Official - I have a Hopper 3 Thread!

Picture is sharper on 4k TV and 1080p TV.
Mine isn't, having same issue as several others, sort of "soft" looking almost like 720 instead of 1080, been fiddling with settings (it's just on one tv) still not as good as previous H2, or 2 other tv's (it's an LG,same brand others were complaining about?). will give it time, may switch boxes to see if it makes a difference.
 
I sold TVs and installed them as well for over 10 years and can barely tell. My dad shoots and edits film as well, he's also made some documentaries and he can't tell either.

For the record, we record 1080i but must send video to be broadcast in 720p.
We could save ourselves time in the delivery process by just shooting in 1080i, but I figure having more lines of resolution is better than less, even if no one can tell the difference.
I consider it a bit of future-proofing :)
 
I'm curious as to why that is.

There's only one cable outfit we send our stuff to that broadcasts 1080i. Everyone is is 720p. So we shoot/edit/archive 1080i (maybe under the notion that you can see a difference with the extra lines of resolution on a large tv), and create a second master at 720p for everyone else.
 
I'll chime in with my viewing experience. I've never been impressed with Dish HD service.

Late 2002 and 2003 I had the 6000 feeding a 50" Samsung DLP. It was good, but I had HD sample mpeg2 files that were incredible feed off the computer.

I've had about every succession of Dish HD receivers, minus the 921, eventually having a couple 722k with the dual OTA tuner. From there I had the H1, added a HWS, then now with the H3.

Dish has noticeably been delivering an inferior HD picture, when compared to what HD has been and could be. That is limiting most of my enjoyment of TV for the PQ attributes.

The H3 was installed last Friday the 5th. I watched some of "A Knights Tale" from HBO later on Friday. This movie has probably been some of the best HD I've seen delivered by Dish in ~10 years. I've noticed other programming bring more vivid, clearer and appearing with a higher resolution. Fifth Element on BBC(?) Saturday night looked much better than most anything I've seen lately too.

But as always, if it's garbage in it'll be garbage out, as seen by a majority of the other programming.
I have ku- and C-band FTA in the house feeding the same 55" Samsung LCD, so I can usually find some pretty damn fine looking HD material for comparison.

I have never seen a Dish HD PPV or OnDemand via Internet that looks to be even 480, always sub-dvd quality.

I'm more than satisfied with the Hopper 3 PQ, recognizing some material just isn't being delivered up to its potential.

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We had our install on Sunday . Called dish on Friday morning, CSR was excellent NO PROBLEMS at all. Equipment and install at no cost (customer since 1999) . Set an afternoon appointment, installer arrived about 12:45 and had all the right equipment. Install took about 3 hours using existing R6 in place. Hopper downloaded all software in about 30 minutes, installation of 4 joey software went smoothly. Very impressed with everything. So far hopper and joeys are impressive however, new hopper software will take a while to get use to. I must say that all my experience, over many years with Dish Network,has been excellent.
 
I had high end powerline connectors ($200 thingies) when I had a ViP 622. When I got the HWS, the powerlines did no better than 4 mbps while the built in wifi of the HWS smoked it. I mean smoked it.

I think wifi equipment has advanced so much since the introduction of the powerline solution.

I highly suggest you try the Hopper's wifi.
I do have the wifi connected and it is pretty good. Signal strength is 50%. Looking at upgrading wifi. Older Centurylink router just doesn't quite cut it.
 
I do have the wifi connected and it is pretty good. Signal strength is 50%. Looking at upgrading wifi. Older Centurylink router just doesn't quite cut it.
Yep...I found out a router can make a big difference. Got an 'N' router 2 years ago and performance really jumped. (I'm stuck with DSL 6 mbps)

I am looking to upgrade to an new "AC" capable soon.
 
I installed mine last night, called to process the "dishing it up", and got "I am sorry, Dash is closed at 12 pm Eastern".... (Dash is a special installer line). grumble grumble... I called in this morning and got it activated. So far so good, aside from a few hiccups, it is working fine. Side note, I do find it funny how Dish makes us work 365/year, but you work a hard day and try to activate after 9pm Pac time and they are closed...
 
I installed mine last night, called to process the "dishing it up", and got "I am sorry, Dash is closed at 12 pm Eastern".... (Dash is a special installer line). grumble grumble... I called in this morning and got it activated. So far so good, aside from a few hiccups, it is working fine. Side note, I do find it funny how Dish makes us work 365/year, but you work a hard day and try to activate after 9pm Pac time and they are closed...

I know the struggle. Retailers are required to provide service 24/7 yet retailer services only has to work regular hours.
 
Just upgraded from HWS & Joey 1 to H3 and 4k Joey yesterday. Install went pretty smooth (they added a second dish, dont know why when my only dish is SuperHD dish with all four satellites here in SoCal) and I was up and running in less than 3 hours. Installer was great, waited till software was downloaded, ensured my external 2TB HDD was connected and working and even set up connections to receiver etc. I am not sure if PQ improved or not, but it is nice to play with new system that is faster, UI looks modern. Everything seems to work so far well. Now bring 4k content already!!
 
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We want to hear how about your ordering experience?
Ordered directly through Dish. Quick and easy. No out of pocket expenses.
One Hopper, one 4k Joey, 1 wireless joey and one connected joey.

We want to hear about your install how did it go?
Very long time to install. Great tech who only installed one Hopper 3 before mine.
He arrived at 10am and left at 8pm. Added a second dish. Downloading of
new system was very time consuming. Painfully slow.
Dish needs to help speed up things for their techs..

We want to hear what the Techs did and upgraded at your house!
Tech added a second dish. Put in a new LNB on older dish. Tried to put
dishes on eastern Arc and put back on original western signal.

We want to hear your thoughts on the Hopper 3!

So far so good. Not use to new screen yet. My universal remote works
the same except the guide does not scroll as fast for some reason?
Love the 4k!!!!! All in all im pleased with it!

We want to hear what you would change about the Hopper 3?
Not sure yet...Need more time with the Hopper 3.
I do think i would have liked a second Hopper like my old set up.
So recordings from kids are labeled in a different room.
 
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We want to hear how about your ordering experience?
First attempt through DIRT thread didn't go well as they kinda shrugged and said I was looking at four satellites so it wouldn't work. Um, I look at 2 as far as I know based on what the check switch tests showed... Tried again with 1800333DISH and got through it in 15 minutes over the phone while they worked through some kinks in setting up the work order

We want to hear about your install how did it go?
Set it up for a 12-5 install slot on Super Bowl Sunday (gulp, no pressure) as slot was only one open for several days. Dish Tech (not a third party retailer guy), got there at 2pm and stayed for 2.5 hours. Worked neat and explained everything along the way. It was obvious he was a by the hour installer as he took the time to do it right. Big improvement over the old days when the guy was obviously being paid by the installation and had to fly to the next job as soon as possible so his paycheck didn't suffer.

We want to hear what the Techs did and upgraded at your house!
New 1000.2 dish and lnbs installed and ancient massive switch in my telephone closet removed and replaced with a few small ones that look they came from a radio shack (ie. simple). Unplugged a 722, 622, 621, and 211, and replaced with 4 joeys (1 kitchen TV had been fed off of the UHF output of the 722, now it has an independent tuner). All had external drives connected for aux storage.... Still haven't hooked them up... will try tonight and offload archived content to the Hopper3. I assembled and placed the Joeys while he worked on the Dish install. He told me to make sure that I didn't plug in the power on them until he gave me the go ahead... After the Hopper3 completed its initial software download (I have Fios Quantum which was showing throughput of 65 MBs on the Hopper... it took about 20 minutes). He hooked up the Joeys and it went fairly quick as each did their download. He was told he had to do a diagnostic check on the Hopper3 when all was done and got a weird error that said he had a low signal on on of the satellites.... He did a transponder check on most of the channels and they were all nominal, so it sounds like a software glitch.... I had the same thing on my 722 back in the day on the 77 satellite which didn't get much use as most of my channels were on 61.5 and 72, I believe...

We want to hear your thoughts on the Hopper 3!

I skipped the first two generations of Hopper, so it was a huge UI leap from the 722 generation I was familiar with.... The old boxes were often struggling to keep up with the datastreams as you would get some weird artifacts (action and sports scenes would slow down and skip frames every now and then). Those anomalies seem to have disappeared thankfully. I didn't care for the carbon ui look myself... Changed it to the light option and made the fonts bigger. Would love to completely kill the banner at the bottom like i was able to do previously. Autohop worked well on the shows I watched it on. You wound up seeing a few seconds of a network promo before the show resumed. Not as clean of a transition as my ad free Hulu plus subscription is, but still fine. Getting it to control my TV and receiver was surprisingly easy. Much better that the "let's try 50 Sony codes to find one that works"... I put in my projector model number and it came right up. Ditto for my AV receiver. Took about 30 seconds to a minute for the Hopper to wirelessly program my remote after each device was added.

We want to hear what you would change about the Hopper 3?
I'm hating on the tiny remote.... I prefer discrete buttons for trickplay functions... No page scroll buttons anymore. No Record button? You have to drill down a selection with the select button to do it. The side buttons are illegible in most light environments. As I use an AV receiver for my audio, I can control the sound but I have to switch to the AUX button... Any way to change it to the SAT stack of commands like I used to be able to do? Apologies if it is in the manual, I haven't seen it yet, I know I was able to do it with my 722 remote... Still need some tweaking time.... I'm not crazy about how it organizes recordings. I'm used to one master list popping up when I press the DVR button, now I have to drill down in some folders, it clutters quick with PrimeTime shows it records that I don't want (Is there a way to tell it to NOT record certain shows,... if not there should be?) Also the shows I do want get bunched in with the others. Do they get deleted after 8 days if I don't watch them by then, even if I set up a recurring timer for the show? Video on Demand is kind of wonky. It shows a current episode and then shows me seasons from two years ago that I can stream? Looks like I still have to go back to Hulu for that kind of thing.... Would prefer to have the option to NOT have to drill down on the Sirius channels with multiple key presses, but I guess with the page scroll going away they wanted to speed up the scrolling process. Favorite Primetime Big 4 shows should allow an optional star to be attached so that they don't get deleted at 8 days in case I am out of town on vacation...

Bottom line, I like having a whole house DVR, am nervous about storage capacity now that we went away from 4 receivers with EHDs and we would fill THOSE up, but we'll see, especially with the EHDs (can I hook up multiples, can I hook up all four I have now through a hub, or am I asking for trouble). Would love to see a better remote in the future (more buttons... the old design was better... if not, then at least make them back lit for ten seconds when a key is pressed... AA batteries are cheap, lets ramp up the usability. This is OK as a stripped down remote for the simple folks who couldn't get their VCRs to stop blinking 12:00, but power users need something more usable with single key presses doing most functions....
 
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