Why is the OTA module tuner so weak?

Gfretwell

Member
Original poster
Mar 9, 2016
14
1
florida
I have had 2 of them and I still have a lot of pixelation and drop outs on a couple channels. This also causes the signal loss screen on the satellite channels according to this forum.
Dish has been out, the 722 was replaced, the LNB was replaced on a signal loss call but it still fails and it does track the OTA being last on a bad OTA channel.

I have a deep fringe antenna, an amp and the stations are only 30 miles away. Performance is the same as using lesser antennas and no amp. The TV picture directly is perfect when the OTA is failing.
It does seem to pick on the PBS station the worst but it also fails on the CBS station occasionally.

Is there anything I can do or am I just stuck
 
My 612 has this bug. If the last OTA channel I tuned to drops out, it puts that signal lost screen up even if I am on a satellite channel. When is Dish going to fix this? The solution is to tune to a strong OTA channel and then go back to the satellite channel you were watching.
 
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broadcast signals are like waves on a pond. go toss a rock in a pond. it will create all sorts of waves.

some will cancel each other out, some will increase wave height 2 or 3 times.

sometimes you can move a antenna higher, lower or move a few feet to get better operation..

this is why OTA antenna installers sometimes walk the roof with another person looking for signal strength on desired channels

incidently this occurs to all types of radio waves, and is why cell phones have dead spots that you can repeat ... in otherwise great signal areas.
 
My 612 has this bug. If the last OTA channel I tuned to drops out, it puts that signal lost screen up even if I am on a satellite channel. When is Dish going to fix this? The solution is to tune to a strong OTA channel and then go back to the satellite channel you were watching.

Has been that was always. It also makes it take awhile to tune in an OTA channel that does have a signal, but if you don't wait long enough it looks like it too has no signal.
 
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Indeed, a deep fringe antenna with amp 30 miles from the towers is like shooting rats with a Bazooka. 30 miles from the towers should almost be doable with a coat hanger on a strong station. Please take the amp out of the loop and try again.
 
I started with a very modest antenna and it was really bad, then I kept bumping it up to where I am now. My PBS stations ch 30.x still only show 60 on the signal strength. When I look at it on the TV directly the picture is perfect.
The PBS is on the same tower as more than half of the other stations. VHF and UHF There are only 2 towers here for all of them.
If this was actually overloading the tuner, I would expect to see more than 60.
On my TV I can see all the stations with that wire loop you used to get for free with a portable TV. I can't get anything to work on the Dish unit with that.
 
If this was actually overloading the tuner, I would expect to see more than 60.

I have a UHF station about 1mi from me so I know what of I speak. What you are reporting (60) is not actually a signal strength, but rather an inverse digital error rate. When the error rate goes up for whatever reason, including overloading the tuner, then the numbers will go down.

What happened when you take out the amp?
 
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I had the same problem with an ota module in a 222k. I swapped out the module and had same results. I finally concluded there was something wrong with my receiver. It would run real hot with module in it. I connected ota directly to TV and it gets all channels perfectly.


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I understand that software issues might cause problems with an OTA module installed in a 722K. I don't know if recent software updates have corrected this, but my wife is afraid to set DVR events on an OTA channel because it tended to screw up the recordings other timers set on satellite channels. One of the reasons we bought the OTA module was so we could record two sat channels as well as at least one OTA channel simultaneously. Of course, that was years ago.
 
I understand that software issues might cause problems with an OTA module installed in a 722K. I don't know if recent software updates have corrected this, but my wife is afraid to set DVR events on an OTA channel because it tended to screw up the recordings other timers set on satellite channels. One of the reasons we bought the OTA module was so we could record two sat channels as well as at least one OTA channel simultaneously. Of course, that was years ago.
My parents are on my 2nd DISH account and they have the 722k and they are at a "moved" service address. Now we use a diplexer to turn the clip on antenna to do both sat and ota. It has worked well for me for years I have the same set up at my house on a 2nd sat dish running to my turned off 211k to power it for just ota .

But my parents have a two story home on either side of them and a huge tree in the back yard of the house directly across from the sat dish. I ended up going with eastern arc lnb and repointed and reaimed the dish so they get great signals on their satellite channels, with no reception problems that were caused using western arc and that damn tree in the neighbors yard. But here is the rub. They get comparable strengths as mine on their ota signal on ABC, NBC, and FOX. But of course they want to watch their local CBS station for their news. That channel comes in at 70 - 75 strength and often crashes and causes break ups and no channel. I get it around 100 strength at my house down the road.

I think that one channel is being blocked due to the 2 story houses and the huge tree. Except that the same signal is split to their tv as well. The hd Phillips tv is doing just fine with no break ups on any channel. My dad has often watched it instead of the sat receiver due to the break ups. I even replaced the ota module in the 722k and it made no difference. I repointed the Terk 44 omni directional clip on antenna and it can get better signal on CBS ,but they lose the Fox station and the strengths on the ABC and NBC station will go way down to around 75 - 80 strength. Mean while the tv never loses signal on the ota tuner built in . So I have to imagine that the older 722k ota module is not as good as it should be. It might be just older technology that doesn't work as well as the tuner in the newer tv.

I have a new antenna coming Tuesday that is an real stand alone antenna and a dedicated line run so we can do ota on its own with out the diplexer thing. I hope this will fix the problem. I also have a 4 tuner Tivo coming for just ota- got it from Best Buy using my reward credits . If it works with the Tivo and doesn't lose the CBS station ,they can just use the Tivo for their own local stations and keep the Houston stations for the news they like to hear from the big city. I used to live in Houston for a year back in the early 90s and I hated watching their news; due to the murders/robberies that were so prevalent. I tried to get them to upgrade to the Hopper and get their own locals and my dad say NO WAY for the $15.00 dvr fee. So if this doesn't work they are just out of luck.
 
My parents are on my 2nd DISH account and they have the 722k and they are at a "moved" service address. Now we use a diplexer to turn the clip on antenna to do both sat and ota. It has worked well for me for years I have the same set up at my house on a 2nd sat dish running to my turned off 211k to power it for just ota .

But my parents have a two story home on either side of them and a huge tree in the back yard of the house directly across from the sat dish. I ended up going with eastern arc lnb and repointed and reaimed the dish so they get great signals on their satellite channels, with no reception problems that were caused using western arc and that damn tree in the neighbors yard. But here is the rub. They get comparable strengths as mine on their ota signal on ABC, NBC, and FOX. But of course they want to watch their local CBS station for their news. That channel comes in at 70 - 75 strength and often crashes and causes break ups and no channel. I get it around 100 strength at my house down the road.

I think that one channel is being blocked due to the 2 story houses and the huge tree. Except that the same signal is split to their tv as well. The hd Phillips tv is doing just fine with no break ups on any channel. My dad has often watched it instead of the sat receiver due to the break ups. I even replaced the ota module in the 722k and it made no difference. I repointed the Terk 44 omni directional clip on antenna and it can get better signal on CBS ,but they lose the Fox station and the strengths on the ABC and NBC station will go way down to around 75 - 80 strength. Mean while the tv never loses signal on the ota tuner built in . So I have to imagine that the older 722k ota module is not as good as it should be. It might be just older technology that doesn't work as well as the tuner in the newer tv.

I have a new antenna coming Tuesday that is an real stand alone antenna and a dedicated line run so we can do ota on its own with out the diplexer thing. I hope this will fix the problem. I also have a 4 tuner Tivo coming for just ota- got it from Best Buy using my reward credits . If it works with the Tivo and doesn't lose the CBS station ,they can just use the Tivo for their own local stations and keep the Houston stations for the news they like to hear from the big city. I used to live in Houston for a year back in the early 90s and I hated watching their news; due to the murders/robberies that were so prevalent. I tried to get them to upgrade to the Hopper and get their own locals and my dad say NO WAY for the $15.00 dvr fee. So if this doesn't work they are just out of luck.

Are you on WA? EA tends to put the clip-on at a sharp angle to your broadcasters. I would get the antenna pointing in the right direction first.
 
Are you on WA? EA tends to put the clip-on at a sharp angle to your broadcasters. I would get the antenna pointing in the right direction first.
We were on the western arc for years till the neighbor's oak tree started covering the reception of the satellites. So I moved them to eastern arc the sat problems went away. The ota reception has always been iffy on channel 6 CBS.


Just to add to this, I did a recent email to a contact I have at Echostar, that deals with our locals in this area and he confirmed something for me. The sub channel of this main CBS channel is the CW. We had had numerous audio/video problems with the Satellite version of the CW for our local area. I wrote him an email to ask him to research the station and see what was up. He wrote back that our CBS channel 6 had been transmitting at a lower power signal for the Cw , which was causing problems for the satellite version of the Cw as well. So I wonder if this would explain why the CBS channel can come in at 75 to 100 strength -depending on what tuner you use. On the Vip receiver I get 75 at the most. On my hopper ota usb tuner, I get 100 strength. Either way I have a new antenna coming tomorrow and I hope that this weekend I can try it out and see if I can get a better strength on this channel.
 
He wrote back that our CBS channel 6 had been transmitting at a lower power signal for the Cw , which was causing problems for the satellite version of the Cw as well.
If it's a subchannel, the broadcaster can't dedicate less power to it. It should be the same power as the primary. What they CAN do is change how much bandwidth is available for each subchannel. Maybe that's what he's referring to?
 
If it's a subchannel, the broadcaster can't dedicate less power to it. It should be the same power as the primary. What they CAN do is change how much bandwidth is available for each subchannel. Maybe that's what he's referring to?
How can you tell if the broadcaster is changing the bandwidth between their channels?
 

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