DVR Question

[bobbowski]

Quick question:
I don't know what kind of dish I have. I also don't know exactly what kind of multi switch I have but i think it is a 6x8. I had HD awhile ago but the signal was bad because of trees, etc. When I had Directv come out last year to upgrade my whole house, they told me because of the poor signal I couldnt go HD. No big deal. They gave me a couple of regular receivers for the extra tvs and all was good.

I decided I wanted to add another DVR to a tv that currently only has 1 cable coming from the multi switch to the tv. I really don't want to drill another hole into the house to run the second cable to the back of the DVR. The only thing I want to be able to do with this DVR to is pause and rewind live tv. I have no requirement to tape one show and watch a second or anything like that. Do I have any options besides running a second cable? Cable splitter right before the DVR? Pretty sure this is a no. Another multi switch right before the DVR? Not really familiar with them so I don't know.

Thanks for any help.

 

[DAS]

In the settings you can set a dvr to work as a single tuner which should do what you said you wanted.

 

[jdspencer]

You really need to give us the exact dish/LNB you have now. And the DVR model.

I suspect that you have the Phase III dish to receive the 101, 110, and 119 sats. Back a while ago HD was provided from 110 and 119.

Now, HD is on 99 and 103. If you have good signal strength on 101 you should be fine for 99 and 103.

So an upgrade to the Skimline dish with the SL3 LNB will work just fine.

 

[Lanarian]

Set it to Single Tuner in the Dish Configuration and you'll be fine.. Run the one cable you have to the Satellite In 1 connector. After you set it to Single Tuner, you get an error message about no signal on Tuner 2, with boxes with Green check marks and red X's, just click on Continue. For some reason (Known only to the engineering guys) the Single Tuner setting doesn't actually take effect until after you get the error message... which confuses the heck out of a lot of people.

 

[Mr Tony]

Quick question:
I don't know what kind of dish I have. I also don't know exactly what kind of multi switch I have but i think it is a 6x8. I had HD awhile ago but the signal was bad because of trees, etc. When I had Directv come out last year to upgrade my whole house, they told me because of the poor signal I couldnt go HD. No big deal. They gave me a couple of regular receivers for the extra tvs and all was good.

I'm confused...SD is on 101 and HD is on 99 & 103 so its very unlikely you can get SD but not HD...what are signals on 101?

 

[Mr Tony]

What does the dish look like?
a round dish with one eyeball?
a elliptical dish with 3 eyeballs?

how many receivers are you working with right now? If only 2 there shouldn't be a switch anywhere

 

[Mr Tony]

Back a while ago HD was provided from 110 and 119.

HD hasnt been on 110 for a few years now
119 only has Spanish HD and never really had English HD before that

 

[bobbowski]

The dish looks like an elliptical with 3 eyeballs. I now have 4 receivers in the house.

I am going to give the settings thing a try that sounds exactly like what I need to make this work. Thanks!

As for the whole HD / SD thing. When they installed back in 2006 or so, I had an HD Receiver, this was just before they had an HD DVR Receiver. The signal on the HD Receiver was always in the low to mid 70s. First sign of weather and I would lose it and half the time it wouldn't come back without some minor adjustment. It wasn't a big deal because at the time I had a SD DVR connected to the same TV. When I finally had Directv come out to upgrade the whole system in the house the tech told me that the signal for HD was too low and that HD was not an option. Something about some new rule that if the signal strength doesn't reach a certain level then install is not an option. Took him for his word since I've always gotten great customer support from Directv and its contractors.

Thanks for the help!

 

[cave1376]

Does the lnb, the thing that has the eyeballs, have one eyeball centered on the arm with an eye on either side or are two eyeballs set off to one side?

Does the dish have "SLIMLINE" on it?