DirectTV Question

[DaDeuce]

Hey Guys, I'm purchasing my first home this week and I am planning on going with satellite TV. I've got some questions that I can't seem to find straight answers to when I am trying to compare Direct & Dish.

-For the recievers, do I have to hook them to phone lines? Can I hook them to ethernet instead? Do Need to hook up all to phonet/net or will just 1 suffice?
-Apparently you can turn the Dish HD boxes into DVR just by pluggin a Hard Drive into them? Is this possible with Direct?
-Can I record OTA broadcasts through the reciever like you can with Dish?-Do I need multiple cable outlets to get dual Tuners? My house only has one coax cable ran to each potential TV location.
-I currently envision haveing HD DVR's in two rooms (Master bedroom & Living room) and SD in our office and Future theater. If in the future I want to move the a HD DVR from the master to the theater, but still have HD in the master, I should buy a HD reciever now instead of swapping it out later, correct? If I swap it out it will re-up my commitment?-How reliable are Direct's recievers? I keep hearing horror stories about recievers going out and commitments getting extended whenever they swap one out.

Thanks guys

 

[jdspencer]

All DirecTV HD DVRs can have external hard drives added to increase capacity (the internal isn't used in this case). A phone line isn't required. The HR20 DVR has an ATSC tuner (2) built in for OTA recording. The other HR2x boxes need the AM21 external tuner to allow OTA recording. If you order at least enough receivers to get over 5 tuners (DVRs have 2) then they will install the SWM dish, which allows the use of a single cable. However, this dish only allow a total of 8 tuners.

Future changes could restart any commitment.

 

[DaDeuce]

Another question, can I stack the referral, AAA, and Amex discounts/promotions?

 

[jdspencer]

I have no idea about stacking promotions. Give DirecTV a call and ask.