Bell TV - Satellites

Satellites

Bell TV broadcasts from four geostationary satellites: Nimiq 1, 2, 3 and 4iR. Nimiq 4iR is temporary and is being replaced by Nimiq 4. All follow an equatorial path, giving coverage to most of Canada. Nimiq is an Inuktitut word for "that which unifies" and was chosen from a nationwide naming contest in 1998. The four satellites are owned and operated by Telesat Canada. Bell's uplink site is located in North York which is in the Toronto area.

Nimiq 1 was launched on May 20, 1999 and contains 32 Ku-band transponders at 91° W. (From the time of service launch in 1997 to the switch to Nimiq in 1999, ExpressVu used the already crowded Anik E2.) Nimiq 2, launched on December 29, 2002, also includes 32 K-band transponders. Nimiq 2 provides HDTV, international programming, and all newly released channels. It occupies the 82° W slot. Nimiq 3 went online on August 23, 2004. Originally called DirecTV3, it is an old DirecTV satellite moved to a new orbital slot near Nimiq 1 to offload some of the transmitting work from the original satellite. In February 2006, Nimiq 3 was moved behind Nimiq 2 to support it, while another satellite, Nimiq 4i (formerly DirecTV2), took Nimiq 3's spot behind Nimiq 1. Nimiq 4i was replaced with Nimiq 4iR as it ran out of fuel on April 28, 2007 and was de-orbited. Both Nimiq 3 and Nimiq 4iR feature 16 Ku-band transponders. Nimiq 4 was launched by a Proton rocket which lifted off on September 19, 2008 at 21:48 UTC.

Each satellite typically has 32 divisions of signal called transponders. A transponder usually has enough bandwidth to broadcast approximately 10 channels. Because HDTV requires more bandwidth, some transponders on Nimiq 2 will typically broadcast only 4-5 channels. LyngSat provides a listing of channels on Nimiq 1 and Nimiq 2 broken down by transponder.