Lots of Questions

[staci]

First off, I haven't been around here in Ions, It feels just like home since my last journey here :)

Here is the situation, hopefully someone can lend guidance to my numerous concerns. Anyone feel free to comment on all or just a few.

Ok we have 16 Receivers all owned. We pay no mirror fees on these. Apparently DTV changed to a lease program in early 2006, so you are no longer able to "own new receivers" without paying in excess of 700 for a DVR. We carry insurance on all these receivers and any replacement is still owned. However if we accept or buy a "leased receiver" we then start paying 4.99 each. We don't really want to go there.

Here is what we have

2-HR-20-700
1 HR10-250
2 R-20 DVR
5- R-10's DVR
1 Hughes DVr Tivo (Im not sure what it is, off the top of my head)
5 misc std receivers


Up until a few months ago we had the 3 LNB Dish with Off air for HD

We also have 4 SS212 Stackers that in essence are a Single Wire MS feeding 4 rooms that only had 1 coax.

Just recently they came out and added the 5 LNB KA/KU dish, now the SS-212's don't work, our 32 port MS doesn't receive HD signals 950-2150 MHZ. and the none of the TV's with a diplexer that were also receiving off air signal work.

What should I do, and does anyone also know why DTV started charging mirror fees when it never did before for its long term customers from 1998?

And slick (but legal) advice is always welcome.

[JimSpence]

Well, I've been a customer since 1996 and have always paid a mirroring fee. But, you are probably a grandfathered Primestar customer, which is why you have no mirroring fee. Only DirecTV can tell you whether you lose all of that or will only have the fee on new receivers.

You can't easily diplex OTA with the MPEG4. Your solution is to use 4 high frequency splitters and feed two WB616 (6x16) multiswitches. Your single wire rooms will need an extra cable run and you'll need to run a separate line for OTA.

If I may ask, why so many receivers?

[newsposter]

I have a friend thats from primestar too. She always told me she cant change anything on her system or things would cost a lot more.

can you tell me how you got hr20s as owned ? were they replacements under warranty?

[staci]

Thanks Jim and News,

Yes we are an old PS customer. Running now another 2 lines for those Single drop locations is prohibitive.

Thats why we "poped" for 4 of the Smart Stackers. That solved the problem . Now that DTV is adding new progrtamming that isnt compatable it puts me in a pickle.

I understand that the SS212 arent HD, but I feel they should still work with a R-10 or R20.

The only thing I can think of that might work would be to have DTv place a 3 LNB dish next to the 5 LNB and feed the standard recievers from that. The only problem is that there are still only 4 lines between the dish and the MS's. And these 4 lines are in a sheetrocked ceiling.

Is there and "diplexer like thing" that could feed both 5 and 3 LNB on the same drop and then split them b4 they hit the MS's.


Just thinking out loud here.

And Jim , we normally have about 14 recievers going , with 2 spares sitting on the shelf

All 5 Bedrooms, , Gym, LR, FR, Theatere room has 2 DVR's, Office, and the pool house

[JimSpence]

You might still be able to use the SS212s if you use them for the MPEG2 sats. Get a 4x8 multiswitch and connect to the 6x8. This will block the MPEG4 frequencies (I hope) and allow the use of the SS212s.
Of course, you'll only be able to use them on non-MPEG4 receivers.

I'll let others reply to this speculation.

You might want to think about sharing a couple of receivers to the rooms/areas. I'm sure you don't have all of them tuned to different channels at the same time.

[staci]

Jim,

Am I hearing you right....

I would not need to put in a 3 LNB dish.

I could keep the current 5 LNB KA/KU dish feed 2-x16 WB MS (via 4 WB PP Splitters). Come off one of those 5x16WB into a old 4x8 and feed the 4- SS212's from there into the R-10's ?


If that would work, things would be awesome.

[JimSpence]

I believe that will work. But, others here should verify it.

[emania]

Jim is correct, you can still have all your single wire legacy DVRs working with diplexed OTA if they are hanging from your old stackers - the stackers would be attached (4 wires?) to the new multi-switch (6xN) up to the 5LNB dish - the HR20s would need to be directly connected to the new multiswitch - They would not be able to receive OTA via a diplexer, and I'm not sure which single wire system works with the HR20 (i know there is one), but if you need to pull one new one for the OTA, you may as well pull two (or dual wire)....

the 6x8 multiswitch would serve the purpose, but leave you no room for expansion, or replacement of the old units. better to go bigger in this case 6x16 (under $200 retail) - the next size up is quite expensive (approaches $500 retail)

I found some more here: http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=62299