Bad signals on 4 of 32 transponders

[wirwin]

I was getting really bad pixellation when watching a show (actually it was unwatchable) while other channels were OK, so I went to the setup menu where you can check the signal strengths of the different transponders.

Of the 32 transceivers, most showed a signal in the 90+ range, and it was stable. On a couple of transceivers, it was stuck at zero - maybe some are not used?

But on 4 transponders, the signal would jump up and down between 0 and about 90, every couple of seconds.

I have another HDVR2 in the house, using the same multi-switch and the same dish. On that one, none of the transponders exhibited the unstable signal.

I checked cable connections and can't see anything that appears loose. I have also noticed the unit doing a reboot a couple of times (over a period of weeks).

Is this a sign my Dtivo is about to bite the dust? (Seems odd that only 4 transponders would be affected - I mean all the transponders use the same hardware, right?)

[gsr]

Not sure if it's related to your problem, but I just noticed that my Tivo's were reporting "Searching for signal on satellite 1...", so I checked the satellite signal strength. All is well EXCEPT that all of the odd transponders on the 119 satellite are giving me a signal strength of zero.

The 4 coax wires from the integrated multiswitch on my dish go to a set of satellite rated 2 way splitters. From each splitter, 1 line goes to a Spaun 5x12 multiswitch in my basement and the other line goes to a Terk 5x8 multiswitch in my family room. Tivo's hooked up to both multiswitches are giving me the same odd transponders out on 119.

I powered down both multiswitches and then plugged them back in with no change.

I did some rewiring that I finished up about a month ago - no wiring has changed since then, so I'm assuming there's either a problem on DirecTV's end OR I have equipment failure somewhere in the chain. I suppose there's also a somewhat remote possibility that a coax cable has developed a problem, but I think that's less likely.

Ideas are welcome.

[John T Smith]

>satellite rated 2 way splitters

Everything I've ever read on this forum says that you may NOT use a splitter

[gsr]

>satellite rated 2 way splitters

Everything I've ever read on this forum says that you may NOT use a splitter

Splitters can be used to drive identical inputs to multiswitches. This is what I'm doing.

Splitters CANNOT be used to take the output from a multiswitch and drive 2 receivers.

[rbtravis]

I was getting really bad pixellation when watching a show (actually it was unwatchable) while other channels were OK, so I went to the setup menu where you can check the signal strengths of the different transponders.

Of the 32 transceivers, most showed a signal in the 90+ range, and it was stable. On a couple of transceivers, it was stuck at zero - maybe some are not used?

But on 4 transponders, the signal would jump up and down between 0 and about 90, every couple of seconds.

I have another HDVR2 in the house, using the same multi-switch and the same dish. On that one, none of the transponders exhibited the unstable signal.

I checked cable connections and can't see anything that appears loose. I have also noticed the unit doing a reboot a couple of times (over a period of weeks).

Is this a sign my Dtivo is about to bite the dust? (Seems odd that only 4 transponders would be affected - I mean all the transponders use the same hardware, right?)

In all likelyhood your LNB is going bad or maybe one of your cables is going out. try reversing SAT1 and Sat2 and see if the problem moves. If the problem moves its probably the cable else replace the LNB

[rbtravis]

>satellite rated 2 way splitters

Everything I've ever read on this forum says that you may NOT use a splitterSounds like someone is intermixing dish network equipment on directv. splitters are Dish Network equipment, a different system.

[Marc]

On my DirecTV setup, I also had splitters used as gsr described above: four splitters used to split the four lines from the dish into two parallel 4x8 multiswitches. This is apparently a standard way to hook up multiple multiswitches in parallel.

That said, I encountered the exact same problem as the OP. It turned out that one of my multiswitches went bad. I had the protection plan from DirecTV, so I called them and they sent someone out who replaced the broken multiswitch.

[JimSpence]

It would help if you posted which TPs are fluctuating.

BTW, on 101 the spot beam TPs are 4, 12, 18, 20, 26, and 28. These will be zero, very high or somewhere in between depending on where you are in the beam.

[gsr]

It looks like I've figured out my problem and it's not exactly good news, at least financially. I spent some time today to confirm that everything was wired properly. When I started, things had escalated a bit - the 119 odd transponders were still out, but all of the 110 transponders were also out (all 3 of them).

To summarize, I have 2 multiswitches connected in parallel using splitters rated for DirecTV satellite use. I have a Spaun 5x12 in the basement and a Terk 5x8 in the family room.

As part of the process, I disconnected the inputs to the Spaun SMS 51202 multiswitch. When I did this, everything came back in the family room. I plugged the lines back into the V/LOW H/LOW inputs on the Spaun multiswitch and all was still good. I then reconnected the lines into the V/HIGH H/HIGH inputs and the 119 odd and 110 transponders went back out again in the family room. I then disconnected the V/HIGH H/HIGH lines again and everything was good in the family room again.

So, it looks like my Spaun multiswitch most likely has a problem and will need to be replaced. This presents a bit of a quandry as I wasn't planning on replacing that one any time soon as I still use the OTA antenna feed that it diplexes into the signal in several rooms. I was planning to replace the Terk multiswitch as I'm planning to switch to the new dish and get one of the new DirecTV DVR's so I can get the new MPEG4 HD channels. Since I don't need HD satellite channels anywhere but the family room (the other rooms only have HDVR2 DirecTivo's in them), I can probably limp along with things as they are for a while as very few channels will be lost in the other rooms in the house.

Sorry for hijacking this thread - my problem initially seemed similar enough to the original poster's problem that starting a new thread didn't seem to make sense. Clearly, based on what I've found we have very different problems.

[rbtravis]

Now that GSR is finished hijacking this thread, what happened to wirwin? was his problem solved?:confused:

[wirwin]

Now that GSR is finished hijacking this thread, what happened to wirwin? was his problem solved?:confused:

I'm back! (And I have no splitters, so we can set that aside.)

I tested it again last night and the following transponders are exhibiting the problem (more than I observed previously):

15, 16, 17, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28

In all of these, it is 'Satellite Input 2' which is showing it. Input 1 is always good.

There is no signal at all on 4 and 18 (either input).

I will try the suggestion of switching the input cables and see if the problem moves.

On the suggestion of an LNB going bad;wouldn't that show the problem equally on both inputs? And wouldn't it affect my other HDVR2 equally? (Maybe this is pointing towards a cable problem, but I wonder how a bad cable could affect only some TPs.)

Thanks for the suggestions so far.

[gsr]

I'm back! (And I have no splitters, so we can set that aside.)

I tested it again last night and the following transponders are exhibiting the problem (more than I observed previously):

15, 16, 17, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28

In all of these, it is 'Satellite Input 2' which is showing it. Input 1 is always good.

There is no signal at all on 4 and 18 (either input).

I will try the suggestion of switching the input cables and see if the problem moves.

On the suggestion of an LNB going bad;wouldn't that show the problem equally on both inputs? And wouldn't it affect my other HDVR2 equally? (Maybe this is pointing towards a cable problem, but I wonder how a bad cable could affect only some TPs.)

Thanks for the suggestions so far.

If the problem is only affecting 1 tuner on one of your receivers, then it's highly likely that you have either a bad cable between your multiswitch and that tuner OR that tuner is bad. Swapping the cables at the DVR end will give you your answer - if the problem moves to the other tuner, then you've got a bad cable, if the problem stays with the same tuner, then you've got a bad tuner (which strikes me as more likely).

[freakfactory]

I'm back! (And I have no splitters, so we can set that aside.)

I tested it again last night and the following transponders are exhibiting the problem (more than I observed previously):

15, 16, 17, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28

In all of these, it is 'Satellite Input 2' which is showing it. Input 1 is always good.

There is no signal at all on 4 and 18 (either input).

I will try the suggestion of switching the input cables and see if the problem moves.

On the suggestion of an LNB going bad;wouldn't that show the problem equally on both inputs? And wouldn't it affect my other HDVR2 equally? (Maybe this is pointing towards a cable problem, but I wonder how a bad cable could affect only some TPs.)

Thanks for the suggestions so far.

Are you using SVideo on the unit that is giving you grief? Try changing it to composite to see if that fixes the issue. Some units have an issue with Tuner 2 when SVideo is connected.

[wirwin]

I swapped the cables on the two satellite inputs, and the problem remained with tuner 2. So it would seem I have a bad tuner. (thanks gsr)

I also tried disconnecting the s-video output (which I use exclusively) and tried it on composite. The problem goes away. So it would seem my bad tuner is caused or exacerbated by using s-video (thanks freakfactory).

Naturally I can't live with composite for long, so I guess I need to trawl craigslist and e-bay for a replacement. I am guessing this is a hardware problem of some sort, not likely to be fixed by a new version of software.

(This is a puzzling fault to be sure. A tuner (input) that is affected by an s-video output? I don't see the connection, but I suppose it could be some piece of s-video circuitry drawing enough power to mess up an adjacent circuit somehow....

Also, how can a bad tuner work perfectly for 20+ transponders but fail miserably on the other 8? Transponders differ by - what - frequency of their signal? I'm no EE, but this is curious.)

[rbtravis]

http://www.ccscorporation.net/dss.htm
is who you contact if you want it fixed. Fast and reasonable. Good Luck :)

[Pauli]

I swapped the cables on the two satellite inputs, and the problem remained with tuner 2. So it would seem I have a bad tuner. (thanks gsr)

I also tried disconnecting the s-video output (which I use exclusively) and tried it on composite. The problem goes away. So it would seem my bad tuner is caused or exacerbated by using s-video (thanks freakfactory).

Naturally I can't live with composite for long, so I guess I need to trawl craigslist and e-bay for a replacement. I am guessing this is a hardware problem of some sort, not likely to be fixed by a new version of software.

(This is a puzzling fault to be sure. A tuner (input) that is affected by an s-video output? I don't see the connection, but I suppose it could be some piece of s-video circuitry drawing enough power to mess up an adjacent circuit somehow....

Also, how can a bad tuner work perfectly for 20+ transponders but fail miserably on the other 8? Transponders differ by - what - frequency of their signal? I'm no EE, but this is curious.)
The S-Video connector issue is a known problem -- there are many, many reports of it here and it is simply fixed by using the composite connector. Most,if not all, report that they see no difference in video quality by going with the composite connector instead of the S-Video connector, so that is your simplest, long-term solution.

[wirwin]

The S-Video connector issue is a known problem -- there are many, many reports of it here and it is simply fixed by using the composite connector. Most,if not all, report that they see no difference in video quality by going with the composite connector instead of the S-Video connector, so that is your simplest, long-term solution.

My display device is a projector to a 92" screen, which tends to magnify any shortcomings of the video quality. (Even s-video doesn't look too good on it, and composite seems to have more 'ghosting' and general fuzziness.)

I see used ones showing up on craigslist for $45-$65 so I may try that, if I can find one that doesn't have the problem.