of the remote control and a UHF
to switch to the selected channel. Oddly interface box that plugs into the back of the
enough, the channel list does not disappear 3500S. This lets you control the receiver
until the OK button is pressed again. from almost any room in the house.
Expert conclusion
+
The Pansat 3500S is a very versatile satellite receiver. It comes with a
wide variety of features including Smart Search, component video out-
puts, servo motor control and an embedded Conax system. As many
as 5000 TV and radio channels can be stored. The SD memory card
slot lets you play back MP3 files or upload new receiver software. Ron Roessel
TELE-satellite
-
Test Center
North America
During a channel scan, the receiver occasionally got hung up for several minutes
on some transponders adding to the total scan time. Passwords are needed to get
into some of the menu functions. While this is good, for those users that don’t have to
worry about unwanted access, this feature unfortunately cannot be turned off.
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TEST REPORT Satellite Receiver Info-Box

Channel List

Pansat 3500S
Digital Satellite Receiver with Main Menu

Embedded Conax
TECHNICAL
DATA
Manufacturer Panarex Electronics, Sun Valley,
California, USA

Fax +1-818-768-5191

E-mail pansatusa@cs.com

Model 3500S Antenna Setup Menu

Function Digital Satellite Receiver with

Embedded Conax

Channel Memory 5000

Satellites 80+

Symbolrate 1-45 Ms/sec.

SCPC Compatible yes

SD memory Card Slot yes

USALS yes
Info Bar
DiSEqC 1.0 and 1.2

A/V Outputs yes, 3 x RCA

S-VHS Output yes

Digital Audio Output yes, optical

Power Supply 90-250 VAC, 50/60 Hz

Features
TEST
RESULT

SD Memory Card Menu

Channel Memory

Channel
Scan Speed

Channel
INTERNATIONAL

Switching Speed
SATELLITE

Video Quality

Audio Quality

TELE
Tuner Sensitivity

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