PVR 921 No Longer Supported for New Activations????

[acruther]

I recently sold a PVR 921 to a guy and he said he was unable to activate it because it was not MPEG4 compliant. As far as I knew, I thought Dish wasn't going to MPEG4 until the end of the year and even then they were grandfathering existing HD receiver owners for a period of time.

I called Dish and they said this was incorrect - that they even issue new 921s. Does anyone know who's right???

 

[Mr Tony]

you can use a 921 for SD programming and OTA HD

You CANNOT get HD through Dish (locals, national stuff). You had to be grandfathered on the MPEG2 package (the old HD stuff like TNT, ESPN, Discovery, etc) to keep it.

I have a 811 and called Dish for fun today and they said I could activate it as a new/returning customer which they said I could. They even mentioned they are coming out with a "new version" of the 811 (AKA the 381 or something like that..there's a post on it)
SD through Dish
HD through OTA

 

[navychop]

And there's some MPEG-4 stuff out there now.

 

[acruther]

you can use a 921 for SD programming and OTA HD

You CANNOT get HD through Dish (locals, national stuff). You had to be grandfathered on the MPEG2 package (the old HD stuff like TNT, ESPN, Discovery, etc) to keep it.

I have a 811 and called Dish for fun today and they said I could activate it as a new/returning customer which they said I could. They even mentioned they are coming out with a "new version" of the 811 (AKA the 381 or something like that..there's a post on it)
SD through Dish
HD through OTA

Well that's not the answer I was hoping for!

So strange since I see a lot of PVR 921s sold on ebay these days. Are all the buyers getting hosed?

 

[dfergie]

Dish is converting the 921's they get back into model 781's for SD and OTA HD only...

 

[acruther]

Dish is converting the 921's they get back into model 781's for SD and OTA HD only...

So is there anything I can do with the 921 other than do an Office Space on it [PC Load Letter ]?

 

[Mr Tony]

it will work for SD programming through Dish and HD OTA

 

[Pepper]

A 921 or 942 basically serve now the same purpose as the 721 or 522, respectively - with about twice as much recording space and the OTA digital tuner. The 811 is equivalent to the 311 plus OTA.

That's about all those are good for. For those still into SD with no need for HD, I would think especially the 9xx DVRs would be more desirable because of the huge hard drives.

Exception to the above, you can add the old HD receivers to an already existing HD account and will get the old MPEG-2 stuff.

 

[Claude Greiner]

They will activate it with HD programming, you just need atleast 1 MPEG 4 receiver on the account subscribed to one of the new packages.

 

[Tom Bombadil]

This is not news. Dish quit activating 811s, 921s, and 942s for new HD customers on Feb 1, 2006. There were a few reports in the first few weeks after that date of people talking CSRs into activating them, but for the most part, the 921 has been out of the HD picture for new HD customers for nearly 6 months.

Excepting as Claude mentions, if you have a new 211/411/622 receiver and sub to HD programming, and have the 811/921/942 also activated on the account, then you should pick up the MPEG2 HD channels.

That said, Dish has been very low key about informing people on this. I think they should have prominent announcements about this on their web pages.

 

[Jim5506]

My understanding is that if you already have HD with a 211/411/622 you can add a 942/921 and you will be able to activate it with HD because you are an HD customer already. Of course - no MPEG4 or MPEG4 wannabe channels.