Got my 622 yesterday: First impressions...

[ChetK]

First of all, let me say that I've never owned a PVR before.

HOLY COWLIMOLEY!!! This thing kicks serious buttocks! It is such an exhilarating feeling to be able to pause live HDTV, and time shift!

It didn't take me long to hook it a up since I already installed a DP34 and had two lines ran from it to where the receiver is now sitting. I had printed out all of Scott's screenshots in his review thread to follow everything that he did and it helped confirm things like check switch and screens I should see along the way.

I fired it up and it downloaded the latest software (took maybe 10 minutes). However, I never made it to a functional screen as Scott did in his review. After going through all of the set up, it now gives a prompt that the receiver is not functional until calling Dish Network (and their phone number). So, I used my cell (because I thought the receiver might need to do some dialing) and called the number and went to "tech support". The dude knew everything to do. He was very helpful and he answered every single question I had with full accuracy. We added locals (for channel guide info), I already had my OTA antena pluged in so we were good to go. He confirmed everything as it was happening. We even chatted about our kids (he has a 9 month old, I have a 10 month old) and how they have developed (all during down time due to computer things). I thought it was kinda neat. He even asked me if I wanted to keep my current receiver active. I did and he told me about the additional receiver fee (very knowledgable about their offerings). All in all, it took about 30 to 40 minutes on the phone, but that's not a big deal as it was a good experience. He even went through what my new monthly payments would be. Nice guy!

As for the 622 itself, I love it. We recorded The Sopranos on HBOHD, Lost on OTA ABC and American Choppers on DSCHD while we switched over to the DVD player to watch King Kong. When KK was done, I flipped back over to the 622 and watched The Sopranos and this morning I watched American Choppers before coming to work. I could never do that before. Good stuff. My wife will probably watch Lost tonight minus the commercials.

There is a couple of things that I haven't figured out yet:

• There are a lot of times that I'm prompted to go to Live TV. I guess that's because there's only one OTA tuner and I'm recording something on another OTA channel. Hopefully this will become more of a non-issue once E* adds HD locals in my area.
• I am trying to figure out the difference between the Dish Pass and simply selecting a program in the guide and adding it to "PVR" with "New Episodes". Can anyone help here?

One last note regarding HDPPV: I've been wanting to catch The Island on HD-PPV, but I never knew when it would be coming on because the old 6000 receiver only looked about 30 minutes into the future , but, with the 622, I can now see a whole week in advance. So, I scrolled through (or maybe I did a search for it, I can't remember), chose one for Sun. evening, it asked me if I was sure I wanted to buy it, I said yes, and then it allowed me to put it in PVR mode. So now I get to record it and watch it whenever I want. :up

All in all, I am very happy with my purchase (I'll go ahead and give DishStore.net a plug because I'm very happy with their price, expertise, communication and fast shipping!)

Also, I should give a shout out to the folks on this forum who made it very easy for me to figure out the DP34 install and help me become knowledgable about check switch and how to handle the activation, etc. This forum has helped tremendously and, without it, I probably would not have purchased the 622. But I'm glad I did. THANKS!!!

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I fired it up and it downloaded the latest software (took maybe 10 minutes). However, I never made it to a functional screen as Scott did in his review.

The software is different now then when I got mine. I understand that by pressing cancel on your remote will get you past that screen.

Enjoy it, its a great receiver.

 

[datwell]

Yup. We just love our 942 for the same reasons! We'll be calling for our 622 on 4/1!

BTW, try CSI Miami or War of the Worlds or some such in HD - WOWSER!

--Doug

 

[ChetK]

The software is different now then when I got mine. I understand that by pressing cancel on your remote will get you past that screen.

Yeah, I figured it was the new software. No biggie really. I'm pretty sure I hit cancel and it didn't do anything, but it might have been guide I was hitting. Either way, I never got past that screen until I called E*.

Enjoy it, its a great receiver.

Thanks! I will!

 

[ChetK]

BTW, try CSI Miami or War of the Worlds or some such in HD - WOWSER!

--Doug

Hi Doug,

Well, we've had HD before, so I'm fully versed in how great it is, but I've never been able to time shift anything in the past (SD or HD).

I will say this about the receiver though. I believe that the picture quality is actually better with the 622 than with the 6000. I had to adjust the 6000 brightness levels in the receiver itself. The 622 levels are nice right out of the box. I don't even know where I'd go to change that in the menus right now anyway.

They may have also made improvements in the MPEG2 decoders since the old 6000 receiver. The picture quality seems a lot crisper and a tad cleaner. Of course, that means I'll be able to more clearly see the macroblocking when there's not enough bandwidth. MPEG4 is yet to be seen, but I'm glad this receiver will be able to handle it. That definetly swayed my decision to buy it.

 

[dfergie]

The Mpeg 4 HD locals look pretty good on my 622 and the picture seems much sharper/better than my 921...

 

[ChetK]

So has it been confirmed that the HD Locals are, in fact, in MPEG4? I thought E* was having troubles with their MPEG4 encoders.

That's great news if it's working. Why not go ahead and put ESPN2, the additional 5 Voom channels and Universal HD in MPEG4?

 

[riffjim4069]

There is a couple of things that I haven't figured out yet:

• There are a lot of times that I'm prompted to go to Live TV. I guess that's because there's only one OTA tuner and I'm recording something on another OTA channel. Hopefully this will become more of a non-issue once E* adds HD locals in my area.
• I am trying to figure out the difference between the Dish Pass and simply selecting a program in the guide and adding it to "PVR" with "New Episodes". Can anyone help here?

60% of our recordings are OTA. We purchased a Sony HD DVR (ATSC/QAM) that helped elliviate the space problems and conflicts. However, we now have HD LIL here in the Washington DC area that also takes care of the conflict problem. Houston HD LIL should should take care of your problem as mentioned. FYI: our 720p stations (ABC, FOX) look ok (a little soft), but we're having lip sync and trailing/stuffering video problems with our 1080i stations (CBS, NBC). HD LIL may come in handly once in a while, but so far the encoders can't touch OTA.

Personally, I avoid Dish Pass (read too many complaints). I simply select a show and set the desired timer options. It's a piece of cake and the timers have worked flawlessly on the 942 and 622.

One last note regarding HDPPV: I've been wanting to catch The Island on HD-PPV, but I never knew when it would be coming on because the old 6000 receiver only looked about 30 minutes into the future , but, with the 622, I can now see a whole week in advance. So, I scrolled through (or maybe I did a search for it, I can't remember), chose one for Sun. evening, it asked me if I was sure I wanted to buy it, I said yes, and then it allowed me to put it in PVR mode. So now I get to record it and watch it whenever I want. :up

Yes, the 9 day EPG rocks! Just set it and forget it.

 

[riffjim4069]

So has it been confirmed that the HD Locals are, in fact, in MPEG4? I thought E* was having troubles with their MPEG4 encoders.

That's great news if it's working. Why not go ahead and put ESPN2, the additional 5 Voom channels and Universal HD in MPEG4?

I think the current MPEG-4 encoders suck...they still need serious improvement!

 

[dfergie]

The only comparison I have since My Cbs local is absent (Krqe) is between my Fox, and Nbc from D*HD and their Mpeg4 counterparts from E* and the E*versions knock the socks off of the D* version PQ wise... there are occasional audio synch problems though...But I watched a Earl last night from last week downrezzed to a Replay from D*HD and it had synch problems too....

 

[Kaydigi]

There is a couple of things that I haven't figured out yet:

* There are a lot of times that I'm prompted to go to Live TV. I guess that's because there's only one OTA tuner and I'm recording something on another OTA channel. Hopefully this will become more of a non-issue once E* adds HD locals in my area.
* I am trying to figure out the difference between the Dish Pass and simply selecting a program in the guide and adding it to "PVR" with "New Episodes". Can anyone help here?

Personally I would stay away from new episodes. Because some shows aren't marked as new when they are. This isn't Dish's fault it's whoever supplies them the guide data.

I would set up a Dish Pass but beware sometimes shows changes names. An example would be Survivor; the finale for the show is always called something else like "Survivor-Finale Episode Grand" and the Dish pass may not catch that.

Take your time and set up test recordings and you'll probably fall into your groove in no time.

 

[ChetK]

Cool. Thanks for the advice. It is dually noted. :up

 

[dlsnyder]

Personally I would stay away from new episodes. Because some shows aren't marked as new when they are. This isn't Dish's fault it's whoever supplies them the guide data.

I would set up a Dish Pass but beware sometimes shows changes names. An example would be Survivor; the finale for the show is always called something else like "Survivor-Finale Episode Grand" and the Dish pass may not catch that.

Take your time and set up test recordings and you'll probably fall into your groove in no time.

I've noticed that they do this alot for programs that are repeated on the same channel on the same day, like the Friday night lineup on Sci-Fi channel. The first airing of the episode carries the "new" designation, but any subsequent airings on the same day do not. IMHO they should mark all airings of that episode as "new" as long as it airs on the same day. If the episode is already recorded from an earlier showing it should not record it twice.

 

[gbjbany]

my 942 works that way. If i say new it only records the first one.
if i say skip it, to avoid a conflict, then it records the second occurance, etc. BBC america is a big culprit of 2 or 3 times a day, and really poor descriptions. And DVR /watch that more than most channels.

 

[ChetK]

Thank God I only have HD channels. I sure would hate to have to manually edit long lists of re-occuring SD programs. It's bad enough with HD programs. It wouldn't be that big of an issue if I could store more than 30 hours of HD content.

By the way, when I spoke to that nice guy in tech support, I asked him when he thinks the hard drive option for transfering stored HD content will be turned on. He said he thinks it will be very soon and that he has seen it functioning already. I made sure he knew I wasn't talking about transfering photos and he confirmed he knew what I meant. That's pretty good news I think.

 

[Kaydigi]

By the way, when I spoke to that nice guy in tech support, I asked him when he thinks the hard drive option for transfering stored HD content will be turned on. He said he thinks it will be very soon and that he has seen it functioning already. I made sure he knew I wasn't talking about transfering photos and he confirmed he knew what I meant. That's pretty good news I think.

That's the only thing stopping me from getting a 622, not enough HD space. I can't wait until the extra HD space is enabled.