Can I relocate my Dish HD Receiver (VIP222)?

[Neon01]

Hello all, first time poster here, been reading through the forum for a little while and gotten lots of great info. I'm a Dish Network subscriber currently with 2 HDTVs and 2 SDTVs. I have a 722 running my main HDTV and bedroom sdtv, and a 222 running an HDTV in my study and SDTV in my basement.

The wife and I have decided to upgrade the small SDTV in our bedroom to an HDTV, so I need a receiver in there. Rather than leasing another receiver, I realized I don't watch much tv in my study, so SD signal will be fine on that HDTV, and I'll just move the 222 to our bedroom. Of course, this will also require rerouting both secondaries, since currently the bedroom is running as TV2 on the living room 722. I didn't really want to pay dish $99 just to do this unless its really non-trivial. I'm pretty tech savvy so I figured I'd at least make an attempt.

The guys that installed dish just used my existing cable tv wiring to set it all up. I'm pretty sure that the Rf cables are all connected through splitters to the outside. Is moving the 222 into the bedroom as simple as plugging it into that wall connection and moving the RF receivers for the remotes in line with the correct TV2 for each receiver?

Your help is appreciated.

 

[TheKrell]

You can very likely do this yourself and save yourself the $99. Nevertheless, it's nontrivial because installers make use of 2 devices that may look like splitters but which are not. Connecting them all up correctly is a little confusing, but it can be done.

The thing that looks like a splitter on the back of each receiver connected to the two satellite tuner inputs via 4" cables is called a "DishPro Plus separator." Leave those where they are (on the back of each receiver) when you are moving things around. That part is easy.

Now for the confusing part. The other things that look like splitters, but which are not splitters at all, are called "diplexers". They always come in pairs. These allow you to run RF TV signals over the same cable as your satellite antenna signal. They were originally designed to combine the satellite antenna feed with a conventional OTA antenna. But with Dish Network "Duo" receivers, they are often used instead to backfeed the TV2 output to other TVs. This is probably what your installer did to feed your bedroom and basement SDTVs.

So, in order to move your study 222 into your bedroom, you are going to have to locate at least 3 of your diplexers, figure out what they are doing, and recable everything to do what you want. It's a bit of a puzzle, but I'd say if you're tech savvy then you'll regard it as a challenge and get it done in no time.

 

[Neon01]

You can very likely do this yourself and save yourself the $99. Nevertheless, it's nontrivial because installers make use of 2 devices that may look like splitters but which are not. Connecting them all up correctly is a little confusing, but it can be done.

The thing that looks like a splitter on the back of each receiver connected to the two satellite tuner inputs via 4" cables is called a "DishPro Plus separator." Leave those where they are (on the back of each receiver) when you are moving things around. That part is easy.

Now for the confusing part. The other things that look like splitters, but which are not splitters at all, are called "diplexers". They always come in pairs. These allow you to run RF TV signals over the same cable as your satellite antenna signal. They were originally designed to combine the satellite antenna feed with a conventional OTA antenna. But with Dish Network "Duo" receivers, they are often used instead to backfeed the TV2 output to other TVs. This is probably what your installer did to feed your bedroom and basement SDTVs.

So, in order to move your study 222 into your bedroom, you are going to have to locate at least 3 of your diplexers, figure out what they are doing, and recable everything to do what you want. It's a bit of a puzzle, but I'd say if you're tech savvy then you'll regard it as a challenge and get it done in no time.

Thanks, that's what I was looking for. I see what you mean about the diplexers. I figured there had to be something to splice in the Rf channel that's heading to the TV2 via the Rf cable. However, it looks like all of this is simply on the back of each of the receivers, as I don't believe they installed anything in the walls. The back of the receiver has a network of separators and such that split the cable line many times. I wonder if the diplexer is simply on the back of that. Is there another place these are traditional positioned?

 

[boba]

Diplexers are used in pairs so there are 2 on the cabling going to your 722 and 2 on the cabling going to your 222. 1 Diplexer for each receiver is probably near the receivers but you will have to hunt through your system to find the other half.