Is there a hardware guide?

[nwflyboy]

Sounds like you want the Hopper, just contact a DIRT (Dish Internet Response Team) member here at the forum, there names are in red and they can be found on the link that shows the staff. They can help you upgrade to a Hopper/Joey. The Hopper/DVR fee is $12 per month and the Joey is $7.

Thanks, you posted as I was replying to above.

Do you need a Joey for every TV, including the one adjacent to the Hopper, or does that TV just pull directly from the Hopper (in other words, is the Joey only needed for additional TVs/TVs that are not co-located with the Hopper)?

If so, it looks like we're looking at 1 Hopper + 1 Joey = $19/month (TV#3 could continue to pull from its dedicated 211k). If not, then $26/month. Hmmm.

We would be losing our 722...would we get a credit for that? The charges on my monthly bill are not broken out in much detail, but there is a $7 monthly charge for "HD Receiver" which I'm thinking might be for the 722?

 

[ChadT41]

Hd reciever is the 211k. You are not being charged for the 722. Your $7 DVr service charge would disappear, and be replaced with a $12 hopper charge. So $19+7.

 

[nwflyboy]

That is correct as long as it is purchased. No other leased equipment other than hopper and Joey. Up to 2 purchased 211 family recievers. I'm gonna guess his 211k is not owned. It's leased.

Your guess is correct. None of the Dish gear is owned.

In that case, does the 211k need to go, and would need to be replaced with an additional Joey?

 

[ChadT41]

Correct. So 2 joeys and 1 hopper would be your solution. That's $26 total for reciever costs. Compared to $14.

 

[KAB]

In that case, does the 211k need to go, and would need to be replaced with an additional Joey?

If you want whole home DVR sharing, yes you would want it to go, and welcome a Joey.

 

[nwflyboy]

Cool. So a net increase of $12/month (that's for 1 Hopper + 2 Joeys, feeding 3 TVs - one TV plugged directly into the Hopper, and two in other rooms connected to Joeys), that would get HD programming to TV#1 and TV#2 (and potentially TV#3 if/when it gets replaced with an HD-capable screen), preserves our current flexibility in terms of separate tuning/recording & watching live/recorded programs, with the additional minor benefit of enabling the viewing of recorded programs on TV#3 (which we don't have currently).

Assuming all the above is correct, then it sounds like the right solution.

We've been getting charged $10/month for Blockbuster At Home which we don't really use, so we could drop that and then it's just 2 bucks a month increase, which I could live with. I will probably have a couple questions about small details which I will append to this thread.

This forum, and the useful info provided by its helpful members, is one of the reasons I have been satisfied with Dish. Many thanks to all who have helped educate me once again.

 

[ChadT41]

I find it amazing how much more people like dish, when they understand all of it's values and components. It seems the ones who really fight against it, only have a very very basic knowledge of how it works. But they are educated in other fields they think correlate directly. ie software engineers and programmers. Although helpful, it is slightly different, and can change your entire perspective.

 

[nwflyboy]

Honestly, a non-trivial portion of my customer satisfaction with Dish comes direct (pardon the expression) from this forum and being able to get honest, useful answers to questions. Don't know how typical that is, but it is (or should be) worth something to the corporate overlords. Just sayin'.

 

[KAB]

Honestly, a non-trivial portion of my customer satisfaction with Dish comes direct (pardon the expression) from this forum and being able to get honest, useful answers to questions. Don't know how typical that is, but it is (or should be) worth something to the corporate overlords. Just sayin'.

It is. That is why Dish has dedicated a handful of choice employees, know here as DIRT to help us when we need it. They are invaluable, and I thank Dish for making it possible. Directv seems to want nothing to do with a similar scenario, as they have been lobbied unsuccessfully many times by this site's owner, Scott G.

 

[ChadT41]

Haha. @Scott Greczkowski the dish forum savor. Haha. Jk.

 

[KAB]

Haha. @Scott Greczkowski the dish forum savor. Haha. Jk.

Would you care to elaborate on that comment?

 

[nwflyboy]

OK, so now some questions about little details...(before this gets threadjacked...)

1. Our existing 722 has (I think) a 500GB internal hard drive (mostly full, like all hard drives). I believe that a replacement Hopper would have a 2 TB drive, which is a nice increase. Is there a simple way to transfer existing recordings from the 722 to the Hopper? I'm guessing that the easy way would be to plug in an external drive to the 722 before the upgrade, copy everything from the 722 to the external drive, then plug in to the Hopper and copy back all after installation. Yes? Of course there's this...

2. Currently, I have a 1.5 TB (IIRC, I believe it's 1.5 TB) external hard drive (mostly full) attached to our existing 722 via USB. Can I assume that after upgrading to a Hopper that I can simply plug, play, and archived programs will be accessible/transferrable to the Hopper? Or are there complications? I could locate an unused external HD for the transfer purposes, so would need to be able to plug in 2 different drives. They would not both need to be connected to/accessible from the Hopper at the same time, of course (IIRC, you only are allowed one external HD plugged in at a time, but it was/is still OK to connect more than one drive, as long as you only do one at a time - I assume that has not changed, correct?). Any other surprises to expect there?

3. Regarding commercial-skipping: I see what appears to be legalese that says (my bolding) "You can instantly skip commercials in primetime TV – ABC,CBS,FOX and NBC with PrimeTime Anytime™ feature"....which implies that one can not skip commercials during other programming. What's the operative definition of "skip commercials" here? Our existing 722 allows us to jump ahead (I think) 30 seconds (and jump back, I think, 15)...that's what we call skipping commercials (and it's one the greatest inventions since the wheel). Has this feature been killed/restricted (due to some lawsuit/licensing agreement), or is that same jump ahead/jump back function still always available? Is this referring to some other, additional function that is only enabled for "PrimeTime Anytime" (which is probably not something we would use much, since we don't watch much of that stuff)? I would be pretty bummed if the skip ahead/skip back function was gone.

4. How many different programs can be recorded simultaneously with a standard Hopper/standard Joey? It says "up to 8" but only with a Super Joey, and doesn't say how many with a non-super Joey. We would have 1 Hopper + 2 Joeys.

Thanks again!

 

[KAB]

Ehds used on 722s are completely compatible with the Hopper, and function identically.Two can be connected at one time.

With "instantly skip", you are referring to Auto Hop, which, if chosen, will automatically skip commercials recorded from the four networks (with pending execption of ABC, who has contractually demanded a three delay on the feature). You can skip, reverse, etc all other networks like you do now.

PTAT uses one tuner to record all four network channels, leaving two others...four with Super Joey.

 

[ChadT41]

Would you care to elaborate on that comment?

It was in Reference to the previous post about Scott trying to get directv to do something similar to dirt. We all know Scott does a load of great things for us, and although a joke, was also pointing out that he is a 1 man rock band.

 

[nwflyboy]

Nice - so I can easily reuse my existing 1.5 TB EHD (and retain the recordings on it) by simply plugging in to the new Hopper. Good.
The Hopper allows the use of two EHDs simultaneously? That's good to hear. Sounds like I would be buying a new EHD before the upgrade: copy stuff from the old 722 to the new EHD, then plug both my existing and the new EHD into the Hopper. Cool.
By the way, what's the largest size EHD volume now supported? Still 2 TB?

Sounds like "Auto Hop" is something new (and it requires no manual button pressing), not a replacement for the existing skip forward/skip back functions. Not a feature I'm likely to use, but the feature I love hasn't been disabled. Good.

Sounds like PTAT is special case for recording. Leaving PTAT out of it, am I correct in assuming that with my proposed configuration (1 Hopper and 2 Joeys, all standard, 3 TVs), I could record (at least) two separate programs at a time? I assume there would be 3 separate tuners, one for the Hopper and each Joey (so each of the 3 sets could be watching something different)? Right?

Thanks again.

 

[ChadT41]

Outside of ptat, you can do three individual functions. Whether it be record one watch two, record two watch one or record or watch all 3. During ptat, the four locals are recorded using one tuner. So you can record the big 4, plus still have 2 tuners free to do with what you please. Best part the tuners are not fixed tuners like your current set up. They are active based on the order you turn your tv on. So there is no more such thing, as a tv1 or tv2. It changes everytime it's powered on or off. And you can join tuners with another room. That's pretty handy if you are like me, doing homework in my office, and going back and forth to the living room, I can have both TVs on, and on the same tuner.

 

[TheKrell]

Correct on all counts. The Hopper has 3 satellite tuners. If you add the OTA dongle, that makes 4 (tuners). Some people who want to record a lot of stuff off satellite at once may find the 4-at-once Big Four networks of no use, and run out of tuners. In that case, you can substitute a Super Joey for a regular Joey and gain 2 more sat tuners. Regular Joeys cost $7/mo, while the Super Joey costs $10/mo.

 

[bigjohnok]

It is. That is why Dish has dedicated a handful of choice employees, know here as DIRT to help us when we need it. They are invaluable, and I thank Dish for making it possible. Directv seems to want nothing to do with a similar scenario, as they have been lobbied unsuccessfully many times by this site's owner, Scott G.

that has to do with numbers of customers Dish has 14M customers give or take a few Directtv has 20M customers, so its a wise decision on Dish's part to try and be more proactive in customer support.

 

[KKlare]

The PTAT function does not need to be enabled but if it is for even 1 day and 1 network, then you can record or play any or all 4 majors on any day using 1 tuner. I move it so that PTAT is never recording, just the channels and times I choose, when I want. Yes you can do that any time of day. PTAT applies only for 7 to 10PM (8 to 11 ET/PT).

You can use any size self-powered HDD from 50GB (ha!) up to 2TB, larger may work but are limited at some point of directory entries, nominally 1000 but I have 1500 on some and may be pushing it. An HD recording is about 2GB/hour, more for OTA with no sub-channels and less than 1GB/hr for SD. I recommend 2TB. Loss of a disk is major but putting recordings on multiple drive is a problem too, just more, smaller failures.

Generally transfers go smoothly but maybe 1 to 2% are problems and may not transfer one way or the other. I now have ~135 awaiting (forever) transfer to EHD from the internal 2TB, of which the user can store 1.2 TB. (Always remember the drive makers use 1000^4 bytes/TB while we use 1024^4 for the TB term. So a 1TB driver holds only 931GB.) Never enough drives and I have nominally 18TB.

For Auto-Hop you will be asked if you want to do it, to make it the user's choice and not Dish's. It will clip out the commercials with perhaps 1 to 2 seconds showing except the final trailer being unclipped.

If doing it today I would go with the SuperJoey as the extra tuners help especially as Dish now tries to record the overlap for back-to-back recordings on different tuners. With Joeys in place you may not have enough tuners.
-Ken

 

[dwarren2]

Don't think this has been posted. A great feature of the Hopper is that it backs up info to the remote. So if the dvr fails, when you replace it, you can restore all your timers and if you have the ota module, all your local scanned channels. No longer do you have to write down your timers and reenter them.
The Hopper will support 2 ehd's at a time.
Do you travel? If so, get the Hopper with Sling. That way you can use Dish Anywhere to watch your dvr. With my old 722 with Sling Adapter I was able access my ehd while using DA. That feature, they called it a bug, was dropped with the Hopper.
You can also transfer programs to a tablet. What I gave done is get an IView tablet that has a mini hdmi port. Using a cable I can connect to a hdmi port on a tv and mirror DA to the TV. Worked great when the wife and I were on vaca at the end of June. We were able to watch our local news instead of the news where we were staying.
If you have 3 tv's you would need 1 Hopper and 2 Joey's. For your sd tv, the Joey has composite out's.