How does a dish receiver decide which transponderto use?

[thegrod]

I was using a DISH 500+ aimed at the Western Sats; 110,119, and 129 and also 61.5 on a seperate Dish 500 so I could get my Syracuse, NY locals. Back when this was installed there were line of sight issues and everything I wanted in HD was not availble on 72.7 as it is today. I just had an Eastern Arc 1000.4 installed and it works fine. I seem to have all channels from before. So that's the good news. The old Dish was not taken down on purpose and by request so that I would have it through the winter since it was in a better spot for snow removal but 129 is weak and does pixelate at times. So it is a backup. Since 77 has nothing I need on it now it was disconnected at the install. Since I have two available ports and the 3 Sats cables availbale right by the DP44 switch I hooked up 119 and 129 just to see if everything would work and my "back-up" could just be installed full time. So now I have a blend of signals coming from all 4 Sats: 61, 72, 119, and 129. I get everything and the info button depressed twice confirms that all 4 sats are "in play".
My question is: How does a dish receiver (this is a 722 and I also have 222's) decide which transponder to use? Signal strength, random, or what?
Thanks for any insight.

 

[Tampa8]

I have something similar to you, 110/119/61.5/72. In another thread some of us including a Dirt team member did some tests and I think we all came to the same conclusion. The receiver will look at the lowest numerical sat first and go up from there.

So on my system any channels that exist on more than one sat will come from 61.5, then 72, then 110 then 119. This past Winter when we had about two feet of snow fall and the EA dish was covered constantly, I would get any channels available from 110/119 instead. For some reason to this day, HBO (the main 300 channel) most often is coming from the 110 sat, I don't really know why. Every so often USA on 105 will be off 110 as well. Perhaps after the update when a sat check is done those transponders are weak and not immediately seen?

 

[thegrod]

Thanks for the reply but I am not actually seeing that situation. I was having trouble getting nonpixelated CNBC or the Weather channel wwhen my only SAT was 129. When just 61 and 72 were installed then 72 did a fine job. When I just added 119 and 129 the receiver chooses 129 even though 72 is still available and maybe more stable. When I did the initial check dish after adding the last two 119 was listed as a "feed" rather than a single LNB. Not sure what that actually means other than that the LNB is that eye type with a 118 and 119 output port whears the 129 is a single LNB to the side I believe.

 

[Tampa8]

Cover over 129, see if the receiver will now pick channels from 72 that are also on 129. If not, something seems wrong, if it does, I am not sure why it isn't picking 72 over 129.

In my other set-up I have the WA complete, with 72 as a back-up. Sure enough, with 72 in there, the receiver always takes same channels from 72/129 from 72 first. Take out 72 and it will take 129.

 

[thegrod]

I have the dishes on my roof so they are not as easy to get to but I do have quick easy access to the dpp44 switch. If I pick a channel that is on 72, disconnect that Sat, then I can see if it defers to 129 without going through the check switch setup.

 

[Pepper]

If it's doing that then they have seriously improved the software in recent years. Last time I had a mixed arc setup, it seemed to randomly pick one or the other (usually whichever one had the lowest signal level) but nothing would get it to change once it had picked.

 

[TerriT]

which transponder to use?

My question is: How does a dish receiver (this is a 722 and I also have 222's) decide which transponder to use? Signal strength, random, or what?
Thanks for any insight.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for posing this question; I have been curious about this for quite some time!