Most people around here are using the 48cm mini dish. This is called the zone 1 dish. I think we are a little north for a zone 1 dish and we should all be using a zone 2 dish which is 60cm. They are the same shape just a little bigger. The bigger dish will give a stronger signal to your digibox. This should help with the signal loss during bad weather. I only have a zone 1 because it used to be my neighbours, I was about to move my dish as it was partially obscured by the side of his house when I first moved in, he saw me and told me I could have his old dish on our shared chimney as he had gone NTL. When the weather is very bad I start getting broken up and freezing pictures. When the weather is bad and my digibox is breaking up I can move my big dish round and watch sky with my dreambox with no breaking up. In the case of satellite dish's, size does matter
The mounting height of the dish makes no difference, the satellite is 22,000 + miles away so a few feet higher on your house won't matter.
It is probably a little out of line Mel.