Photography by King Controls
Last year King Controls introduced a clever portable satellite TV dish called the VuQube, and some boaters began enjoying its ability to tune in DirectTV, Dish, or ExpressVu channels while only costing $899. But they had to place the 17.5”-high “cube” on a dock for stability and use its remote control to manually tune in the needed satellite. Now King Controls has managed to fit a gyro-stabilized dish into the same rugged casing, which means you can put it on deck or in an optional bracket and sit back while it automatically locks on to the satellite TV system you chose with the included controller. It even switches “birds” automatically when needed. The new VQ4000 costs $2,295 but still only requires a single co-ax cable to set up (plus your own receiver) and weighs just 12 pounds. Thus you could still make use of it when land yachting or for a tailgate party. Incidentally, any of these marine satellite TV systems can be set up to utilize the marine stereo discussed in the main story for the audio portion of your TV entertainment, though you’ll need home-style gear to get true surround sound.
King Controls
(800) 982-9920
This article originally appeared in the January 2009 issue of Power & Motoryacht magazine.
