Hi VGCharters, I have two dish satellites wasting themselves on my roof after I stopped receiving dish programs to my home and I have been wondering if any of you know how to make these satellites to receive wireless signals. I have a very crappy router so I thought that maybe I would have better wireless signals for my computer if I could be able to do this. I found some info over the internet about converting satellites into routers but the info is not too specific. Is there anyone here who could share some knowledge on this? Thanks.

Don't bother with it. It's slow and expensive(at least in the UK).

the question is where do you want to get the signals from?

Thanks for answering guys.

@ My aim is some unsecured signals that are around but right now they are too slow. I would like to see if I could reach my University's signal.

You want to recieve a signal from your University? How far away is your University? It would only be practical to a certain distance, past that distance there would be no point. I'm not certain that you should do it, I think it would be pointless.

A better idea would be to sell the satellite dishes and take out a decent package from an internet provider lol.

My University is just a couple of blocks away. But yeah, I was reading some stuff off the internet and if I understood well I can't find other signals by improving my reception because catching signals will depend in the radio that the actual signal covers. But anyways, I would like to see what happens if I improve from this crappy router, I bet that it would be a huge improvement from what I have right now.

Yeah, that would be the best option but until I get to find a job I am kind of short in money, so that is not an option for me right now unfortunately.

if you have a router with a detachable antenna, you can always try to put the antenna where the feedhorn of the satellite dish was, and pont the dish towards your university.

Yes, it has a detachable antenna but one of the things I would like to know is how to connect the dish to my computer I mean, the router brought me a CD with the driver to make my computer recognize the router, how do I make my computer recognize the dish as a router?

you don't. you keep your router as it is,  you just extend the antenna of your router with a cable and attach it to the dish instead of the feedhorn, the dish should give the signal a boost. that would be the easiest method i can think of. 

Oh I get it. I would only need a cable extention for the antenna to connect it both to the dish and the router. I will try this out, thank you very much.