Gave up on D

[hazmat626]

E installed yesterday and life is good at the crib. Last year during the Fox dispute I switched to D. Man what a mistake that was. I know some will say I told you so and they were right. There are several reasons for me coming back to E. But the one that's most important is the Wifey hated the switch from day 1. After not reading anything on sat guys for almost 8 mos. I am happy to see E employees reading and replying to people's comments and concerns. Good job Dish Network.

 

[ZachS@DISH]

Welcome back, if you need any help let one of us know.

 

[bearfan4]

For someone that may be thinking about switching to D*, what did you not like about it? What did you miss about Dish?

 

[mdavej]

I also had D* for a long time and was satisfied overall until recently. Pros are MRV, sports, PPV, OnDemand, lower cost if you have lots of receivers, and really good deals for new customers (triple the savings Dish currently offers). Cons are about 30 few national HD channels including many of my favorites like AMC, BBCA, E!, TCM, HLN, etc. All the missing HD content was the main reason I switched to E*. I miss MRV, but am very happy with the switch otherwise. I like being able to record 4 things at once on one box (2 OTA and 2 Sat). Couldn't do that with D*. You can also get by with fewer boxes thanks to Dish's Duo receivers/DVRs.

 

[nuttz565]

E installed yesterday and life is good at the crib. Last year during the Fox dispute I switched to D. Man what a mistake that was. I know some will say I told you so and they were right. There are several reasons for me coming back to E. But the one that's most important is the Wifey hated the switch from day 1. After not reading anything on sat guys for almost 8 mos. I am happy to see E employees reading and replying to people's comments and concerns. Good job Dish Network.

Im in the exact same boat as you. I switched to D when the fox dispute was going on last year. I stuck it out for 9 months but came back to E last week. I was having problems with pixelization and had 3 techs out and none of them could figure it out. I'm actually glad though because that gave me a " valid " reason to come back. I can honestly say though that I'm so glad to be back with E and will be here for the long run

 

[hazmat626]

For someone that may be thinking about switching to D*, what did you not like about it? What did you miss about Dish?

CONS for D...Guide menus confusing and cluttered with ads. Constant problems with MVR feature. And as mdjavej said HD content lacking.
Pros for E... Setting up favorites lists. Menus easier to navigate. Remote easier to operate. Easier to schedule recordings.

 

[peano]

For someone that may be thinking about switching to D*, what did you not like about it? What did you miss about Dish?

The HRs are dead slow bug filled receivers that they make worse with each new firmware version.

 

[whatchel1]

The HRs are dead slow bug filled receivers that they make worse with each new firmware version.

I'd heard that the HR-24's were pretty good but the others were dogs.

 

[Blackloz]

The HR-24 I got about 1 week ago is way, way better then my HR-22 and almost as good as my Bell9242 (Vip622) almost being the key word here.

 

[nuttz565]

The HR-24 I got about 1 week ago is way, way better then my HR-22 and almost as good as my Bell9242 (Vip622) almost being the key word here.

Ya and what's amazing about that is D's latest and greatest receiver is almost on par with a receiver(622) that has been out for like 3.5 years. While I was with D I thought the hr24 was actually decent, but to think that Vip's have been around for a while now and they still stand up against any dvr out there is saying something.

 

[Blackloz]

Well I would have to agree with that. Echostar makes the best equipment in North America period.

 

[KAB]

Ya and what's amazing about that is D's latest and greatest receiver is almost on par with a receiver(622) that has been out for like 3.5 years.

5 years.

 

[DodgerKing]

Ya and what's amazing about that is D's latest and greatest receiver is almost on par with a receiver(622) that has been out for like 3.5 years. While I was with D I thought the hr24 was actually decent, but to think that Vip's have been around for a while now and they still stand up against any dvr out there is saying something.

Almost on Par? Even their older DVRs can do many things and probably more total things than the Dish DVRs, even if they are slower, particularly with networking

 

[lparsons21]

Almost on Par? Even their older DVRs can do many things and probably more total things than the Dish DVRs, even if they are slower, particularly with networking

Well, that certainly may be your opinion, but I've read way too many that don't agree with you on that. I left D* a few years back solely because of the dog-slow operation of the HR series at the time. Now I see that D* still sends out those same dog-slow HRs to new installs and some are reporting that the HR24 is getting slower. For those of us that look at the 2 services at times to contemplate switching, that doesn't bring up warm and fuzzy thoughts...

I've been in a look to see mood lately. Switching to D* loses me the excellent HDDVRs of E*, loses quite a few basic HD channels that I do watch on a fairly regular basis, and get to pay more for it than I do with Dish. Heck, it isn't even a huge savings over the 24 months of commitment when you average out the monthly cost. There are only 2 things of potential value to me that switching would help with.
1. Slightly better HD quality, though the SD quality of D* is pretty poor.
2. MRV - this has some value to me, though not much.
3. OK, I said 2, but it is 3 - better management of recordings.

 

[DodgerKing]

It is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of fact. There are things that the HRxx's can do that the VIPs cannot, just as there are things the VIPs can do that the HRxx's cannot. When you total the number of features each does, the HRxx's do more, particularly with networking.

We have had many discussions about this many many times in the past. It has been shown that the HRxxs can do more in total than the VIPs. Where opinion plays a role are which of these features are important and which features one prefers.

 

[lparsons21]

...they also become important if you don't use them because of the overall sluggishness of most of the HR series. I found myself using damned little of the 'features' of the HR because the speed of response on the remote made them unuseable in any sane sense. All my opinion, of course.

I did back up my opinion of the sluggishness to the point of intolerable by cancelling DirecTV. I made a strong point that it wasn't the service/channels/billing crap, just pee-poor response that just got worse with every new firmware/software upgrade. Based on what I read now in the D* forums, I fully expect the HR24 series to be dog slow at some future time as the programmers learn better ways to write doggy software...

 

[mdavej]

D* hardware is fine. But the developers can't leave well enough alone. Just when they're operating at a somewhat tolerable speed, they break it with a new release. The 24 series can mask the inefficient code somewhat thanks to faster processors. But in all the years I had HR2x boxes, I got the impression that the developers don't really know what they're doing. Most the network related features they add work so poorly as to be unusable. TV apps are cool, but limited and slow. Media share has never worked well. Youtube is the exception. It's nice to have and seems to work fairly well. All the little DVR related enhancements, on the other hand, are great, and I wish Dish had them (1 button to record, 2 buttons to record a series, quick tune, bookmarks, skip to tick, boolean searches, group playback, etc.).

 

[Hemi 6.1]

It is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of fact. There are things that the HRxx's can do that the VIPs cannot, just as there are things the VIPs can do that the HRxx's cannot. When you total the number of features each does, the HRxx's do more, particularly with networking.

We have had many discussions about this many many times in the past. It has been shown that the HRxxs can do more in total than the VIPs. Where opinion plays a role are which of these features are important and which features one prefers.

I don't care what features you guys claim the HR's have over the others, They function like SH*&. And most of the HR' features require waiting for it to load at a snails pace. I think for a multi billion dollar company D* is piss poor at making receivers..

 

[nuttz565]

5 years.

Wow 5 years, well that makes the argument even harder to defend the HR's!

Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

 

[peano]

I'd heard that the HR-24's were pretty good but the others were dogs.

I have an HR24 and it used to be bearable (still quite a bit slower that a 722), but then they sent down new software that completely f'd it up and made it dead slow with blank screens on channel changes. I should not have to perform daily "triple reboots" just to make it function somewhat correctly.