Anyone using a Sonora Smart Stacker?

[Darichard]

I've been struggling with how to get a 2nd coax line to my TV room, and it just ain't gonna happen, so I ordered a Sonora Smart Stacker. Guy came out today to install the dish.

I intalled the Smart Stacker at the house, and destacked it at the DTiVo, but I'm not getting any signal to the DTiVo. The cabling is fine - a single feed to the unit works like it should.

When I go to the Sonora site (http://www.sonoradesign.com/newpdfs/spec_ss212_7.pdf) to look at the wiring diagram, it shows a single feed for the 101 sat running into the Smart Stacker, and the other feed with 119/110 sats on it. How am I supposed to ensure that I get a 101 feed only to one input of the Smart Stacker? Are they assuming an older 3-LNB disk without a built-in multiplexer?

For now I can use one feed in with all channels, so at least I can get some TV.

[Darichard]

I called Sonora for tech support today. Got a guy who was really helpful. Unfortunately I'm traveling and could not test his recommended solution. He seemed puzzled by how I had hooked up the stacker side. I referred him to the Sonora store web site, and he had the same reaction to the install docs as I did - they make no sense.

His diagnosis was that the distance between my stacker and destacker was soo short and that I needed to use the included attenuator on the destacker side. Will try this when I get home late tonight.

[Darichard]

Got home late last night, made some changes, and everything is working. Firstly, there was a small cable splitter in the signal path that I wasn't aware of. This appeas to have caused most of the problem.

The documentation on the Sonorastore website is absolute garbage. And the unit I recevied comes with no docs whatsoever. In this case having the docs on the web is worse than having nothing, because the docs are wrong. C'mon guys, you need to get it together better than this.

Now that it's working, I have to say that this device does meet the claims that have been made here. I now have two DirecTV feeds running into my HD DTiVo and can see all 3 satellites on both tuners. If you have only one coax line into your house, this is definately a viable option. There are still some issues, like getting power to the external stacker. I wish they could would power this thing on the destacker side.

I'll try to get a full review written. In the meantime, feel free to message me with any questions. Just have to say again that I'm thrilled to be getting both tuners working.

[Jedis]

I just hooked mine up today.

At first it was not working, but then I remembered I had a diplexor in the wall. I removed it and the Tivo still reported only one tuner was enabled.

I reran the Guided Setup and still no dice. At this point, I was completely perplexed. Rebooted unit and reran Guided Setup - still not working. For the heck of it, I ran Guided Setup again and told it I had an Oval Dish (I have a Round one). Of course, it couldn't detect the 119 satellite because the dish doesn't receive it. Switched it back to Round dish and it showed I was getting a signal on both lines.

I finished the setup and tried to view a channel. It worked. However, at the bottom it said tuner 2 was not receiving a signal. I checked the satellite signal strength and it showed it was indeed getting the signal. I reran the Guided Setup again and it still didn't work... Rebooted again after it finished the Guided Setup reboot and it is working now.

No idea why it decided to start working. Hopefully it continues to work!

[Jedis]

Well, last night I was watching TV and I got the 'tuner 2 message' at the bottom of the screen again. I flipped channels a few times and it went away and started working again.

Any idea why this would happen? Seems it sporadically works - not all of the time.