In project, Antenna performance is characterised by some main parameters of direction diagram, main lobe width, sub-lobe level, gain, polarization, frquency band width, voltage standing wave ratio(VSWR), noise temperature and antenna wind load, etc. Please refer to national standard  GB11442- 95 for the requirement of C-band antenna electric performance while refer to national standard  GB/T 16954-1997 for the requirement of Ku-band antenna electric performance.

Attention should be paid in the following problems when choosing antenna.

1. Choose in strict accordance with the requirement for antenna in Receiving Technology Condition for Aluminum Antenna Satellite TV (standard title).
    
2. Antenna structure is reasonable or not, including whether antenna support is firm, whether elevation and azimuth adjustment bar pitch and regulation is convenient, etc.
    
3. Selection of plate antenna and mesh antenna is related to user’s station location. In large, medium cities or industry areas, it is probably best to choose panel antenna because of serious air pollution. If the station is located in windy mountain area, choose aluminum mesh antenna which possesses lower gain compared to plate antenna, is easily influenced by rain and snow, but has strong ability of anti-wind.
    
4. Selection of feed forward antenna and feed back antenna. Due to the appearance of HEMT device and low noise, it is available to directly connect them at the back of feed, which overcomes the weakness that feed forward line loss is higher than that of feed back line, and meanwhile greatly reduces feed forward line’s noise temperature. Now feed forward antenna’s gain is lower 0.2dB than that of feed back antenna, which has little effect on receiving quality of TV signal of satellite TV receiving station. However, feed back antenna can be used as the antenna of satellite communication earth station in the meantime while feed forward antenna cannot.
5. Selection of antenna tracking, drive mode. When using large-caliber antenna, mostly choose double-shaft tracking. When using small-caliber antenna, choose single-shaft or double-shaft tracking.
   
   Antenna has three drive modes which are manual, power-driven and automatic. The first two modes possess characteristics of artificial positioning, simple function and low cost. The third drive mode generally adopts mono-board microcomputer control when using double-shaft tracking. It possesses the function of automatic selection (the accuracy can be more than 0.3°), one satellite tracking, or several satellites preset (the accuracy can be more than 0.1°). Thus antenna can quickly find any satellite that needs. And antenna can be in the best receiving status by means of signal tracking.  When using single-shaft automatic tracking antenna, bridge balance mode is adopted to memory satellite position automatically. And it can also preset more satellites in a geostationary orbit and find any satellite quickly, but it cannot track satellite by signal.
    
6. The possibility of TVRO. The most effective way to reduce antenna caliber is to increase satellite EIRP, reduce noise temperature of high-frequency tuner, improve antenna efficiency and reduce receiver’s threshold level.
    
7. Selection and application of offset antenna. Small antenna with Ku-band receiving has two types which are prime focus and offset. Prime focus Ku-band antenna’s focal length is shorter. Under the condition of same size, offset antenna’s gain is a little higher than that of prime focus. Therefore, small antenna with Ku-band almost adopts offset antenna.