HP z552 DVR

[bjdotson]

I have a triple LNB directv dish that goes to two receivers. One upstairs and one downstairs. I recently won (haven't received yet) a z552 Digital Entertainment Center. It's basically a media edition PC-DVR with dual tuners so it does not have a satellite receiver built in. I would like to hook up my dish so that I can use both tuners on the DV. The wiring for both receivers are in the walls so even if I did move the receiver that is downstairs to upstairs, the wiring would be problematic. What is the best way for me to hook up both receivers to the dual tuners of the DVR

 

[damaged]

Normally with DVRs with receivers built-in:

If the two existing receivers are not dual tuners, then I assume there is only one coax running to each of the 2 tuners, in which case, you have 2 free outputs from the dish you can use, just run those two extra outputs to each tuner of the new dvr.

If the 2 existing units are dual tuners, and have 2 coax going to both, then you will need a cascadable 4x6 multiswitch to get the 2 extra runs.

Now you say the DVR has no sat tuner:

So you will need 2 receivers to feed the 2 dvr inputs to take advantage of dual tuner features, or you can split off from the receiver (from the cable that runs from a receiver to the TV input) and have that one receiver feed the same signal to both dvr inputs, but you won't be able to use the dual tuner features.

 

[bjdotson]

Mr

what would be accomplished by splitting the signal so that the same signal would be at both tuners

 

[damaged]

The problem is that the receiver has one input and one output. As I understand it, running the cable straight from the dish to the DVR will not accomplish anything since the signal needs to go to a receiver and the DVR does not have a satellite receiver built in.

Updated the info in my post as you typed this, scroll up and re-read it.

Basically you need to take a coax from the dish, plug into directv receiver, then the output from the receiver into the input of the dvr, then dvr to TV, if the dvr has 2 inputs for tuners, then you'll want 2 receivers total, (one per coax to dvr connection OR split the output of one receiver as described in my prior post).

You can also have one D* receiver to dvr on one of the dvr tuners, and on the other one, put cable or OTA.

 

[hdtvGeek]

You will still have to change channels via the STB. Some of the Directv STB's have a serial cable interface that will allow the media center PC to change the channel or else you would need an IR blaster.

You might want to check out an HTPC forum for more specifics on hooking up/using a Home Theater PC. One example is http://www.htpcnews.com/

 

[bjdotson]

Mr

Thank you for thinking about my problem. I was hoping for an easy way to split the one output from my receiver to both tuners so that I could watch one channel and record another, but I guess that is not possible. The wiring for my dish was done by a professional installer and comes out of the wall, upstairs and down. I could move the downstairs reciever to upstairs, but that would leave me without satellite tv downstairs and I would still have to figure out how to change the wiring to get it to the upstairs. I guess I'll have to just use the one tuner and forgo full funtionality at this time.

Thanks again for trying

Brent