Home - Hopper and RV - Wally options.

[CookieMonster]

Hello, all!
New to the forum and would introduce myself. I'm certainly not a pro nor a novice either. When talking mini-dishes, I always pride myself on having one of the first Hughes Directv systems on a self install kit. (Brother-in-law was an employee).

But anyways, I found the answer to my first question here and thought I'd post a follow-up. That first answer was that the Wally receiver that I bought for my RV - with the mobile antenna, will not work when connected to my home system

Oh, well. Got to accept that and move on to options. Right now at home I have the Hopper 3 system - 1 hopper and one Joey. Things like DVR and mobile dvr/anywhere options are not important to us. I'd like to add the wally to my home system when at home and either return my Joey or upgrade to 3 receivers (or more). I say maybe more because when the college kids are home for the summer, they may want to pay for having a receiver in their room. We primarily watch one tv.. The 2nd one in my study is just for the man programming (car shows and is used 3-4 hours a week. Like I mentioned earlier, the bedrooms could possibly get one added for a period of time, but they seem content to Netflix it via Roku most times.

So here are my options as I see it please confirm/critique my thinking
1) Do nothing. 2 receivers at home and 1 in RV. If adding to home, get more Joeys (more cost).
2) Use the Joeys as-is (or delete one) and wire my mobile antenna at home where I can use the wally inside. I think I already have a 2nd circuit to the outside and my Playmaker tested out fine near my regular dish.
3) Convert to all Wally's. Is this even possible? Would I change out the LNB on my dish, return my Hopper/Joey's on rent and buy the Wally's?
4) Other suggestions?

Thank you so much for the first answer above. Even if I don't get this one answered, at least it got me to stop trying to get the wally to work where I'd swapped it in for the Joey.

 

[Jackonearth]

Hello, all!
New to the forum and would introduce myself. I'm certainly not a pro nor a novice either. When talking mini-dishes, I always pride myself on having one of the first Hughes Directv systems on a self install kit. (Brother-in-law was an employee).

But anyways, I found the answer to my first question here and thought I'd post a follow-up. That first answer was that the Wally receiver that I bought for my RV - with the mobile antenna, will not work when connected to my home system

Oh, well. Got to accept that and move on to options. Right now at home I have the Hopper 3 system - 1 hopper and one Joey. Things like DVR and mobile dvr/anywhere options are not important to us. I'd like to add the wally to my home system when at home and either return my Joey or upgrade to 3 receivers (or more). I say maybe more because when the college kids are home for the summer, they may want to pay for having a receiver in their room. We primarily watch one tv.. The 2nd one in my study is just for the man programming (car shows and is used 3-4 hours a week. Like I mentioned earlier, the bedrooms could possibly get one added for a period of time, but they seem content to Netflix it via Roku most times.

So here are my options as I see it please confirm/critique my thinking
1) Do nothing. 2 receivers at home and 1 in RV. If adding to home, get more Joeys (more cost).
2) Use the Joeys as-is (or delete one) and wire my mobile antenna at home where I can use the wally inside. I think I already have a 2nd circuit to the outside and my Playmaker tested out fine near my regular dish.
3) Convert to all Wally's. Is this even possible? Would I change out the LNB on my dish, return my Hopper/Joey's on rent and buy the Wally's?
4) Other suggestions?

Thank you so much for the first answer above. Even if I don't get this one answered, at least it got me to stop trying to get the wally to work where I'd swapped it in for the Joey.

You can actually get the Wally to work at home with your Hopper, you just need to install a second dish for one or more Wally receivers. You can buy another home dish online for less than $100.
With that said, you'd be better off using Joeys for each additional TV in your home and deactivating the Wally in your RV when you're not using it. Remember that regardless if you own or lease each receiver, you'll still have to pay $7 per month for each additional receiver, whether it's a Wally or Joey. Since the Joeys let you do everything the Hopper can do while the Wally can't do anything that the Hopper or Joeys can, the Joey is a better addition to the Hopper system and you won't need a second dish at home for additional Joeys.

 

[Bobby]

What Jack says is correct to some degree depending on how your H3 is presently configured. If you have a hybrid LNB what he says is exactly correct. If you you have a DPP LNB with a 42 switch you don't need a second dish, just a cox directly from the dish to the Wally location. All that said, keep in mind that a Wally integrated into your Hopper system is just a standalone receiver. You won't be able to watch recordings or set timers from the Hopper. If it were me, I'd simply buy the Wally and activate it when I am in my RV and deactivate it when I'm not, as Jackonearth suggested. Add Joeys as need in the home. This way it will only cost you $7 a month extra when you are on the road. It is prorated at that so, if you are on the road for 2 weeks, you would pay about $3.50.

 

[navychop]

When shifting dishes, don’t forget to run Check Switch. You might do it twice, if need be: Once with coax disconnected, and again after connecting to the “new” dish.

 

[CookieMonster]

I think this is the DPP if I compare it to something on ebay. Not the hybrid. Only one cable out to house. How would I know for sure? I think that I understand it now... It just becomes a matter of ecomics. I have another year and a half with the dvr for $10 a month before it becomes $15. So as long as it's not a big pain to start/stop service on the Wally, I think that the only time it would make sense to use it would be to temporarily add another receiver at home (kid home for summer) which would save me from adding then returning a Joey. Right? So the more I talk about it... the less it seems worth it to put too much effort into it.

 

[Jackonearth]

View attachment 132537
I think this is the DPP if I compare it to something on ebay. Not the hybrid. Only one cable out to house. How would I know for sure? I think that I understand it now... It just becomes a matter of ecomics. I have another year and a half with the dvr for $10 a month before it becomes $15. So as long as it's not a big pain to start/stop service on the Wally, I think that the only time it would make sense to use it would be to temporarily add another receiver at home (kid home for summer) which would save me from adding then returning a Joey. Right? So the more I talk about it... the less it seems worth it to put too much effort into it.

That's a Hybrid dish. You can tell by the "DPH" on the sticker in the picture. "H" is for Hybrid. If you had a DPP dish with a switch, there would be two cables from the dish to the switch.
It sounds like your best option would be to buy a Joey and activate and deactivate it as needed. You won't need to install a second dish this way.

 

[CookieMonster]

Thank you. And yeah, that's dissappointing. I think you meant activating and deactivating my Wally. My ideal solution would be to put the Wally in my den and return the Joey. Then I'd just take the Wally with me when we take the camper... It's easily accessible in both places. But if it's going to cost me a bunch to save that $7 a month, then it's really not worth it From what I read, i'd either have to do a complete 2nd dish or change out the LNB/switch, and that may be risky if I get something wrong... So it's not adding up at the moment. Right now I'm leaning to just doing the activate/deactivate as needed. It's a little bit inconvenient since I do the RV mostly a long weekend at a time, but it's not terrrible.

 

[Bobby]

No, this is really simple. All you need to do is purchase a Joey for your kid's room and activate it when home and deactivate it when away. The same would go for your RV Wally but in reverse. The only cost to you is for the Joey. It's less than $80...

Amazon product ASIN B079BBVKJJ

 

[Jackonearth]

Thank you. And yeah, that's dissappointing. I think you meant activating and deactivating my Wally. My ideal solution would be to put the Wally in my den and return the Joey. Then I'd just take the Wally with me when we take the camper... It's easily accessible in both places. But if it's going to cost me a bunch to save that $7 a month, then it's really not worth it From what I read, i'd either have to do a complete 2nd dish or change out the LNB/switch, and that may be risky if I get something wrong... So it's not adding up at the moment. Right now I'm leaning to just doing the activate/deactivate as needed. It's a little bit inconvenient since I do the RV mostly a long weekend at a time, but it's not terrrible.

No, I didn't mean activating and deactivating your Wally. I meant buying a Joey for your home and activating it when you need it and deactivating it when you don't. You wouldn't need a second dish or a switch this way. In fact, you wouldn't need to modify your dish setup at all. Adding another Joey to your home is much easier than adding a Wally. And since you can activate and deactivate both the Joey and the Wally as needed, there's no benefit to installing a Wally in your home instead of another Joey.

 

[CookieMonster]

Yeah, I get it. Was just trying to simplify to avoid flipping service all the time. I will definitely be at least shutting down the wally all winter while the campgrounds are closed.... But just for fun.. has anyone noticed that the Wally seems about twice as fast as the Hopper? Being that we don't use our DVR at all... I'm going to leave moving to 2 wally's and replacing my LNB as an option. Will wait till my wife gets a chance to use it, but it goes to the guide as soon as you hit the button and flips pages instantly as well. Our hopper crawls through this function and it's frustrating.

 

[pattykay]

3) Convert to all Wally's. Is this even possible? Would I change out the LNB on my dish, return my Hopper/Joey's on rent and buy the Wally's?

Yes, this is possible. I have a three-Wally system, and that works well for me. Keep in mind that with three Wally receivers, the total monthly fees would only be $14 ($7 for each additional Wally, with no fee for the first one, and no DVR fee) compared to the regular-priced $22 in fees ($15 DVR + $7 Joey) that would come with your Hopper system + $7 for each month you add the Wally, for a total of $29 in fees. (Yes, I realize you are currently getting the promotional rate on the Hopper.) Obviously, the savings would be even more than that if you deactivate the additional Wally receivers when they are not in use.